Gordon Riker

Gordon Riker was a Massachusetts College of Art and Design graduate. The afternoon of April 4, he'd been riding his fixed gear from his Jamaica Plain apartment to a job on Newbury Street when a taxi smashed into him and threw him under the wheels of a dump truck. He died instantly at the corner of Huntington Avenue and Forsyth Street.

Within days, someone had erected Riker's "ghost bike" memorial near the site of his death. Students often stopped to light a candle for Gordon

Before the Fall 2007 semester, Northeastern University facilities workers removed the ghost bike.

The above information is from an article in the Northeastern University Student Paper.

The day after Riker died, his friend, Kelly Wallace wrote a message on her MySpace blog.

“I can’t even believe this. Gordon was such a safe rider. I even made fun of him for wearing a helmet before, but he laughed at me for NOT wearing one. . . . So to all my friends, all over the country, riding bikes . . . please be careful.”

Less than a month later, Kelly was also killed while riding her bike in the Boston area.