club's "mother chapter" – the national headquarters – from San Bernardino to Oakland. Later that year, Barger suffered a fractured skull during a fight with Oakland police. Although the basic organization was in place when Barger took over leadership of the club, he introduced additional rules pertaining to new members, club officers, and the establishment of new chapters. Under Barger's leadership, the club's membership began to increase. By 1960, the Oakland Hells Angels had established an extensive narcotics network within the club. According to George Wethern – who later testified against the club and entered the Federal Witness Protection Program – in his 1978 book A Wayward Angel, Barger convened a meeting of the leaders of the Hells Angels and other California motorcycle clubs in 1960 in which the various clubs parleyed over the mutual problem of police harassment. The clubs voted to ally under a "1%er" patch to be worn on their respective "colors". The term refers to a comment allegedly made by the American Motorcyclist Association (AMA) that 99% of motorcyclists were law-abiding citizens, implying the last one percent were outlaws. The Oakland chapter, with Barger serving as its president, assumed an informal position of authority within the Hells Angels that began following a standoff with local police and the California Highway Patrol in the aftermath of an outlaw motorcycle meeting in Porterville in September 1963. Although always a predominantly male organization, the Hells Angels had female members until 1964 when Barger imposed a rule making the group male only. Barger justified the male only ruling under the grounds that female Hells Angels were less able to defend themselves against rival bikers looking to steal their patches. The Oakland Hells Angels maintained a preeminent position as "first among equals" by having the largest membership of any U.S. chapter and because of Barger's esteem among club members internationally. The author and journalist Hunter S. Thompson wrote in his 1967 book Hell's Angels: The Strange and Terrible Saga of the Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs that "in any gathering of Hell's Angels, there is no doubt who is running the show", describing Barger as "a 6-foot, 170-pound warehouseman from East Oakland, the coolest head in the lot, and a tough, quick-thinking dealer when any action starts", and saying of him: "By turns he is a fanatic, a philosopher, a brawler, a shrewd compromiser and a final arbitrator." Barger continually denied that he