Famous people who ride (or rode)
Posted by Ben Baker on Jul 4th 2016
| As you put some miles behind you, ever wonder who else has to get on two wheels to “just clear my head?” Here are a few famous people who were known to get on bikes |
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| Bob Dylan |
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| Dylan crashed his 1964 Triumph Tiger 100 not far from his Woodstock, NY, home in 1966. Reports say he had injured vertebrae, but did not go to the hospital. It proved to be a life-changer for him as he stopped a huge tour schedule, waiting nearly 10 years to go back. |
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| “When I had that motorcycle accident … I woke up and caught my senses, I realized that I was just workin’ for all these leeches. And I didn’t want to do that. Plus, I had a family and I just wanted to see my kids,” he said. |
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| Buddy Holly |
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| According to Brett and Kate McKay, the man who brought the electric guitar to teenagers rode a Triumph Ariel Cyclone because he and band members were kicked out of a Harley dealership. Get more details here. |
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| Elvis Presley |
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| Elvis loved motorcycles. During the time he was married to Priscilla, she gave him seven Harleys. Contrary to what some believe, Jay Leno did NOT buy one of the Elvis bikes for a cool $2.5 million. The King’s first ride was an HD ST165 in 1955. |
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| Malcolm Forbes |
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| Best known for the magazine about millionaires and billionaires that carries his name, Forbes was inducted into the Motorcycle Museum's Hall of Fame 1999. An article in his magazine discussed bikes and those who ride. Two quotes from the late rider are included in the article, including one that is all too telling, “There are two types of riders—those who have been down, and those who are going down.” |
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| Marlon Brando |
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| The Godfather once said, “It still pleases me to be awake during the dark, early hours before morning when everyone else is still asleep. I’ve been that way since I first moved to New York. I do my best thinking and writing then. During those early years in New York, I often got on my motorcycle in the middle of the night and went for a ride–anyplace. There wasn’t much crime in the city then, and if you owned a motorcycle, you left it outside your apartment and in the morning it was still there. It was wonderful on summer nights to cruise around the city at one, two, or three A.M. wearing jeans and a t-shirt with a girl on the seat behind me. If I didn’t start out with one, I’d find one.” |
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| Brando took his love to the Big Screen in The Wild One, a classic biker movie. His 1969 Harley-Davidson FLH Electra-Glide sold for $256,000 at an auction in 2015. |
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| Jimmy Carter |
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| The only president to come from Georgia is also the only president to ride a motorcycle for more than just a publicity stunt. President Carter rode before entering politics. Once he got into that, he put his riding days behind him. |
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| Some governors from various states ride and some members of Congress ride. |
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| Daryl “Chill” Mitchell |
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| This actor, best known for his role as Dexter Walker on The John Larroquette Show and Patton Plame in NCIS: New Orleans used to ride. In 2001 he was on a bike and hit gravel. He went down and when the dust settled, he was paralyzed. |
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| Roald Dahl |
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| Best known for “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” which was later turned into two “Willy Wonka” movies, Dahl also rode. “As a schoolboy at Repton, disguised in waders, helmet, wind-jacket and goggles, he had roared noisily through town on his illicit motorbike, relishing the annoyance he caused the masters and exulting in the fact that no one in authority recognized him.” This and other adventures are recounted in his biography by Donald Sturrock. |
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| Here’s a list of celebrities who ride bikes. |
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| Add the ones we missed in the comments below |
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