Peter Fonda’s “Captain America” chopper from Easy Rider, one of the most iconic motor vehicles in movie history, will hit the auction platform next month.
The record for a movie or TV motor vehicle is $4.6 million, netted by the original TV Batmobile at auction in 2013.
“The Easy Rider bike evokes powerful emotions even in non-bikers. It personifies the ’60s, all of the good and the bad that decade brought,” said Profiles boss Joe Maddalena in a statement announcing the sale.
The bike is currently owned by businessman Michael Eisenberg, who once co-owned a motorcycle-themed restaurant with Fonda and his Easy Rider director and co-star Dennis Hopper.
The bike was previously owned by the National Motorcycle Museum and, before that, by actor Dan Haggerty, who had a bit part in the movie before going on to do The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams.
Haggerty was also in charge of tending to the motorcycles used in the movie. The production used at least two different Captain America bikes for filming, but this is the only one to survive today.
This is the bike used in the climactic scene when Jack Nicholson’s George Hanson is shot and Fonda’s character Wyatt is blown from his bike when a bullet hits the gas tank. The bike was damaged during filming, but Haggerty repaired it after Fonda told him he could keep it. The other motorcycle was stolen before the movie was released.
The bikes were designed African-American chopper builders Cliff Vaughs and Ben Hardy with design input from Fonda.
Haggerty often rode the motorcycle, which he said was like “going out with sex symbol Marilyn Monroe.”
