I'll take this off on my favorite tangent: I hope some of the Japanese collectors are also Shimano executives who show their Toeis, Singers, etc. to their American colleagues--and who go on rainy rides with them, comfy on their fender-bearing randonneuses while snickering at the American racer wannabes riding along on their products which cannot in any way fit fenders! May there be some $1000 complete bikes with 60's geometry and 40's style someday, human-powered executions of the Mazda Miata idea!
David Feldman
----------
>From: "Larry Strung" <strungl@pathcom.com>
>To: "Jonathan Cowden" <jac33@tron.arts.cornell.edu>, "Donald Dundee"
<rebour@hotmail.com>
>Cc: <sachs@erols.com>, <moos@penn.com>, <p6man@home.com>,
<classicrendezvous@bikelist.org>
>Subject: Re: [Classicrendezvous] Prices paid and International collectors,
was Re: Speaking of Japanese collectors
>Date: Tue, Nov 7, 2000, 5:47 PM
>
>Gentlemen (and ladies of our list),
>
>I'd like to contribute my two cents on this subject in the form of an
>anecdote.
>
>In my "lost years" when I was an avid motorcyclist and racer, I had
>witnessed a similar exodus of exotic classic motorcycles from North America
>to the land of the rising sun. Many friends and fellow enthusiasts greated
>this with anger, and sought to keep the machines on these shores. Ridicule
>often befell those who sold out to the big bucks offered by wealthy
>collectors in Japan.
>
>Then at some point I had an opportunity to travel to L.A. for a business
>trip which allowed me a few hours of free time (I think it was from 5 in the
>afternoon until the red-eye departed just before midnight for the return
>flight to Toronto - ah, the glamorous life of business travel). I used my
>time wisely and scouted out a bike shop in one of the beach suburbs of L.A..
>It was an amazing motobike shop, run by a Japanese gentlemen, and full of
>all kinds of interesting "collector" bikes. I recall a whole row of Italian
>road racing motorbikes from the 1950's and 60's, all less than 250cc and
>jewel-like. There was even a celeste Bianchi 175cc production racer that
>had me drooling.
>
>After I had made friends with the owner, who warmed to my knowledge of his
>display, he showed me pictures of a collection that he had just arranged to
>be brought back from Japan to America for auction. He plopped me into a
>chair and handed me a couple of hundred photographs, fresh out of their
>sleeve from the photo shop. What's that term that Alex Clarke uses? The
>rarest of the rare? The photos showed at least one example of every exotic
>racing motorbike you could imagine, all the way up to 4 cylinder Italian
>works Gilera and MV racers from the 50's. Pictures of Manx Nortons were
>passed quickly over as being completely blaze.
>
>This was shortly after the first impact of the recession in Japan, and the
>economic tables had turned. The Japanese collector had gone bust, and his
>amazing collection of bikes were now worth more money in America than in
>Japan.
>
>I wondered how many Japanese collectors would be behaving like us North
>Americans, and were upset that this gentleman's collection was leaving
>Japan. Then I thought about the Italians who first witnessed their racing
>treasures leaving their homeland for America, because it was only our
>selfishness that allowed us to think that these bikes "belonged" in America.
>
>I came to the conclusion that it didn't matter what country the bikes ended
>up in, because the economic forces ensured that the bikes were not "lost
>forever". Indeed, the enthusiast in Japan, or Europe, shared the same love
>and emotion towards these machines as we did. What a great calling card, a
>shared interest, to open the door to communicate with people from around the
>world. Now with the internet, and the wonderful Classicrendezvous list, we
>can instantly communicate with our fellow enthusiasts around the world.
>B.C. can comment on this topic from Holland, and a rebutal can come from
>Takao Noda in Japan. We all have more in common with each other than we
>most likely do with our own next door neighbors.
>
>In the end, I would rather own one great bicycle and have 9 friends who each
>had one great bicycle, than own 10 great bicycles and have no friends at all
>to share them with. But then, that's just my opinion.
>
>Regards,
>
>Larry Strung