The Motorcycle Hall of Fame Museum in Pickerington, Ohio, is holding its annual Leather and Ice Online Auction, with a goal to raise $25,000 to support the museum’s continuing mission of preserving motorcycle history through displays and stories highlighting the impact of motorcycles on American culture yesterday and today.
Now in its 5th year, the Leather and Ice Online Auction runs through November 30, 2008. Among the more than 300 items up for auction are riding jackets from First Gear, museum T-shirts autographed by 21 Hall of Famers, signed posters of Cook Neilson riding New Blue, the re-creation of Neilson and Phil Schilling’s famous Old Blue Ducati 750SS, at Daytona in 2007, numerous full color posters by motorcycle artist Harry Miller – hell, you can even bid on a burrito dinner for 10 from Chipotle! One of the big items up for auction this year is a scholarship to the PowerSports Institute, a premier technical university in Ohio offering state-of-the-art training for students interested in careers in the powersports industry.
And if none of that trips your trigger you can always stuff somebody’s stocking with raffle tickets for a chance to win a pair of Triumph Bonnevilles — a first-year 1959 pre-unit T120 Bonneville and a 2009 50th Anniversary Limited Edition T100 Bonneville — for a meager $5 a ticket or five tickets for $20. The winner in the bike drawing will be announced at the AMA’s annual Vintage Motorcycle Days at Mid-Ohio in July 2009. All proceeds from the raffle and the auction go to support the museum, which has worked diligently since its1990 founding to support motorcycling’s great heritage. It’s a critical organization, and we can’t think of a better way to make a motorcyclist happy at Christmas and support an institution that works to ensure the preservation of the history of motorcycling. Click here to log on and bid. — Richard Backus