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During the debut season of “American Pickers,” Mike Wolfe and Frank Fritz visited with a collector named John from Wisconsin in the episode “Leland’s Café.” As they dug through his massive treasure trove, Wolfe stumbled upon a Star high-wheeler bicycle that dates back to the 1880s and immediately knew he had to have it. John asked for $3,000, but for that price, Wolfe really had to think on it. Sure enough, he made John an offer he couldn’t refuse: $3,000 for the Star bike and $800 for a Victor bike. With that, Wolfe and Fritz walked away with two incredible pieces that wound up taking sizeable bites out of their budget.
That’s a lot of money to drop on a couple of bikes, but at the end of the day, it was well worth it for Wolfe. After all, during his youth, a bike was a luxury just out of reach for his family. So, how did he find a set of wheels as a kid? Picking. “I was cutting through this yard, and I remember seeing, it was a girl’s bike, and I picked that up, and I was amazed that someone would throw out a bike,” he told CBS Sunday Morning in 2020. Not only did this provide him with a bike, which he’d wanted for some time but couldn’t afford, but it jumpstarted his love for picking, and the rest is history.
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An old bike might not be as fancy or flashy as an antique hot rod or motorcycle, but for Mike Wolfe, some are worth the price tag attached to them — even if said price tag has a comma on it.
