The Cellar - Nov 16, 2014: Batmobile

There have been numerous versions of the Batmobile in the comics and eight versions for TV and movies.
If I say the “First Batmobile”, most people think of the Barris custom used in the 1966 TV show.
http://cellar.org/2014/Futura.jpg

But before the TV show, DC Comics noticed as the pseudo-sophisticated Beatniks being replaced by dope smoking Hippies and mid-teen Boomers wanting to be amused, were driving a lot of interest in Batman. Ka-ching! Ka-ching!
Through Green Acres Ice Cream Company in New Hampshire, DC heard of a car they might use for promotion. Supercompressor says…

Quote:

What is believed to be the world's first car that became an officially licensed Batmobile was conceived and customized starting in 1960 by 23-year-old Forrest Robinson. After finishing the design, Robinson and a young friend, Len Perham, begun building the car in the Robinson family barn. Robinson completed the car in 1963-two years before the George Barris customization of the TV Batmobile was started. The "'63 Batmobile" is the earliest known car in existence that was sanctioned by a DC Comics licensee.

http://cellar.org/2014/bluecoupe.jpg
Now obviously this car wasn’t built to be a daily driver. It’s a garage queen for cruising on summer Sundays, or impressing the roller skating carhops on warm Friday nights. It’s also the kind of car that once everyone has seen it, and knows who it belongs to, other interests sing the siren’s song. So when DC Comics wanted to lease it for a promotional tour Forrest said, run, Batmobile, run.
The lure of the bright lights of fame and fortune corrupts, ask Wayne Bobbitt or Levi Johnston.
http://cellar.org/2014/downfall.jpg

When the car came home, Forrest was trying to raise money to start a business, so he sold it for $200… that would be almost $1500 today. The car was resold a couple times then ended up in a New Hampshire field for near fifty years.
In 2008, the car was discovered by Bobby Smith of Swanzey, NH. He sold it to a rare car dealer in Chicago, who re-sold it to auto historian George Albright. In February 2013, the '63 Batmobile was purchased by Toy Car Exchange LLC and transported to Borbon Fabrications in Sacramento, CA, a company that specializes in vintage car restorations. I heard they spent 1700 man hours on it.

http://cellar.org/2014/bigbatcar.jpg

Now it’s at Heritage Auctions, opening bid $90,000 ($112,500 with buyer’s premium)