Rick Cole

“I have patterned my entire career around the automotive industry. As a teenager, my love of 50’s and 60’s era vehicles drew me to what would be a long career as one of the world’s best known auctioneers of classic cars. Rick Cole Auctions, which I started in 1978 with a $2000 investment, became the pre-eminent source for collector vehicles internationally. I conducted record-breaking auctions in Los Angeles, Newport Beach, Palm Springs, and Monterey. In close to a 20-year span, I conducted over 100 major collector car auctions during which time I sold more significant private automobile collections than any other auction firm. Being in Los Angeles, I soon became known as the ‘Auctioneer to the Stars’, and was able to buy and sell hundreds of personal vehicles for celebrities such as Steve McQueen, Frank Sinatra, Robin Williams, Johnny Carson and Sylvester Stallone. In the later 1980’s, long before million dollar cars were considered an unachievable dream, I sold over a dozen vehicles for over $1 Million apiece. In 1988, I auctioned a Ferrari 250P racing car for a then unheard of $2.8 Million. A few fun sales of the 20,000-plus classic cars I have sold include a James Bond 007 Aston-Martin from the movie ‘Goldfinger’, a Batmobile for creator George Barris, the Buick convertible featured in the final scene of ‘Casablanca’, and the cream-colored Roadmaster from ‘Rainman’. So sought after were my predictions on car values in the 80’s and 90’s that “USA Today” asked me to write a semi-annual article which was entitled the ‘Rick Cole Gold List’ of collector car values.” I appeared twice on the hit show ‘Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous’.

“A true lover of motor sports, I was active for many years in the vintage racing world, and competed (and won races) at major circuits across America including Laguna Seca, Road Atlanta, Watkins Glen and Road America. I also competed in the prestigious Mille Miglia in Italy. In 1992, I signed a relatively unknown racing driver named Jimmy Vasser to his first pro contract and ran him in the Indy 500. Vasser was fastest rookie at the Speedway that year, and became one of racing’s great drivers becoming IndyCar PPG Champion in 1996.

“At the urging of then-Mayor Sonny Bono, I constructed a 1.9 mile street circuit on the streets in LA’s local desert playground in 1990, bringing back the famed Palm Springs Road Races to prominence. Roger Penske, Carroll Shelby, and Phil Hill were among featured dignitaries I was able to honor at this annual event.

“I sold my auction company in 1997 to RM Auctions, who today carry on the tradition of my famous Monterey Sports Car Auction which I created in 1986 and conducted for 12 years. In 2000, I became Chairman of Runflat America Corporation, which became a major supplier of runflat safety device technologies to the United States Department of Defense.”