Grateful Dead auction brings over $1m

Grateful Dead fans dug deep yesterday (Tuesday, May 8th) during an auction of memorabilia from the group's late road manager Lawrence "Ram Rod" Shurtliff. The "Life On The Golden Road With The Grateful Dead" sale at the Bonhams & Butterfields auction house in San Francisco brought in more than $1.1 million, and the big item was Jerry Garcia's Travis Bean-designed electric guitar from the mid-70's, which went for $312,000. Some other guitars also went high -- a handmade Doug Irwin model, which predates the famous "Wolf" and "Tiger" models he made for Garcia, brought in $186,000; an acoustic guitar custom-made for Garcia by Alvarez-Yairi and Modulus brought in $102,000; and a mid-70's Gibson guitar owned by Garcia went for $39,000.

The highest non-musical lots at the auction were the original paintings used for the cover of the band's 1969 album Live/Dead, which were sold for $87,000, and a leather guitar strap from Nudie's, the famous country-and-western outfitter, that Garcia used in 1973 went for $20,400.

Ram Rod, who was also the president of the Grateful Dead's corporation, was with the band from their very earliest days until the end. After he died last year, his son Rudson decided to auction some pieces off, telling USA Today, "Things like Jerry's old guitars should be in the hands of someone who can make people dance again."
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