Bryan Adams is a phenomenally successful rock star, accomplished songwriter, and acclaimed photographer. But, in the mind of Ottawa’s David Gagnon, he’s also a bicycle thief.
Gagnon, 55, claims Adams took off with his prized Raleigh Chopper in the late summer of 1970.
According to Gagnon, Adams was not yet 11 when the crime allegedly occurred outside a convenience store in the Ottawa suburb where they both lived.
He says the bike was taken from “directly in front of the then [Queensway] Drive-In Theatre.”
Earlier this year, Gagnon came across a Henry Munro Middle School class photo from the early ‘70s and “there in the [third] row is the kid that stole this bike.”
The photo, he says, brought back memories of “that sunny day, slowly rolling along atop a bike that weighed almost as much as me with no place to go.
“I remembered that little encounter on that deserted strip.”
Gagnon didn’t know Adams at the time so he couldn’t report him as the alleged theft. “It was only when I saw the class photo that I was able to put a name with a face,” he says.
Adams attended Henry Munro for Grades 6 to 8 and did one year at nearby Colonel By Secondary School before his family moved to Vancouver in 1974.
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In April, Gagnon shared his conspiracy theory at LyricInterpretations.com. He claimed that Adams’ 1985 hit “Summer of ’69” — which the singer co-wrote with Jim Vallance — is a “metaphor for stealing one of the most collectable (sic) & rare bicycles known to have existed.”
(On eBay, a red 1969 Raleigh Chopper is currently valued at $1,400 USD.)
He also claimed to have asked Adams, in a Facebook conversation in April, if he remembered the bicycle — and that Adams “terminated [the] conversation with me.” In fact, Gagnon had been communicating with the administrator of Adams’ official Facebook page.
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What does Gagnon want to say to the singer?
“I have my own money and am not looking for some handout,” he told iHeartRadio.ca, “but he needs to understand I need to know exactly what happened to that bike.
“I just need to know the absolute truth about what happened to it. It’s very important to me that it has to be the whole truth.”