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Iconic '60s Rocker's Life-Changing Accident Is Still a Mystery 59 Years Later
Iconic '60s Rocker's Life-Changing Accident Is Still a Mystery 59 Years Later originally appeared on Parade.
In the summer of 1966, Bob Dylan was sitting on top of the world, metaphorically speaking. He'd recently returned to his home in Woodstock, New York, after touring Europe and Australia. His critically-acclaimed album Blonde on Blonde had just been released. But days before he was set to play the Yale Bowl, the iconic musician lost control of his Triumph T100 motorcycle, crashing moments after leaving his manager's house on the morning of July 29. What happened next remains unclear, but the accident would change the course of Dylan's career forever.
According to American Songwriter, Dylan never filed a police report or was admitted to a hospital, so there are no official records of the incident. However, Dylan did hole up at his doctor's house in Middletown, NY, for about six weeks before returning to his home in Woodstock, and claimed that he suffered several broken vertebrae and facial lacerations in the crash. What is known for sure, however, is that Dylan retreated from the public eye in the aftermath of the incident; in fact, he wouldn't tour again until 1974.
What did Bob Dylan say about his motorcycle accident?
In his 2004 autobiography Chronicles, Dylan seemed to suggest that the crash gave him a much-needed opportunity to take a step back from the pressures of fame and re-evaluate his priorities.
'I had been in a motorcycle accident, and I'd been hurt, but I recovered,' Dylan wrote, per Far Out Magazine.
'Truth was that I wanted to get out of the rat race. Having children changed my life and segregated me from just about everybody and everything that was going on. Outside of my family, nothing held any real interest for me, and I was seeing everything through different glasses," he continued.
In a 1969 interview with Jann Wenner, Dylan elaborated on his physical and mental state in the months leading up to the accident, saying, "I was on the road for almost five years. It wore me down. I was on drugs, a lot of to keep going, you know?"
Later released on The Basement Tapes, Dylan wrote the song "You Ain't Goin' Nowhere" while he was still recovering from the accident, with the title seemingly referencing his time of seclusion and immobility.
While fans might never truly know what happened on the day Dylan spun out of control on his bike, many have speculated in the years since that his subsequent self-imposed exile was a necessary phase in his creative development, helping to usher in the decades of legendary albums and performances to '60s Rocker's Life-Changing Accident Is Still a Mystery 59 Years Later first appeared on Parade on Jul 29, 2025
This story was originally reported by Parade on Jul 29, 2025, where it first appeared.
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