Peter Egan was born in St. Paul, grew up in the small town of Elroy, Wisconsin, served in the US Army in Vietnam, and graduated from the University of Wisconsin in Madison in 1971 with a degree in journalism. He worked as a foreign car mechanic in Madison for nine years to support his passion for sports car and motorcycle road racing and wrote several freelance travel stories for Cycle World magazine in his spare time. In 1980, the magazine, based in Newport Beach, California, hired him as a staff editor, and he and his wife Barbara moved to California.

In 1983, he was hired by Cycle World’s sister magazine, Road & Track, and continued to write for both magazines through the decade. While living in California, Peter and Barbara took flying lessons at Orange County Airport and became licensed pilots. After renting aircraft for several years, they bought a 1945 Piper Cub and kept it at the small airport in Corona.

They moved back to Wisconsin in 1990, taking the Piper Cub with them, and settled down in the country, near the town of Stoughton. Barbara worked as a physical therapist with disabled children and Peter continued to write columns and feature stories for Cycle World and Road & Track for the next thirty years. They are retired now, but still working full time taking care of their dog, six cats, and several old cars, motorcycles, and vintage guitars. Or rehearsing with Egan’s garage band, The Defenders.