IRBIT, Russia — This is the story of how a dying Soviet-era industry and an aging biker population in the United States met and found happiness together on the streets and highways of America.

Think of it as Easy Rider, the golden years.

It started as a matter of survival for the Irbit Motor Works, which for decades had churned out its signature Ural motorcycle with sidecar attachment, but which discovered that its business was sputtering into the Post-Communist sunset like so many other Soviet enterprises.

Irbit found salvation in an unlikely niche market: older American riders seeking utility, not thrills or spills. Suddenly the sidecar, a seemingly anachronistic product evoking a World War II newsreel, had a new life among the late middle-aged.

The company shifted its sales strategy overseas in the 1990s and today, despite its deep roots in Russia as the purveyor to the Red Army, it sends 60 percent of its output to the United States.