STORMING DOWN TO BEAULIEU IN THE YEAR OF C&SC’S BIRTH
In the week you launched Classic and Sportscar in March 1982, I drove to the National Motor Museum to meet Michael Ware and discuss exhibits at the museum, but more of that later.
We had first made contact when some friends and I were part-time publishers of calendars in the transportation field (aviation, railways and motoring). We had raided the NMM archive, courtesy of Michael and Doug Nye, for our 1981 edition – which was much-complimented in a review by Bill Boddy in Motor Sport that Christmas.
On this occasion, Michael took me for lunch at The Master Builder in Buckler’s Hard to talk about the future of loans my firm had made to the museum, but in general chit-chat we agreed it was good that a further classic car magazine was being launched to complement Motor Sport and Classic Cars. We did speculate whether the market would absorb another specialist publication… but, as they say, the rest is history.
To come back to the exhibits, our meeting was the culmination of a conversation in the House of Lords between our respective chairmen – Lord Montagu for Beaulieu and Lord Jellicoe of Tate & Lyle for myself. There was the matter of the NMM relinquishing loans of three commercial vehicles and converting a loan of the Tate family’s Model T to a gift. Since I already had contact with Michael, my MD (David Davis, of subsequent political fame) delegated me to sort it out. This was all done very amicably, with the commercials going to the new British Commercial Vehicle Museum in Lancashire, and the Ford being retained by Beaulieu.
To cap it all, I drove to Beaulieu in my new company car, a limited-edition VW Scirocco Storm Mk1 that I subsequently purchased – and that still forms part of my fleet, now extremely rare with probably fewer than 50 examples extant. It’s pictured below at the most recent Scirocco Register meeting at RAF Gosford.
Keep up the good work. I still have the first and early issues: the ads and prices make fascinating reading.
Paul Cooper
Winchester, Hants
Letter of the month wins a beautiful C&SC A4 folio case, worth £295, courtesy of Jordan Bespoke. Since 2005, Simon Jordan has devoted his life to automotive and motorsport-inspired luxury goods, blending the art of British design with the finest Italian craftsmanship.
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Clipped ’wings
As a reader and subscriber to C&SC for 40 years and a Mercedes-Benz Gullwing owner for even longer, 50 years in 2022 (the enclosed p
