KEEPERS
Jim’s father, Jim senior, bought this Austin Seven as a bit of fun for his two sons to enjoy. It’s now become a prized family heirloom…
‘My father worked at Rover then went on to start his own business specialising in pre-war cars, especially WO-era Bentleys, so I grew up involved with old cars. My dad always said that it would be nice to own an Austin Seven so we started doing autojumbles when I was a child, and ten per cent of the autojumble takings were put into a pot for the Austin Seven.
‘I loved doing the autojumbles and still deal in automobilia and enamel signs as a bit of a hobby today. But we didn’t actually sell that much, so this Austin Seven was looking a long way off. Then dad sold a WO Bentley steering box that he’d originally swapped for a pair of Rover carburettors and that gave us enough money to buy a Seven. We looked around and bought this one from Doug Connell – who was well known in the Seven world – in summer 1989. I was nearly 21 at the time and my brother Rob a couple of years younger.
‘It was complete and running and – to be honest – in better cosmetic condition than it is now, but we see the small bodywork dings and scrapes as a part of its history. We had a lot of fun with it; I used it a lot, including for my first wedding in 1992. Earlier that year Rob and I drove it from John o’Groats to Land’s End as part of the Seven’s 70-year anniversary celebrations. We averaged just over 20mph for the trip and ended up driving continuously for 42 hours, taking it in turns to drive and sleep in the passenger seat (we’re both more than 6ft tall). I remember driving along a cliff top and feeling so tired that I was hallucinating! It was an amazing event but I don’t think I’d do it now.
‘The children came along and my wife had some health problems. I ended up becoming a single parent and the Seven got dry-stored in the garage from the late ’90s but Alfie used to sit in it as a child and loved it so we decided to restore it together with help from my dad when lockdown came along. We stripped it all down to a ba
