My first car ever was a grey 1948 Buick Special. I paid $30 for it in 1968 and criss crossed New South Wales many times in it. It wasn't pristine. I had to cut grooves in the tyres because it kept me so poor, but I loved it. However, about 6 months into its ownership I found a "like new" 1947 model" (the dark grey one on the left) and, after a stint working in a tin mine during uni holidays, I was able to bring it home. It was a wonderful old thing. I sold it eventually to a farmer at Booroowa. I wonder where it is now.
The Buick was "proof" of my powers, once sharply directed. I had dreamed of Buicks since being 7 years old when a friend of my father's arrived one day in a black, six wheel, 1938 model. I had acquired my own beautiful Buick and it had not taken me very long.
I had no technical knowledge of cars at this time. However, I had studied styling since I was very young. I recall deep conversations with myself about the relative merits of different designs when sitting on the steps at Grafton and watching the Redex Trial cars pass by. The Redex Trial was (I think) 1953 and we left Grafton when I was 4 (1954). So my interest in auto design had begun early.
Although I knew nothing of the Buick's technical features and I had no appreciation of its unusual straight eight engine, or the torque tube rear axle design, I did appreciate features of its styling, especially the disproportionate length of its low front guards and the soft curvature involving all the styling elements. To drive, it was slightly ponderous, but entirely predictable and easy. Its ride was smooth, soft and quiet over any kind of road. Already I had enough nostalgia operating to immerse myself in childhood memories about these great road liners and I lived the dreams I'd had as a youngster.
One night however, in late 1969, my flat mate, Brian tossed me the keys of his MG saying "Go and have some fun". At once, I found a picture in my memories. I recalled standing on the back seat of dad's 1934 Oldsmobile. It must have been about 1953. I was peering out through one of the small back windows studying the handsome restless lines of a pair of MGs, jockeying the corrugations to fix an overtaking line across the bends of the mountainous dirt road. They were both black, one with a red grill and one with a beige grill. How fast and exciting they seemed.
Now I scrambled into the tiny 2 seater and adjusted myself in the narrow cockpit. Pulling out that little starter knob I knew at once I NEEDED an MG! I released the clutch, a tiny movement, and the little car lunged forwards. I did not look back at the Buick. I had crossed an invisible line in reality.
Returning later that night, I made Brian an offer he couldn't refuse.
How the MG and I stayed alive through those years is a question I'm going to ask God one day. The MG became my best buddy. It brought me enduring friendships, adventures, thrills and spills. Noel and I resprayed it one weekend, bringing it back to its original deep carnation Red. Mike and I took it skiing before I was able to afford a new roof. Our beards were frozen hard by the time we reached Jindabyne. Another time we passed through a cyclone in far north Queensland despite boiling rivers, landslides and inundations full of swirling crocodiles. I learned to tune the engine so precisely it would accelerate all the way up High Street in Randwick. I learned to feel when it was off-song, by the timbre of the mechanical vibration and a slight change to the visceral sounds.
But what I remember the best is the early morning joy I felt each day when I pulled on that little starter knob and set out for uni, racing down the lane to my lectures.
Years later, my affection for those days was still strong and I bought the blue MGA 1600 below. Though never as much fun as the little red TD model, the MGA was a wonderfully competent thing with the looks to match. Even later there was an MGB too. But like the MGA before it, it only accentuated the feelings of lost innocence that parted from me the day the little TD was sold.
But, its a mysterious thing, even happy boys get curious about other things. One March morning about 1971, newly returned from another stint in the tin mine, my pockets jingling, I went browsing in my favourite sports car shop, Geoghans on Parramatta Road. I had been drawn there by a Jag which was handsomely parked among rows of Lotuses, MGs and Austin Healeys. I had no intention of buying it. But I knew my sports car history and the Jaguar XK120 was a hero of the mythology. There were very few good examples of XK120s in circulation by now: I suppose most had been trashed - Jags were never noteworthy for their reliability.
For those of you born in a later era, the XK120 was launched in 1949 as a sort of show car; it was never meant for production. In the clamor following its first motor show appearance however, several were made and sold. They quickly stunned the world by their speed. In an age when very few cars could achieve more than 70 mph (110 kph), XK120s were being clocked at 120 mph. About 1950 in a specially scrutinized timed run, one achieved over 170 mph on a Belgian motorway!
A few days later the Jag was at home beside the MG in the garage.
By now I had the sports car thing very badly. I couldn't be stopped. When a friend told me in 1971 he had decided to sell his Lotus, he had chosen his mark well. The Lotus was a tiny car, even by MG standards. Almost light enough for three men to lift. And it was capable of astonishing things. For a start, it was capable of speed within a whisker of the Jaguar's best. And it would do it all day at barely 4 1/2 litres of fuel per hundred kilometers. Today, 40 years on, manufacturers still cannot achieve that fuel efficiency, not even in micro cars barely quicker than a shopping trolley. The Lotus was not just incredibly pretty, it was as effective as a rapier. Stirling Moss described it as the best car in the world for a fast trip between any two points. At that time, there were only 8 of these cars in Australia. Most had been imported for racing.
I found the Lotus was almost too perfect to drive in Australia where the roads were primitive and Law enforcement is psychotic. Instead I packed it on a boat and sent it to England where I followed a short time later. In England I had it rebuilt by specialists and I used it for wonderful weekends of country touring. Later, when I moved to France, I took it with me and we made many fast trips from Paris to the south and back again.
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