What is art? A shape, a form, an abstract collection of ideas, an image created by man to invoke thought,...
In May 1968, my former wife and I traveled by train, ferry and again by train from Pirmasens, Germany, to...
Throughout history, French manufacturers have created some of the most unusual automotive designs ever made. Most will agree that many of them had brilliant engineering, however the French approach to styling, especially in the mid-century era, is interesting to say the least. Weird, beautiful, ugly, strange, fantastic, modern, and eclectic...
Joe Ballengee was driving his ’65 Lancia Flavia Sport Zagato through the Santa Fe Arts District, during the Santa Fe...
We open the smallish front doors, typical of open cars of the 1920s, and climb in. Chris Kidd pulls down...
1958 DeSoto Adventurer The 1950s were a halcyon period for American car manufacturing. After the deprivation of the war years, the American public yearned for a little excess—bigger, faster, flashier. Catering to this new appetite, during the 1950s American manufacturers went through a rapid period of automotive development, both technically...
“Bella figura” is Italian for “beautiful figure.” Winston Goodfellow uses the phrase in the title of the section of his...
Sensational French shapes and racing pedigree are part of what make Talbot-Lago automobiles exotic, beautiful, rare and sought after. Few...
Photo: Steve Oom With just over 600 produced between 1954 and 1962 it can t be said that the Jensen 541 was built in huge numbers. In my 45-plus years of older car enthusiasm, I can say that I have seen four Jensen 541s, and with pleasure have driven two...
Photo: J. Michael Hemsley After he had finished the restoration of his 1936 Stout Scarab, Ron Schneider took it to...
Photo: J. Michael Hemsley When you have the only one ever built, you might have trouble convincing people that it...
Photo: Peter Collins Things were bad. There had been difficulties before for Lancia, but on both occasions the good guys had ridden over the hill to save the damsel in distress in the nick of time. Back in 1955 Gianni Lancia had had to say goodbye to his eponymous company....
Photo: Steve Oom The next time you see an Audi on the road look closely at its badge. Four intertwined...
It’s rather ironic that both the birth of the “Pony Car” movement in the mid-1960s, and its eventual death in...
The 275 GTB occupies a very rarified space in the pantheon of Ferrari road car history. It sits at an important nexus where Ferrari road cars were evolving, becoming more sophisticated, no longer just racecars turned out for the street. Old techniques were giving way to new adaptations of racing-proven...
National Motor Museum mechanics have discovered time capsule finds during the start of the restoration of Land Speed Record breaker...
When Jim Gehkre returned from his tour in Vietnam, in January of 1970, the first thing he needed was a...
What is it about a Stradale? Ask most Alfisti what Alfa they’d most like to have in their garage, and a significant percentage will say a Tipo 33 Stradale. I’ll admit, I’m odd, since my choice would be a Giulia TI Super, but the Stradale is a close second even...
In September 2022, I travelled to Townsend, Tennessee, in the Great Smokey Mountains for Okteenerfest. The annual gathering of Porsche...
When someone says “Sunbeam,” most car people immediately think of the “Tiger.” Sunbeam was much more than just that one...
The term Metropolitan is an adjective meaning, “Of, relating to, or characteristic of a metropolis.” It was also a term used to label those who had the sophistication, fashionable tastes and manners associated with a metropolis. That is until Nash Motors, in 1953, came out with a stylish, diminutive, grocery-getter...
A frenzy of uncorked Mini Coopers, followed by a gaggle of vintage MGs, Triumphs and other assorted vintage sports racers...
“100 miles per hour speed with 100 percent comfort and docility.” This proclamation was made in an advertisement that appeared...
Bonnie Menapace (nee Hemsley – yes, she’s my daughter) got her first Alfa for her 16th birthday. It was a used, yellow 1979 Alfa Spider Veloce, which she still has. Andy Menapace got to share that Alfa Spider when he married Bonnie, and he got to learn how to change...
Singer-songwriter Carol Connors once bet Carroll Shelby that if she wrote him a hit song, he’d give her a Cobra....
The names of the great marques roll off the tongue like poetry—Porsche, Jaguar, Maserati, Mercedes, Rolls-Royce and, of course, Ferrari....
The spectacular Mercedes-Benz 540K represented the zenith of pre-war accomplishments by the Stuttgart-based firm in the pre-war era. It is considered by many to be both a technical marvel and a styling masterpiece. An evolution of the brilliantly engineered 500K, whose independently suspended chassis it shared, the 540K was powered...
Joe Conzonire eases his 1903 Packard Model F Runabout out of his shop and pulls it into the sunlight. It...
Chatting with Barry Alan Twitchell about his Porsche 993, he remembered that during a dinner in Switzerland, the owner of...
An amazing thing happened in Chattanooga, Tennessee, in the fall of 2019. A couple of automobile enthusiasts proposed the Chattanooga Motorcar Festival and convinced the city to allow it to happen. There was a time trial, rally, and concours. It was to be an annual event, but Covid-19 interfered and...
