Amelia Island, 11 March 2001
Quality in Quantity
In just six years from its inception, the Amelia Island Concours has established itself as one
of the premier and most prestigious events of its type in the world. The gathering has grown
in both size and quality over the years, and this year attracted over two hundred and twenty
cars and motorcycles to the golf links adjacent to the front entrance of the Ritz Carlton in the
exclusive Amelia Island resort in northern Florida. The span of automobile history
encompassed ranged through a truly wide reaching spectrum, from pioneers of the
motoring revolution like the 1886 Benz and 1910 Pierce, through American sporting and
luxury icons of the twenties and thirties like Duesenburg, Packard and Pierce-Arrow, a 1936
Scarab electric car, to an F1 Vanwall, the 1965 Lotus Indy car, the 1970 Howmet TX Turbine
sports racing car, a wide selection of Porsche sports racing models, and unique examples
of one man’s dreams like the 1937 Dubonnet Hispano styled by Saoutchik.
Celebration of Surtees and Pierce-Arrow
The main themes of this year’s gathering were celebrations of John Surtees OBE and the
centenary of Pierce-Arrow. As part of the latter there was a road tour for examples of the
marque on the Friday morning, whilst the special guest was Al Gonas, who was the original
kneeling archer model for the Pierce-Arrow logo. For the celebration of John Surtees, still the
only man to have won World Championships on both two and four wheels, there was a wide
selection of cars and motorcycles of the types raced by him during his career on display
around the concours field. The cover of the programme and the event poster featured an art
montage of the maestro and a selection of his racing machinery, by Ken Dallison. The
display included Manx Norton and MV Agusta motorcycles, a ”Matchbox” liveried Surtees F2
car driven by Mike Hailwood in 1972 to win the F2 championship, examples of Ferrari 250
GTO, 250 P and 365 P2, together with a 1966 Lola T70 spider in the red with a white arrow
Team Surtees livery.
Ferrari Fantastic!
Almost ten per cent of the concours field was occupied by Ferraris, with production spanning
the period from 1949 to 1972. They came from as far as California in the west, and Vermont
in the north, and provided an eclectic display of both road and racing models, some of which
are already noted in the Surtees display. The two earliest examples both carried Vignale
coachwork, firstly there was the beautifully curvaceous dark blue 166 Inter coupe of Richard
Fraser, and second the 212 spider of Jeff Fisher, in its original black over metallic sea green
colour scheme, that took three awards at the show, including The Bank of America Trophy for
the best open car. Other early rarities were the Oblin of Belgium bodied 166 MM/53,
displayed by Bob and Judith Selz, and Gil Nickel’s stunning yellow 340 America spider
Vignale. A great attraction was the 375 America with Pinin Farina coupe coachwork featuring
long buttresses running from the roof into the tail panel, however it was not the styling that
attracted the attention, but the crumbling and cracked paintwork that is the complete
antithesis of normal concours presentation.
One of the rarest examples in terms of public viewing was the very original 250 GTO of
James McNeil, which apart from an outing at the Louis Vuitton concours a couple of years
ago, has rarely been seen at public events, although it does get regular exercise around the
roads of Long Island where it resides. To compliment this example, Jim Jaeger brought his
4 litre engined example from Cincinatti. Another extremely rare bird was what might have
been the GTOs successor had things worked out differently, this being the 275 GTB/C
”Speciale” of Ron Finger with its unique body styling on chassis number 07185. There were
further examples of 275 GTBs, including the 1967 New York Show car, originally owned by
Kirk F. White, finished in an unusual shade of pale gold, and even more unusually having
concealed boot hinges, normally a feature of the much earlier short nose two camshaft
model.
Other Italian treats include a pair of pre-war Alfa Romeos, a 1929 Super Sport Zagato Spider
and a 1933 1750 Grand Sport, a more modern Ghia bodied Alfa Romeo 1900 Super Sport
from 1955, and a delightful red Maserati Tipo 61 ”Birdcage”, chassis number 2462, first
owned by Giuliano Giovanardi of Modena, brought by current owner John Schumann Jnr.
Altogether a tremendous selection of some of the world’s rarest and most prestigious
automobiles, impeccably presented in a garden party atmosphere under clear blue Florida
skies, a true taste of Nirvana for any car enthusiast, whatever their proclivity.
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