Just a quick report back to all of you about my trip to the U.K.'s
National Motor Museum at Beaulieu. Lovely day for a drive, went down
with friends in a tintop saw the cars, had lunch and came back up to
London. The best of the museum: a collection of land speed record
cars, a lovely D-type Jag with a racing history, a nice 1949 Cooper
single seater, a couple of 1930's Cords, a really nice 1954(?) TR-2, a
Lotus Elite and a nice green JAP-engined 1928 (I think) Morgan trike.
No other Morgans, no Bentleys of any sort, the entrance was graced by
a Rolls Silver Ghost that was a replica.
If you want to see a good collection of 20's era saloons (sedans to us
Yanks), replicas of period gas stations, and some significant very
early 1900's horseless carriages, then you should go there.
I thought the collection was interesting but missing a lot of
important historical cars, especially given England's very rich
history of automobile development. Very few foreign cars were in the
collection, which is understandable but still seems a bit parochial.
One Itala from about 1914, a Dusenberg, the two Cords, two Mercedes, a
Citroen Traction Avant, a Ferrari Dino. And two truly outstanding
Bugattis.
Nice bookstore there: I bought books, including Ken Hill's "Completely
Morgan", published in 1994.
I know the donor of Beaulieu is or was Lord Montagu, and that he was a
great car enthusiast. But what they have done is to turn the place
into a theme park, complete with video rides, a monorail,
what-have-you. Money would have been better spent acquiring some of
the important cars of English history.
By all means visit Beaulieu if you're here, and if, like me, you want
to see every motor museum of note on the planet. If you're looking, as
I was, for significant chunks of British motor history, you will have
to keep on looking. Frankly, I think there's more history in that
ten-car shed across from the Morgan works in Malvern.
The most interesting car I've seen on this trip is a armored car built
up from a old Model A Ford truck (apparently) by the Danish resistance
movement during World War II. Used in a battle with the Germans to
free imprisoned resistance fighters, the thing is built up with 1"
steel plate, has pock-marks all over one side from what look to be
50-caliber slugs, a few bullet holes in the softer steel of the
homemade turret (!), and is lovingly kept painted up and maintained in
a square in Copenhagen by the local fire brigade. Pretty impressive.
The things you see on a business trip. Cheers to all from Merrie Old
England.
Chip Brown
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