Maserati Tipo 60/61 “Birdcage”

It tells you something about Maserati that the company assembled what is, possibly, its best racing car — the Tipo 60/61 — after it pulled out of motor racing. Maserati Tipo 60/61 "Birdcage"It tells you more about Maserati when you learn that one of the seven sons of Rodolfo and Carolina Maserati was named Alfieri, but when he passed away just months after his birth in 1885, his name was passed on to the next-born son, who came into this world in 1887. (With seven sons to his credit, Rodolfo Maserati was  apparently a devotee of the song “Carolina in the Morning.”)

Maserati brotherhood

Five of those seven Maserati Tipo 60/61 “Birdcage”  became sort of the Marx brothers of motor racing, while Mario, who became a painter, kept his hand in the family business by designing the company’s legendary trident logo. Carlo, the oldest of the Maserati Read more . . .

1964 Mercury Marauder

Mercury has always existed in a Never-Never Land  inside Ford Motor Company. The brand was established in 1939 to fill the huge gap that existed between the luxury Lincoln and the popular-priced Ford, but for some reason, in the 60-plus years, the product has been in existence, Ford execs have been unable to give it a strong identity. 1964 Mercury MarauderCertainly, the mid-priced brands from General Motors —  Oldsmobile, Pontiac, and Buick — and Chrysler’s Dodge division have always had better-defined personas than Mercury, and that has always been to Mercury’s disadvantage. It seems that over the course of its history, Mercury has wavered from being just a tarted-up Ford to a near-Lincoln, which has made it improbable for the buying public to pin down. Of course, in the clutter of the American car market, if a brand has a puzzled image, it really has no image at all. Read more . . .

Jaguar D-Type

There was a time when the Jaguar name didn’t mean aging lawyers and blue-haired matrons. Jaguar D-TypeThere was a time when Jaguars were driven by courageous young men who took them to the very edge of their very high limits. And there was a time when Jaguar was a force to be imagined in the most grueling road racing of all, the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Britain came out slowly from the wreckage of World War II, but by 1948 Jaguar’s William Lyons was chomping at the bit to kick his company up into a higher gear. His daring stroke for the 1948 Earls Court Motor Show was a show car that would become the XK120 sports car.

The swoopy two-seat roadster whose shape, fable has it, Read more . . .

Stutz Bearcat

If a classic American trait is confidence, then Harry C. Stutz was as American as apple pie or baseball. A more confident car guy you are never likely to find, and, to his everlasting credit, Stutz always backed up his confidence in himself with superior quality work.

Born on a farm near Dayton, Ohio, on September 12, 1876, Stutz was only able to achieve  a grade-school education before he entered the work force, landing  a job at the Davis Sewing Machine Company and then moving on to the National Cash Register Company. Stutz wasn’t the type to sit still, despite the long hours. At night,  he took classes in mechanical engineering, and by 1897 he had designed and built his first car, a contraption nicknamed “Old Hickory” because it was built from  a discarded hardwood buggy and scrounged parts. Read more . . .

Porsche 550 Spyder

It is difficult  to separate the Porsche 550 Spyder from the legend of actor James Dean, so why Classic cardon’t we get it all out of the way right now. On September 30, 1955, Dean, fresh off the film Giant, left George Barris’s shop in Los Angeles to go racing in Salinas, a farm town inland of Monterrey made popular  by John Steinbeck. (Dean, of course, had recently starred in the movie of Steinbeck’s novel East of Eden, set in the same location.) The young movie actor was at the wheel of his Porsche 550 Spyder.

By that time, Dean had done more than a bit  racing. A Porsche enthusiast, he had just traded his 356 for the racier, LeMans-winning 550 Spyder, and he was desirous of testing its mettle (and his own) on the track in Salinas. But as he drove toward the sun on that late Friday afternoon along Highway 46,Donald Turnupseed,a student at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo,  was driving home in his 1950 Ford. Read more . . .