Third Annual Ottawa British Car Day

Our Third Annual Ottawa British Car Day was held Sunday July 14. While attendance was down from last year, with the threat of rain, it was certainly a great success from a NASOC perspective.

The trend this year seems to be the debut of new Singers which have been under long term restoration , squirreled away or simply not close to a suitable show venue. Mad Dogs and Englishmen saw John Slusar’s nearly ready car, plus several others that were grateful to finally find a suitable show venue.

In Ottawa, Ken and Graham Pearse arrived with their ’54 4AD which is nearing the paint shop at this point. Ken is the second owner of the car and had the misfortune of driving more than too close to the edge of the road 50 years ago. With a recently rekindled interest in the car, he and Graham have fast tracked its restoration and aim to be at Stowe in the fall.

Paul Bouchard arrived in his Super Ten with all four cylinders beating in a fine rhythm. While the car still needs cosmetic surgery, it’s amazing how much better an automobile can look when it’s actually running.

The surprise of the show was the arrival of Eugene Abondello and Phil Avis, driving Gene’s newly acquired ’35 Singer Long Tail. Alex Mandeville of British Columbia has long owned this little beauty, but with waning interest, let it go a couple of weeks ago to Gene. The Long Tail and my Nine Sports made a lovely looking couple. I look forward to seeing it at Stowe, where I anticipate this year NASOC will have 4 Pre war cars on display. This should be enough to establish a pre war class on its own.

Consistent with the trend for debut this year, we should see about 4 new cars at Stowe and record attendance. My prediction - 4 pre war cars and 7 post war. Be there for the best attended Stowe yet.

Ottawa British Car Day

The Second Annual Ottawa British Car Day was again a smashing success. Our numbers were virtually identical to last year’s with approximately 155 registrants. We had hoped for more, but the week’s forecast for hot and dry weather turned to a 60% chance of showers for the day and a lot of folks were obviously deterred. The day turned out to be dry, with the exception of a torrential downpour mid afternoon.

The show was better this year in large measure due to a greater diversity of cars present. MG’s were of course there en masse, but fortunately these included a TC several TD’s, 3 TF’s and a Magnette, in addition to the twenty or so B’s. While mine was the lone Singer (Fred Muggleton seems to have entirely hung up his spurs), I was joined by an interesting ’48 Morris Ten (very reminiscent of Paul’s Super Ten), an impeccable Morris Minor, a beautiful Alvis and the first Berkley that I have ever seen in the flesh. The Berkley is a chain driven, two stroke micro car that weighs in at about 750 pounds.

In addition to myself representing NASOC was the omnipresent Robert Moreau. While it goes without saying, I’ll say it anyway. Robert represents the epitome of clubman ship. He has supported us at every event for the past four or five years despite the fact that he has been unable to bring a car of his own. His unwavering enthusiasm and desire simply to be in the Singer milieu is a tonic. The number of people he seems to know, however, no matter what locale, is quite remarkable.

As usual the Singer drew a respectable crowd of interested onlookers, but of course, no prizes. The MG and Jaguar clubs, which are common to both the Ottawa and Hudson/Beaconsfield events, tend to determine ahead of time which MG or Jag they wish to see place and vote in a bloc accordingly. This is a pity, as there were some truly beautiful and unique cars that were far more deserving than the three MG-B’s that placed 1st, 2nd and 3rd.

The one surprise of the day for me was when an elderly gentleman approached and said “ I used to own a Le Mans and ran with a couple of guys named Barnes back in England. I think they had a company named Autosports or something”. Small world.

Speaking of a small world, with the torrential downpour, Robert and I ended up sitting out the tropical downpour in the comfort of BMD 211, watching a group of crazies kick a ball around in the pouring rain.

Peter