Concept drive originally published in Open Road, Summer 1996 As a matter of history, the first Subaru with four-wheel drive was based on the company’s 1300G commercial station wagon, requested in 1971 by the Tohuku Electric Power Company for winter maintenance work. Only 20 were made, but they worked so well civilian models came the […]
Pure and potent: Two Nash-Healeys
History originally published in AutoWeek July 21, 1986 “We usually start it in second gear. There is a chatter in first that you can adjust out but it only comes back in a month or two,” said F. Winston Johns, my guide for the day for a pair of Nash-Healeys. His was a perfectly restored […]
1988-89 Chevrolet Beretta GTU: One hit racetrack wonder
Originally published in Sport Compact Car March 2001 In 1988 Chevrolet went racing in the IMSA GTU class and that, simply, is the reason for the 1988-89 Chevrolet Beretta GTU. Of course, the reason Chevrolet racing is, simply enough, marketing. It certainly has paid off grandly for anyone associated with NASCAR, despite the fact that […]
1982 Lancia Zagato: A car we should have loved more
History originally published in AutoWeek June 26, 2000 You should have regrets, America. But Italy, it’s partly your fault as well. A car with pretty, if somewhat quirky styling, a lusty dohc engine and supple ride and handling should have found greater favor. But by 1982 the Italian automobile industry in America was limping with […]
Porsche Boxster: Highballing the trunk line
Contemporary review originally published in Road & Track Sports & GT Cars 1998 I was on the way home from taking my 14-year-old daughter to music camp at Mansfield University when I stopped at a Texaco station in the little burg of Wysox, Pennsylvania. Earlier, my wife had looked at the Porsche Boxster and said […]
1934 Brewster Ford: Beauty was more than skin deep, but not to the frame
History originally published in AutoWeek October 9, 1995 The Great Depression was no kinder to the makers of luxury automobiles than it was to most other businesses, and perhaps it was even worse. Cars are, even for the wealthy, a deferral purchase. Remarkably, the 1930s produced some of the grandest motorcars ever made, as some […]
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