Prague artist Yuriy Shevchuk has won international acclaim on three fronts; painting architecture, jazz musicians and vintage cars. Born in Kiev in 1961, Shevchuk now works with his son Denis who manages his international and local Czech exhibitions and negotiations among the customers and the online e-commerce. Wallace Wyss recently interviewed Yuriy, while the Editor combed the vast number of paintings displayed on his website, focusing on the cars. [Read more…] about Yuriy Shevchuk, Artist
People
John Mecom: A Texas-sized Legend Part 1
By Harry Hurst
Photos courtesy John Mecom Collection
John Mecom is one of the few people who can say that Roger Penske worked for him. Penske drove for Mecom Racing in 1962-63, arguably, the preeminent racing team in the United States at the time. Operating out of Houston, the team ran multiple cars in events in North America and Europe, with the world’s top drivers and mechanics. But racing was secondary to the main business of the John W. Mecom Company: oil wells, hotels, plastics, natural gas pipelines, chemicals, and more. Although he was only in his twenties, John Jr. played a major role in the company his father founded while he ran the racing team. After winning the Indy 500 in 1966 with Graham Hill, Mecom’s attention turned to another interest, professional football. He brought the Saints to New Orleans and was the majority shareholder in the team until 1984. Harry Hurst recently connected with Mecom to ask him about his racing years.
Before you started Mecom Racing there were other wealthy people involved in racing, like Briggs Cunningham and Lance Reventlow. With your background, did you treat racing more like a business?
Jim Clark’s First Race
By David Ross
ODD looking and totally out of place in an event for sports racing cars, the DKW Sonderklasse might have been but could anyone ever have imagined that the driver in the wacky little German two-stroke saloon car would go on to win countless Grand Prix races, two drivers’ world championships and become recognized across the world as one of the finest single seater drivers of all time.
When he arrived at Crimond, the old wartime airfield situated between Peterhead and Fraserburgh where the Aberdeen & District Motor Club ran races for both cars and motorcycles on the same day, Jim Clark didn’t have the slightest inkling that he was about to experience his first race.
Back by Popular Demand
Story and photos by Allen R. Kuhn
As I start my one-digit waltz once more upon my keyboard, the letters begin to flow. Sometimes they make sense, sometimes not. We’ll do the best we can.
“Back by popular demand” might be a bit of a stretch. There were three guys from Sheboygan who said they wanted to see more Maserati pictures. I started thinking that this would be a most salient time to cull the archives once again, with purpose. The archives didn’t let me down.
The Cars of Émile Claveau Part 4
By Karl Ludvigsen
Read Part 1
Read Part 2
Read Part 3
When war intervened Émile Claveau had almost completed the first prototype of a stunningly advanced envelope-bodied six-passenger saloon with a V-8 engine and aluminium alloy body/frame—the Audi A8 of its day. Claveau named it after the philosopher who had been his consistent inspiration: ‘Descartes’. At the 1947 Paris Salon this was present only in scale model form plus its impressive completed engine. This sufficed as a stage from which Claveau could and did discuss the shortcomings of the existing French makers with visiting President Vincent Auriol.
Peter Mullin’s Legacy
Peter Mullin passed away on September 20th at the age of 82.
VeloceToday has reported many times on the Mullin Automotive Museum he created, beginning with the opening in April of 2010. It was a commemoration of the art deco design era when exquisite art and magnificent automobiles were elements of an artful, futurist culture.*
Over the years, we have been fortunate to have four of the most seasoned, respected and knowledgeable automotive writers visit the Mullin and report back to us in detail. Larry Crane explained the museum’s display of Bugatti furniture; the late Eric Davison searched for something really different; Hugues Vanhoolandt was given a special tour and did his magic with his camera; finally, another museum traveler, Brandes Elitch, opined on the opulent Citroen celebration.
The Cars of Émile Claveau Part 1
One of the French Republic’s most talented engineers produced wave after wave of advanced automobiles. Yet both hands would probably suffice to count all the cars he built. Émile Claveau deserves recognition for his undaunted creativity.
By Karl Ludvigsen
French pioneers, among them Panhard et Levassor, de Dion and Renault, made France the early leader in the production of motors and the promotion of motoring. Soon the French were building bigger and faster cars to compete in road races from city to city. They established the first club for motorists, led the founding of the first international association of motoring clubs and organised the first Grand Prix race in 1906.
Michael Lynch honors Steve Earle (2009)
Exclusive story by Michael T. Lynch
From the VeloceToday Archives, 2009
Last Sunday evening, an era in American motor racing ended. At the traditional prize giving ceremony at the Rolex Monterey Historic Automobile Races at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, Steven J. Earle, by far the most influential person in U.S. vintage racing, announced that the 36-year old Rolex Monterey Historics, which he founded in 1974, was ending.
World’s Oldest Rally Navigator
By Pete Vack
Ninety-five-year-old Frank Shaffer recently placed third in the Fools Rush in Rally in Central Virginia, navigating in the same 1958 Mercedes Benz 190 sedan that he had purchased in Germany when new, and currently owned by Mercedes enthusiast and driver in the event, Chip Hughes.
Now if that’s not a record, it’s close to it. And if not a record, then a damn good story in any case. And if not a good story, then at least an inspiration for the rest of us. Here’s how it happened. [Read more…] about World’s Oldest Rally Navigator
Joe Marchetti by Burt Levy
By Burt Levy
The huge annual “International Challenge” vintage race at Road America is one of the must-do events on the vintage calendar—and I was privileged to be there, sometimes on the sidelines, sometimes covering it for magazines and judging in the concours and sometimes right in the thick of the on-track action as the event became what it is today. It all started for me back in the early 1980s, when my longed-for “racing career” was going exactly nowhere. I’d begun racing in 1971 in a series—maybe more like a plague?—of self-wrenched, under-funded, nickel-rocket and borderline lethal Triumph TR3s that rarely finished a race. Then I met Joe Marchetti. [Read more…] about Joe Marchetti by Burt Levy
Meeting Elly Beinhorn
It was Jonathan Sharp’s photo of the Me-108 in last week’s VeloceToday that prompted long time reader and contributor Aldo Zana to send us this compelling and revealing 2003 interview with Elly Beinhorn, answering the question “Who was Elly Beinhorn?” Thanks to Jonathan for his interest in aeroplanes and to Aldo for this interview- Ed.
By Aldo Zana
Photos from author’s collection
She sits at a coffee table, opposite the door. White shirt and a black skirt. Her snow white hair perfectly trimmed and combed. Bernd, her son, enters first: “Hello, Mom. How do you feel, today? Good? Good, for we’ve visitors.”
Kuhn’s Maserati P2, 1960-1963
Photography and Story by Allen R. Kuhn
My Humble Contribution to the Legacy of Maserati from 1957 thru 1963
Almost everything I read about Shelby states that he was a great car designer. I find it hard to accept the fact that he was a car designer. My feelings are he was great at getting the right people on his team to get things done, and knowing what was available to make it happen. Nothing wrong with that.