The Merritt/Fitzgerald cover from 1968.
Orginally published in 2007
By Pete Vack
Ferrari Historians expound on the first comprehensive book about Ferrari
By the mid 1960s, many used Ferraris were falling apart, found in cheap suburban tract housing behind chainlink fences, the Vignale or Ghia bodywork hidden by tarps, dogwatched by a mut on a rope. Most were in America; Illinois, California, New York, Long Island, Boston, and military ports like Long Beach, Norfolk, Jacksonville, San Diego, although old Ferraris could and would be found in Europe, South America, and Australia.
They were usually in the hands of well-meaning, somewhat knowledgeable foreign car enthusiasts who knew what they had but did not have the time, energy or money to properly restore their treasure. Many were young, but saddled with family responsibilities that precluded investing any grand sum into fixing a car whose value was at the very best purely speculative.
Once such young man was Richard F. Merritt, who had worked at Ford, GM and selling Volkswagens part time, and who realized that the Ferrari would be the next Bugatti. Over the years, Merritt would buy and sell 48 of the most desirable Ferraris ever built, but his main claim to fame would come as the co-author (with Warren Fitzgerald) of the landmark “Ferrari, the Sports and Grand Turismo Cars”. If any one book made the marque, it was this one, hereafter to be referred to as “F&M” for Fitzgerald and Merritt. [Read more…] about The Book That Made Ferrari