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Lubin racing

The Hobby of Beverly Hills’ Joe Lubin Part 3

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Carroll Shelby takes the Lubin 250F out for a couple of laps at Riverside before the 1960 Times Grand Prix for sports cars. [photo; Willem Oosthoek Collection]

Story by Willem Oosthoek

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The Birdcage sale left Lubin with one other competition car, the “piccolo” Maserati 250F. He had acquired the car at the factory in late 1959 with his friend Bruno Ferrari, 12 years older and the owner of Latrobe Construction in Pennsylvania. They bought it with the November 1960 U.S. Grand Prix at Riverside in mind, the season-ending Formula One event. It was chassis 2533, previously owned by U.S. privateer Temple Buell.

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The Hobby of Beverly Hills’ Joe Lubin Part 2

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Los Angeles, November 1959. The spanking new, just arrived Lubin Tipo 61 on display in Los Angeles. No, that is not actress Barbara Eden, but JoAnne Pickens, mother of Greg Wood, who supplied the photo. The others are unidentified. [Photo: Greg Wood Collection]

Story by Willem Oosthoek

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It is doubtful that Alfieri would have made the commitment to Lubin for a larger Birdcage engine so quickly if he had not already been in the process of enlarging the 2-liter unit into the 3-liter range. As a result, Lubin received the first Tipo 61 ever built, the 2.9-liter chassis 2452.

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The Hobby of Beverly Hills’ Joe Lubin Part 1

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A 1957 publicity photo, showing Bob Drake in Joe Lubin’s 1.5-liter Bobtail Cooper/Climax next to his wife Mary Davis. Mary is at the wheel of Bruce Kessler’s 2-liter Ferrari 500TR, a former Johnny von Neumann car. [photo: Joe Playan collection, courtesy Jerry Entin]

Story by Willem Oosthoek

Today only a few surviving California motorracing enthusiasts seem to remember the name of Joe Lubin. Yet, Lubin’s activities were a major part of the West Coast sports car scene from the mid-1950s to the early 1960s. After all these years it is pertinent to go back in time and revisit his contributions to the sports.

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