The Milliken Bugatti T35A

There is much more to the Milliken Bugatti Type 35A than just an incident at Watkins Glen.

By Pete Vack

According to Bill Milliken, the acquisition of his first sports car was simply elementary. While visiting New York City in 1946, he happened upon a shiny black MGTB, asked the owner if he’d like to sell, wired home for the $1500 necessary to title it in his name and drove it up to Albany.

At a time when the average price of a new American car was about $1200, the TB was a bit pricey, being a 1940 model and right hand drive. It was very similar to the later TC, with the same snazzy wire wheels, upright chromed radiator grille, and the same 54 hp engine, but only 379 TBs were made before the War stopped production at Abingdon.

Milliken was in seventh heaven; his previous transportation was a secondhand Chevy that was “…little more exciting than a grocery cart.” His thoughts of the early Duesenbergs and Millers of his boyhood returned to him and he found himself in a “machine that turned on all my senses and made driving a delightful experience….my childhood euphoria of driving had returned, and I was to never lose it.”

In Albany, Milliken’s cousin and mentor Ed Waterhouse suggested Bill join the new national sportscar club that had its base in Hartford Connecticut. Milliken joined the SCCA and was soon a guest in the home of Russ Sceli, a local foreign car dealer and enthusiast. Sceli would become the second president of the SCCA, and was known for a fine collection of cars including Bugattis. He had just finished the restoration of a Bugatti Type 35A, chassis 4906. Milliken was “bowled over” by the Bugatti, even though he’d only owned the MG for a month or two, Sceli told him he’d take the MG TB and $2000 for the T35A. A done deal. (Read review “Equations of Motion”)

A historic Bugatti

Although not very important at the time, this particular T35A had a great history. American Bugatti Club Registrar Sandy Leith called it “quite possibly the most significant GP Bugatti in U.S. amateur racing history.” Its U.S. history began with George C. Rand, a gentleman driver and an early Automobile Racing Club of America (ARCA) member who established an official Bugatti Agency in New York in the mid 1930s. Rand had fallen in love with Bugattis when longtime friend Hunt Bancroft Smith brought a Type 35A over from London in 1932. Smith had bought the Bugatti from the Malcolm Cambell Agency while on his honeymoon, but his wife hated it and threatened divorce if he didn’t get rid of it immediately. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and Rand was standing in line for the Bugatti and was soon in possession of chassis 4906, which was later photographed next to his Gee Bee racing airplane. Like Milliken, Rand loved airplanes and spent a good deal of time at the Curtis-Wright Flying School in Garden City, New Jersey. He attended Harvard and took some classes at MIT. Later in life, Rand became involved with the Owl’s Head Transportation Museum in Owl’s Head, Maine, where Milliken’s homebuilt plane is still on display.

McClure Halley purchased the car from Rand who in 1934 was in need of money to fund the Bugatti dealership. “Mac” Halley was a mystery then and now. According to Joel Finn, Halley was a lousy driver, and his favorite pastime was spending a great deal of money at Zumbachs in New York modifying his collection of Bugattis, Alfas and ersatz Mercedes (he had Zumbach install a Miller engine into a 1923 Mercedes chassis) complete with a tachometer in the radiator cap. In the rare color photo by Harold Lance of the cockpit of Milliken’s T35A, it is just possible to make out the add-on group of instruments on the left which Halley insisted Zumbach install. Like all of Halley’s cars, the metal surfaces were shined and everything possible was chromed. (Those same instruments which served to instantly identify 4906 were removed by an owner in the 1970s.)

The fickle Halley sold the T35A in 1935 to Dick Wharton, another good looking preppy and friend of Rand’s. When not on the floor of the stock exchange, Wharton was developing his skills as a race driver and the T35A was perfect for the task. But it also served two other drivers, Bob Fuller and Paul Wilson for the next five years in a variety of ARCA events.

ARCA Record for Bugatti T35A, chassis 4906

1935 May 19th, Sleepy Hollow Ring, NY, 3rd, Dick Wharton
1935 June 23rd Briarcliff Manor, NY, 3rd Dick Wharton
1937, August 7th, Alexandria Bay, NY, 7th, Dick Wharton
Sold to Bob Fuller for $1000 in 1938
1938 August 6th, Alexandria Bay, NY, 5th, Bob Fuller
1939 August 12th, Alexandria Bay, NY, 4th, Bob Fuller
Sold to Paul Wilson in 1940
1940 July 6th, Montauk, NY, 7th Paul Wilson
1940, August 10th, Alexandria Bay, NY, 4th, Paul Wilson
1940, October 6th, NY World’s Fair, 10th, Paul Wilson
Sold to Russ Sceli, 1946, restored, and sold to William Milliken

Milliken was not able to pick up his Bugatti until late October 1946, and while he got the MG TB to Connecticut in fair weather, driving back with the definitely open Bugatti met with snow showers and below zero weather. He stuffed newspapers in his jacket and made it back to Buffalo, where the car began its preparations to conquer the 1947 edition of Pikes Peak.

Modifications to 4906

With the enthusiastic help of the (off-hours) team at Cornell Aeronautical Laboratory (CAL) in Buffalo, the Bugatti was lengthened by almost five inches to 98 ¾ inches to meet event wheelbase regulations by using extension blocks of 4130 heat treated steel bolted inside the chassis rails; the front shocks were moved further out, new unit rim and spider steering wheel, steering post and drag links were constructed. A new, heavy duty and much thicker radiator replaced the original and due to that, a new front cowl was created to cover the larger radiator.

Their efforts were well rewarded with a sixth overall…first time racing, the first time at the 100 corner 12 mile course up Pikes Peak, with a car that was now 15 years old. The Type 35A wouldn’t return to the Peak but Milliken would.

Milliken wouldn’t let the Bugatti rest, insisting upon driving the 300 miles from Buffalo to Albany in the winter again, this time with chains and cold weather gear. He made it after a series of breakdowns and mishaps, he finally accomplished the mission, driven largely on the old stagecoach routes.

At the Glen

Becoming a very active member of the new SCCA, Milliken helped lay the groundwork for the round the houses event at Watkins Glen with his new friend Cameron Argetsinger. Milliken drove from Buffalo with the Bugatti (it was, after all, his daily transportation) and qualified for the first Watkins Glen Junior Grand Prix held on October 2nd 1948. The Bugatti radiator and horseshoe grille was replaced and the car looked splendid.

Despite lack of racing experience, Milliken had moved up to fourth after four laps and then passed Haig Ksayian in a supercharged MGTC. Coming down into Thrill Corner the rear end broke away, the car spun, hit the haybales, and rolled over. Milliken was wearing a safety belt and a helmet…rare in those days..so got out from under the car with nothing but a scratched elbow. But as he extracted himself from the Bugatti, Ksayian nearly ran him over. He missed, and the corner became known throughout the world as Milliken’s Corner. Ironically, one minor accident overshadowed the most impressive race record of 4906, in the hands of Milliken and the previous owners.

Milliken’s last race with 4906 took place at Bridgehampton on June 11th 1949. While fenderless cars…aka Grand Prix cars…were allowed at the Glen, the organizers at the Bridge wanted fenders, so a set were fabricated at CAL. At first attached to the backing plates, the fender supports soon fractured enroute to the event, and attached to the frame before the race. It was fun but unsuccessful. “I thoroughly enjoyed the race until I lost it at Clubhouse Corner and bent a steering rod.

Doctor Sam Scher, a New York plastic surgeon, owned several bigger Bugattis and soon Milliken was driving a T51 followed by the ex-Varzi Type 54, a huge, fast, and difficult Bugatti. Again, Milliken and the crew from CAL took the T54 on, and after the original transmission developed an incurable crack, the team adopted a Buick Dynaflow Torque Converter to replace the broken Bugatti manual transmission. Heresy, said some, but the team really had no choice. Besides, the conversion worked fine, but Milliken rolled the T54 at the Glen in 1950, no doubt the only person to have rolled two Bugattis at the same venue.

Millken sold the Type 35A in 1950 to on Ervin Fuller, who reportedly owned it for the next twenty years. From then on the history is hazy, going through Kirk F. White and raced in France for several years. It reportedly re appeared at Retro in 2009 and is now in the hands of European collector Heinz Bachmann, who is returning it to the Mac Halley-Zumbach configuration with extra gauges and other details.

The lead photo was taken by the Editor of a mural in downtown Watkins Glen on Franklin Street. The art is by Bob Gillespie, depicting “Milliken’s Corner.”

Our thanks to Janet Barnes at Bentley Publishing, Douglas and Bill Milliken, and a special thanks to ABC Registrar Sandy Leith for the use of photos from his collection.

Sources

“George Rand, Gentleman Driver”, Al Bochroch, Automobile Quarterly, V17-1
Automobile Racing Club of America, Joel Finn, Garnet Hill Publishing, 1995
Equations of Motion, William Milliken, Bentley Publishing 2008
“Mister Supernatural”, Karl Ludvigsen, Automobile Quarterly, V44-1
www.bugattibuilder.com, thread on 4906, February 16 2009 author unknown