People say that the Amelia Island Concours is the friendly 'little village' version of Pebble Beach. Hard to say if they are right as we have never seen Pebble Beach so far. And after the four day experience of hundreds and hundreds of top level cars and the Sunday crowds even more. But at least the friendly part is true, the venue is perfectly organised by Bill Warner and crew members like Ellen Thorne to name just one. And yes Amelia Island Concours is accesible just like as a village. If you're early you can park your car 5 minutes walk from the showfield and when you're late there are very frequent shuttles that will drop you within minutes at the showfield. We visited the auctions of Gooding (Thursday), Bonhams (Friday) and RM/Sotheby's (Saturday) prior to the concours. And Oh My !! none of those were boring experiences! At Gooding's - sorry for a small post-war detour - among nearly $30 million of sales it should be noted that the '56 Maserati 200SI stayed with the owner who wasn't satisfied with the offered US$ 4,700,000 ...wow! Bonhams showed that unrestored goodies are doing better and better with a neat $ 1,600,000 sale of a very attractive 1930 Cord L29 Town Car. The long nose, slanted window, low roof and superior unmolested condition did it. At RM-Sotheby's we felt very much attracted to the Sherman tank like 1932 Marmon HCM V-12 Prototype, by far the most attractive 2 door Sedan of the weekend, but at $ 429,000 just a notch above our budget.
After all this the Concours yet had to start... There is no way to describe the abundancy of toplevel motorcars to be admired and savoured and we will serve you just some tidbits to have an idea. The showfield is a pleasant golf range very near the Atlantic with the Ritz Carlton hotel to welcome the tired traveller, golfer or car collector. One of the best places to see the cars entering the showfield is the narrow shaded down drive from the hotel to the greens. One of the first truly american cars we snapped was this unrestored Model A 'straigh eight' Duesenberg, and with unrestored we mean unrestored. Slightly less scruffy this superior Stutz low roof Coupe (note the steering aid lights). Also on Stutz were Corky Coker and wife. Another great man - Jim Grundy - is admiring a rewarding potential insurance object: the fabulous Duesenberg drophead by Graber as presented by mulitple Pebble winner Sam Mann. Next surprises entering the showfield, the most interesting and daring reconstruction of the Dymaxion and the reconstructed Stutz Land Speed Record car that killed its driver Frank Lockhart on Daytona Beach in 1928. Believe us we could go on for another two pages. And promise, we will return with more plus of course our post-war observations.
Still, amid all concours cars, unrestored HPOF cars, town cars, specials, hot rods, replicas, recontructions, specials, sports cars, racing cars and more there was one that we missed out at the show fields: a most intriguing 1912 Racing Special, a 10 litre 4 cylinder chaindrive of uncomparable beauty, balance and perfection which remained only visible to the visitors of the 'duPont Registry Live' show at Friday night. Tomorrow presented in detail.
(all photos PreWarCar)