Henry Ford Greenfield Village's Testa Rossa swap

The great mystery of vintage machines I suppose......

You really don't know if they 'won or lost" until they sell the Locomobile forward!! LOL!

 

It is virtually impossible for an outsider (that is someone who is neither the buyer or seller) to place a monetary value on a car that is one of one and available for purchase to a limited audience maybe once in a lifetime. The only thing that matters is what the buyer and seller agreed to make the transaction happen. This is why pieces of art are so often described as "priceless." I'm sure the museum did what it had to do to acquire the car they wanted. The museum deemed the Locomobile more valuable to them than the Ferrari. There's nothing wrong with that position.

 

For the records, 0704 finished 4th at the Venezuelan Grand Prix, 1000 kms of Caracas in 1957.
branko
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"Deeming" something more valuable doesn't make it so. It appears the museum could have paid cash for the locomobile, because in the end that is what the artists son planned and ended up with.

Of anyone the Museum should have known what the current and forecasted value of the ferrari was, it was a bad deal.

 

Not once but twice, I provided written offers to purchase 0704/TR from the museum several years before and again just a few months before it was eventually traded.

After being traded, Mr. Ford himself who was at the time on the board and may still be contacted me to see if my offer had been made in good faith and if anyone had contacted me to act on it at anytime, which no one had.

My initial offer was for $4M. My final offer was for significantly more.

Today 0704 would likely command no less than $15M and likely much more. I doubt the car they traded to get would command one quarter that on the open market if it were to be offered for sale.

0704/TR simply has no equal and is likely more valuable than any other single TR of an variant or variation bar none.

Ciao,

Bill

 

$4M..."lost in the (e)mail".....it could (and certainly DID) happen!!!

Thanks for the post!!!

 

Man, you have to be a hard core nationalist to prefer this Locomobile to a 250TR, let alone 704!!! I really can't compare those two cars. It's probably only me, but i don't feel any kind of attraction for the Locomobile. Can't say the same from the TR...

 

It's a very strange museum. Oddly, it seems to know more about trains (and now planes) than cars.

Why is the black Cord on a roundtable in such poor condition?

Why did they put so much money into the airplane display, and not update the car evolution line since 1985, when they added a then-current Honda Accord?

The Miller they have is nice, and the 999 car is worth seeing, now restored. They had much better pieces 30 years ago.

Do they still have the Bugatti 41? If so, they could sell it for a fortune to make up for 0704. If not, I wonder how it left the Museum...

 

Link to info & pictures about Locomobile #16:

http://www.conceptcarz.com/vehicle/z10059/Locomobile-Old-16.aspx




With a lead of over four minutes, Robertson’s Locomobile began the final lap of the race apparently on his way to an easy victory. However, instead of taking a conservative pace, Robertson pushed so hard he lost control and skidded backwards off Plainview Road and destroyed one of his tires. Amazingly, the car was otherwise undamaged. Robertson’s place in history hinged on his skills and those of his riding mechanician Glenn Ethridge in changing the tire. In a swift two minutes and 10 seconds, a new tire was mounted on the rim.

Robertson drove the big Locomobile across the line to claim the 1908 Vanderbilt Cup. For the first time, America could finally boast victory in an auto race against international competition. Robertson averaged 67.3 mph and finished one minute and 48.2 seconds ahead of the Herb Lytle’s Isotta.

 

Yes, they still have the Royale. They brought it to Meadowbrook in '07.

 

You talk about their value as if the Locomobile or the Ferrari are commodities. They are not. They are one of a kind pieces. As such, their "value" in the marketplace is highly variable and depends on which crazy millionaire has a feather up their arse that day and decides they just have to have it.

The Ford museum has the Locomobile now and you don't. There's no use in arguing whether or not they got a bad deal when they ended up with exactly what they wanted. One can argue whether they could have gotten more for the Ferrari at the time had they known that all that Helk's son really wanted was cash and not the car itself. But who knows the exact circumstances? Perhaps time was of the essence? Perhaps the deal was fleeting and the deal would have been impossible without the Ferrari? We can never know for sure. With such high stakes it seems unfathomable to call the sellers bluff.

Again, how is it a bad deal if the museum got rid of something they no longer wanted and got something they have been waiting a lifetime to acquire?

 

I will never understand these americans. Life isn't all about value and money.
The Locomobile, is a piece of history and the TR, just an old expensive car.

 

+1. People so often forget that their opinion of something, often based on very limited information, is not equal to the truth. A deal is a good deal if two parties walk away happy, and if that was the case here then great. The world is not as simple as flogging a TR for $10 mil and then buying the Locomobile and banking the profit. If you don't know the full story behind the deal then you don't know if it was a good or bad one.


Onno

 

Because they left way too much money on the table, most likely the people handling the deal were in over their heads. Museums make all sorts of mistakes buying and selling cars.

Read the posts I think many agree.

 

My dealings and formal written offers were directly to the individual member of the board of directors.

My offers were acknowledged but declined. No counter offer or alternate proposal was made by any of the members of the board of directives.

I learned only about the final trading of 0704/TR after an agreement to trade it had already been made when I was in the process of making another offer.

Regards,

Bill

 

Totally agree. We will never know. Add that the Locomobile is a tremendous car, and there are more cars, tastes and histories in the world than Ferrari´s...

 

You don't know that for sure. Like I've said over and over, just because the Ferrari had a certain value on the open market at the time doesn't mean the museum left money on the table in order to make the deal happen.

More speculation.

I don't know how you can call this transaction a mistake. Both parties seemingly got what they wanted. End of story. Yes, people do make mistakes. But I find it insulting that you would accuse the museum of being in over their heads as if they were clueless idiots who didn't understand or appreciate the "value" of a car that left their collection. When you become the director of the board of trustees of The Henry Ford then you can call the shots and decide which pieces belong in the museum and what resources to expend making it happen.

 

Old 16 is a national treasure, one of one, a car that is truly without peer, and thanks to the deal it's on display for the public forever. There are cars that are comparable to 0704 out there in the world. It is one of many race-winning Ferrari sports racers of the 1950s, albeit one in wonderful condition.

Imagine you were Helck's son. You owned what is arguably the most important brass-era American car ever, one that countless people over the years wanted...when you have a car like that you get to set the rules and anyone that wants the car has to play by them. This isn't about money the museum left on the table for a car that was surplus to their needs, it's about what it took for them to get a car they wanted...and actually, on further thinking, if you wanted 0704 from the museum, it's obvious that cash alone wasn't going to make the deal happen.

Life isn't always about money.

Cris

 

i don't really see any controversy here. old 16 is what they wanted, the terms are what it took to get it and they pulled the trigger. could they have held out for better terms? no doubt. but in the mean time someone else could have met those terms. old 16 is one of one there is no "wait for the next one". as for it's value? the last transaction sets it at a tr + $ want a more accurate figure? go to the board and start offering an ever increasing string of numbers. in any case i think the locomobile is a much better fit than the ferrari in a museum after henry ford.

 

Read post 17 a strong qualified buyer for the TR had made multiple requests, doesn't it make sense to to at least call him back and see if he would pay more than the artists son? Thats deal making 101. With a little more due diligence they could have made a few hundred K more and buy the old race car.

IMO they got buck fever and jumped at the deal rather than playing all their cards.

We just disagree, I think the deal could have been better.

 

With all due respect: so what if it could?


Onno

 

You make a great point. If someone wanted to buy Old 16 from the Ford Museum it would be similar to if you wanted to buy Moss's 722 car from Mercedes. It's probably not for sale at any price, so what it could bring on the market is an extremely academic discussion. 0704 on the other hand has an estimable value and will probably be bought and sold many more times in its life.

So whatever the values of those cars relative to the market at the time, as well as relative to each other, of the two, 0704 would probably be the easier/cheaper one to buy today, given that Old 16's owners have no intentions or incentives to sell it.