The Provenance of 0353 AL - 375 America (1958 to 1974)

Thank you very much Boudewijn and Scott.

I took this well known pic as a model and all the pics of this thread were very useful too...

Thanks again.
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I have only what you can find in the still excellent book of Marcel Massini "Ferrari by Vignale" and then copied by the "barchetta" website:

54/aug/06 - Certificate of origin issued
54/dec/22 - Bianca Colizzi, Roma, I - paid Lit. 4,000,000 "Roma 215282"
55 - converted by factory to a 375 America with 4.5 litre engine, chassis no. suffix "EU" changed to "AL"
56/oct/10 - Harry Burl Chambers, Roma, I - paid Lit. 2,000,000
...
Anyway, the original colour was not dark blue but rather something like metallic grey...

 

Thank you for your contribution. Interestingly the brochure is in French, and not in Italian...

Gr. Martin

 

Scott,

Any idea where in SoCal these shots were taken?

Nice shots of the car and your Father.

 

Scott,

Thank you for taking the time to post this material. As you can see it is universally loved by everyone here.

I have to say, the photos of your father remind me of myself for some reason. Maybe because he appears to be the same age as I am now and he seems to have a similar relation to his car that I do. Call me crazy but I've taken dozen of photos of old worn out parts too. But there's a difference between doing it digitally and doing it with real film.

This really is a great contribution to the site.

-F

 

interestingly, i was at that hollywood bowl concours. great setting. missplaced my photos unfortunately. would love to see any photos you might have of that event.
thanks

 

I'm still trying to get my head around the fact the current owner doesn't want all of this great stuff. Did I read that right?

-F

 

Thanks soooo much. This is great stuff. Got any more? tongascrew

 

Boggles the mind.

It will be interesting to see what forgotten history of the car comes to light as the awareness of this documentation grows.

Thanks.

 

Fantastic thread! Just curious - do you have any idea how your Dad got interested / involved in Ferrari world? It just seems kind of unreal that a guy with a family and a regular (night shift!) job drove this amazing car! Maybe the US posters 'of the era' can comment - in 1958 would this car have been recognized in LA as special, or just seen as some odd foreign contraption?

 

All this may not quite be up to Carter's discovery and having printed out the correspondence for my 353EU file, hopeing no curse comes with it, this is very special stuff.This is what real provenance is all about. We who are really into this kind of stuff salute you. Thanks so much. tongascrew

 

To answer Karen, a lot of us in the F-world at that time were not wealthy; maybe most of us.. We did a lot of borrowing at the bank! We had these cars because we loved them, and we loved the experience of being involved with something very exclusive and special.

While we view this car as something very special now, it was just another Ferrari back in the day. Whether it was one of one, or one of twenty, it was all the same. And some of us shunned the "big block" cars as an engine overhaul cost more than the value of the car.

Sorry if this sounds cynical, but those were different times.

 

Ed; We said! Lampredi's were definitely "shunned" by many, as not only were the engines very costly to work on, but also VERY FEW mechanics knew how to successfully rebuild the engines and there were NO parts available. I always gave Wayne Golomb a lot of credit for being so "brave" in his ownership of the Lampredi's. You are also correct, in the we were lucky in that we had "friendly" bankers who made it all possible.

 

Agreed; witness the substantial number of Mondial/Monza/TRCs that had their Lampredis unceremoniously removed and a nice lightweight, powerful alum Buick v-8 dropped in its place! It was practically a no-brainer if you were racing back then; my dad came within an eyelash of doing that very thing to 0556(0446)MD, he just lacked the funds.

 

Thanks for the reply Ed; I hasten to add I was not asking about the financial side but how an 'average' guy developed such an interest in those times, where did the exposure come from? I'm sure a Ferrari on the streets of LA in 1958 was about as likely as snow! And I guess the 12 cylinder cars are under-represented these days for much the same reasons as the Lampredi engines were then.

 

I was a student at the Pomfret School in Pomfret Conn in the mid 1950s which was just a few miles from the Thompson race track.We would get one of the teachers to get the bus out and drive us on race day to Thompson. Everything from stock MGs to Scarabs,Ferraris, Maseratis Jaguars etc etc raced there.Many of the drivers with their cars stayed at the Ben Grovesnor Inn across from the school. We once set up a Mille Miglia type checkpoint on the road which was a big hit.We also pooled our resources and got a subscription to Autosport which would come each week but took a good month to cross the Atlantic from England. I restored my first car in the machine shop at school, an Austin 7 special. I am sure everyone of my generation has some good stories. I hope we hear some. tongascrew

 

How did one become interested? In my case, just kid of 13, enamored of hot rods and drag racing, reading “Custom Car” etc. My dad was an immigrant factory worker, arriving in America in 1933 from Europe on a boat. In large part because of the war, it took 30 years before he could go back to see his sisters, taking the family on a trip, with some time sightseeing in Paris. It was relatively inexpensive then, the US dollar went a long way, and the gift of a pack of American cigarettes made every train conductor or customs guy happy. On this trip, I was by nature focused on all these curious Citroen Traction Avants and FIAT Topolinos, imagining them stuffed with blown V-8 Chevy 283s. Then I bought a copy of the French magazine “Sport Auto”, with a cover picture of a 250SWB in the Tour de France, from a Paris newsstand with my souvenir allowance – still have it. And I saw a real Ferrari on the street. I was immediately captured by the body design and that noise, hooked. Hey, it had driving lights and a wood steering wheel too! Next I’m home, now buying Road & Track and Sports Car Graphic, reading about Jim Clark, John Surtees, Monza, and this place named Maranello.