Old friends Alfred and Carlyle Seccombe happened upon a car show while on vacation in Italy this spring, and were charmed by this vintage Lancia Ardea. Built from 1939-'53, it was a little brother to the Aprilia (1937-''49) and shared the larger car's unitized body and V4 engine configuration, but at 903cc, the Ardea was the smallest car yet produced in the V4 layout Lancia had pioneered in the Twenties with the Lambda. The third series Ardea, built from 1948-'53, pioneered use of a 5-speed gearbox in a mass-produced car. The photo below shows the compact 96.1" wheelbase and short overhangs; longer wheelbases were provided for pick-ups, vans and taxis. The Ardea shared pillarless construction with its bigger brother, so when the front and rear doors open along the car's centerline, there is no post obstructing access.
The Seccombes happened upon the car show while visiting the village of Castellabate, about 900 feet above the beach town of Santa Maria di Castellabate on the Mediterranean, in the Campania region. Apparently there are other attractions to enjoy there besides old Lancias...
For example, there are newer Lancias. In the late Fifties, Lancia had built its first front-drive car, the Flavia with horizontally-opposed 4-cylinder engine. With the smaller Fulvia introduced in 1963, Lancia returned to the narrow-angle V4 format, at first with around 12 degrees between cylinder banks. The whole engine was tilted at 45 degrees to make for equal-length axles to the driven front wheels, and the engine was made in several sizes from 1.1 to 1.6 liters. This glassy and well-proportioned coupe designed by Lancia's Paul Castagnero appeared in 1965, and the Fulvia stayed in production until 1976, though Fiat had taken over Lancia late in 1969.
This well-maintained example appears to be a Series 2 car with the 1.3 S engine option, and looks alert and ready for adventure on its alloy wheels. All Fulvias featured 4-wheel disc brakes; Dunlops on the Series 1 were switched to Girlings with a servo booster on Series 2.
The Seccombes encountered this 1965 Vespa with its happy owner, and it reminded me of the Vespa ridden by Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck in "Roman Holiday" a film from 1953...
Earlier this year, longtime contributor George Havelka had spied another Italian machine from the same era as "Roman Holiday", what appears to be a Ferrari 500 Mondial*. Note the right-hand drive, a sign that this car is authentic. So far as we know, nobody has made replica versions of these short-chassis road racers, which in 1953-'54 featured this alloy body designed by Pinin Farina. The 2-liter, DOHC 4-cylinder 500, with head in unit with block casting, received a lower and sleeker Scaglietti body in '55.
A closeup of the spider in California traffic...
Another design from the same era as that first Ferrari Mondial was Studebaker's Starliner,* designed by Bob Bourke for Raymond Loewy Associates. In addition to the pillarless Starliner hardtop coupe, there was an equally sleek Starlight coupe with pillar behind the door. This coupe seems to be based on the '53 version, but that's a guess because the main visible difference on the '54 was a grid instead of this simple bar grille. Invisible differences included a more rigid chassis. These cars were photographed at a fall show in Edmonds, Washington by Denée Foti, who also took the shots for one of our first-ever posts, on the "almost famous" OSCA.
We were disappointed that whoever did such a clean job of customizing this Starliner (it's hard to clean up something that's already so clean) decided it needed a fastback roofline rather than the original notchback. The rear roof area looks too massive, to this designer's eye, anyway, compared with the original….
Jaguars were out in impressive numbers at the Edmonds show. This XK-120 roadster from the 1949-'54 period is outfitted as a road racer, complete with twin fold-down windscreens.
The maroon XK-120 shows is outfitted for road use, and shows the original v-shaped windscreen with graceful curved supports. The grill and center trim strip appear to be from an XK-140, though. The XK-120 grille had thinner, more numerous bars, and the 120 lacked that center trim strip on the bonnet. This car has the thin XK-120 bumpers, however, and lacks the small circular lights on the lower front fenders that you can see on the XK140 below...
This red XK-140 roadster shows off those more protective full-width bumpers, along with that chrome strip running down to the grille. The 140 was introduced in mid-1954, offering roadster, drophead coupe (roll-up windows, thicker padded top) and a fixed-head coupe with expanded space for rear passengers and more glass area, and continued in production until 1957. The XK-140 was the. first sports Jaguar to offer an automatic transmission, though few were so equipped.
The Series 3 Jaguar E-Type, introduced exactly a decade after the Series 1 in April 1971, featured a new 5.3 liter SOHC V12 engine on the 102" wheelbase that first appeared on the E-Type 2+2 coupe, half a foot longer than the 2-seater coupe and roadsters. The V12 roadster was also on the long wheelbase.
The news that Ford Motor Company would soon stop offering passenger cars in favor of SUVs and pickup trucks, with the exception of the Mustang and the vaguely-related Mustang Mach E electric "crossover", has caused some raised eyebrows both inside the car industry and out of it. As if to celebrate the survival of their favorite ride, Mustang owners showed up for a recent show at the Seattle Botanical Gardens, and longtime reader and contributor Veronika Sprinkel caught these photos...
The Mustang was Lee Iacocca's idea of a sporty car to compete with Chevy's Corvair Monza coupes and convertibles. Ford showed a mid-engined, V4-powered Mustang 1* concept car in 1962, but when the production Mustang showed up in notchback coupe and convertible forms in spring of 1964 as a "64-1/2" model, it was a front-engined 4-seater based on the compact Falcon platform, offering 6-cylinder and V8 power. The car above is a 1965; a simplified grille without the vertical and horizontal bars holding up the stallion emblem appeared in 1966.
Two sixes (170 and 200 cubic inches) and two V8s (260 and 289) were offered through the '65 model year, but Ford just offered the 200 and 289 in '66. Transmission choices, with floor shifts, included 3 and 4-speed manual, and an automatic.
This, as the license plate tells us, is a 1966 fastback. The fastback style appeared late in 1964 as a 1965. model, and was also called a 2+2.
Rear headroom was more limited in the fastback, leading to the 2+2 designation. Carroll Shelby started building his GT-350, with mods aimed at B-production class road racing in the SCCA, based on the fastback body. It succeeded it taking championship honors in 1965 through '67. This '66 fastback shows the standard interior with the automatic transmission; Shelby versions had a Warner T-10 4-speed and lacked a rear seat.
The Mustang grew in weight and engine size options over the next 2 body style changes, in '67 and '69. The 1970 version of that 1969 body shell, shown below in convertible and fastback coupe form (there was also a notchback coupe) was the cleaner of the two, and managed to stay close to the original concept of a compact sporty car for the youth market.
Performance versions of the fastback were offered in Boss 302 and 429 versions, and still have collector appeal today. The 1971-'73 body style grew to a size and weight that departed from the original idea, and was replaced for 1974 by the smaller, Pinto-based Mustang II. Neither of those iterations seemed much like Mustangs back then, however, and they still don't today...
*Footnote: For more detail on the Ferrari 500 Mondial, see "1953-54 Ferrari 500 Mondial: Named After a World-Beater", posted here on Feb. 23, 2020. For the story of the classic Studebaker Starliner, you might want to have a look at "Forgotten Classic: Studebaker Starliner from 1953-'54----Sleeping Beauty from South Bend", posted here on Feb. 20, 2021. And our post on the mid-engined prototype Mustang, "The First Mustang: Ford's Forgotten Mustang I" , appeared on August 26, 2015.
Photo credits:
Top through 6th from top: Alfred Seccombe
7th & 8th: George Havelka
9th through 15th: Denée Foti
9th through 15th: Denée Foti
16th through bottom: Veronika Sprinkel
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