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Fate of a Austin 7 - Can Anyone Help?

mbenne

master brummie
Dad wrote lots of memoirs in later life. The piece below concerns his ownership of two cars and in particular, a Austin 7 he acquired from his brother, which may have been spared the scrapyard, temporarily?

Mom, Dad and I lived with my Grandparents in Cranespark Road, Sheldon until 1956 before moving to our own house, a short distance away. In the early 1960s, while on the prowl with friends in gully territory we came across a Austin 7, parked at the rear of a garage in Whitecroft Road, Sheldon. It had been painted in Highway Patrol livery, looking like something out of the Keystone Cops. It was rather dirty and looked as though it hadn't been used for some time. I cant recall whether I learned about this vehicle before or after our find but this is how it goes.... The car was eventually acquired by some lads who had repainted it and used it tour the USA and had appeared in a local newspaper article. This would have been sometime between 1953 and 1963. I know of other attempts to drive a Austin 7 across the US but this was specifically using a car in Highway Patrol livery.Can anyone throw any light on this?

ps what I find strange is that my Dad didn't pass his driving test until the early 70's, was it the norm to be able to drive a car with only a motor cycle licence????
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In 1952 I did a swap with brother Maurice, a tape recorder for a 1929 Austin seven car. This old wreck spent more time being reconditioned than it did being driven on the highway. Pegg (Mom) would accompany me to the scrap yard. She could always spot the bits and pieces. She had a keen eye for such things. She had had much experience watching her dad over the years. He’d had an assortment of vehicles.

Our monster was named “The wreck”. It was composed of so many bits from so many wrecks it seemed the most appropriate title. It did provide tuition of mechanical improvisation though and saw a few outings for all the trouble that went into the repairs, but its life was short lived. It was eventually given away to a friend who was keen to put more work into its reincarnation. He didn’t intend it to be driven on the road and intended to use the engine only as a means of the driving force of some machinery in his workshop. We never bothered to find out about its ultimate fate.

For a while we were back to the motorbike again.
Motor repairs and maintenance were still very much in the forefront of weekly pastimes.
Pegg’s dad was always finding something to tinker with – Or trade swap for another model. It seemed that the mechanics had become a way of our daily life and was with us to stay.

Our next monster was another old wreck, a 1938 Morris van.
Pegg’s dad had bought it with the intention of restoring it. It had proved a bigger problem than he had imagined. I bought it from him for £16, then I too realised what a lot of junk it was. Had I have been aware of its true condition at the time, I would have refused it and told Pegg’s dad to keep it for himself.

Spare parts for this were easily come by. We again obtained our needs from the local junkyard that we had visited before.

The bugbear was the untold amount of safaris to the scrap yard and the involvement of removing the parts. This vehicle saw a few outings in between full restoration and was used to go fishing while cinemas and theaters took a back seat. Our motorbike was used mainly for transportation to and from work and the van became our new toy.
 
Probably totally unconnected but late 1950 - early 1960s I remember discussing scrap cars with my friend in Goldthorne Avenue, saying that they could be bought for a few pounds, (can't remember exact amount), and his mum said if we could find one for that amount she would buy it for us. We never took her up on her offer. I think we had something like an Austin 7 in mind and as ten year-olds (I guess) it would have just been something to keep us amused at the bottom of their garden.

I wonder if your 'Highway Patrol' story had been heard by us and think a scrap car was a possibility, bearing in mind that car owners were still exceptional in those days. (At that time the only vehicles parked on Goldthorne Avenue overnight was a tipper truck belonging to Nicklin's and an artic belonging to Canning's, (with glass carboys packed around with straw in an open weave steel basket).
 
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