According to the NYT, it was a 1972. There's a story about Brezhnev driving Nixon in a Lincoln and nearly crashing it (in the US) around the same time period. Not sure what happened to the Cadillac, but he *did* crash a Rolls-Royce he owned, and that appears to have ended up in a museum in Riga, complete with crash damage. ... View more

Absolutely. Here's a shot of the one that's in private hands (there were two for the movie, Toyota has the other one). It belongs to the president of the Toyota 2000GT club of Japan, and he actually drives it around sometimes. ... View more

For those unfamiliar with the Shelby/Brock rivalry, I'll add that the actual transporter truck used for these runs out to Eastern SCCA races (a Hino truck, of course) is owned by Adam Carolla, and has been restored. There's a BRE Roadster to go with it. It's a cool truck: Max Balchowsky swapped a Cadillac engine into it, though that's long gone and it's LS-powered now. ... View more

You can't really see it with the bodywork on, but I asked the owner for a shot mid-restoration that shows it. Should be up soon! ... View more

Oh very good. ... View more

It's both, I suppose. The 280ZX was one of those cars that came with the "Datsun by Nissan" badges during the company's changeover to just plain Nissan in the early 1980s. ... View more

The chocolate gun was mailed to you because you were issued a gun and a badge upon joining French Car Twitter. ... View more

Ooh Dolphin Blue would be such a beautiful colour on a Lowlight. Sounds like a great build. ... View more

That's one of the sedan-based Type 34s. ... View more

I think you have to appreciate that sourcing historical photos is a bit of a minefield in terms of publication permissions. There's a great shot of Exner and Segre with one of the Ghia Chryslers, but this stuff isn't old enough to be public domain yet, so you kinda have to work with what you can get your hands on. I thought my editors did a great job with photos here - the '54 MM car-to-car shot is amazing. ... View more

Boana's influence is a little downplayed here because I wanted to keep the focus on Segre, but he was a really interesting character too. It was he who drove the "secret" VW down to Turin, using his connections to make sure nobody knew Ghia had it. ... View more

Fair, but I meant this was a first-gen Ram. I suppose I could have put something in there about the Power Wagons, and in fact, the owner of this truck is currently restoring a '46 PW. ... View more

There's also a clever VW TDI swap (retains all Jeep ancilliaries) from an outfit called COTY that's local to me. It's an offshoot from HPA, so they know what they're doing. ... View more

It's a bit morbid, but they also built a funeral coach version. Apparently the Airstream Heritage Center will have one on display. ... View more

Well, the idea here was to keep the focus on the Airstream because it has the longer-running and better story. I will note that I have found an extremely well-restored Clark Cortez locally, and am working on maybe giving the Clark Cortez its own feature. They're really cool machines and have all kinds of weird associations. Vincent Price owned one, and one picked up the nickname "The Lobotomobile," and THAT is quite the story. ... View more

All steak no side dishes. This is a great review. ... View more

Sam's description of the speed wobbles from the passing truck made my hair stand on end. Between 1947 and 1950, two Czech adventurers named Jiří Hanzelka and Miroslav Zigmund drove their Tatra T87 all over Latin America and Africa, some 70,000 miles. When they returned, the iron curtain had fallen, and ordinary Czechs were no longer permitted to travel. The story of their trip was allowed to be published, and their radio programs and stories provided vicarious escape for tightly-controlled populace. Hanzelka and Zikmund would go on to be 20th century eastern europe's most popular authors. So, while the T87's penchant for dispatching high-ranking Nazis may be apocryphal, it really is a machine that represented freedom. ... View more

Photo licensing and publishing permissions are always a bit of a headache for various reasons, but on reflection I really should have tried a bit harder to hunt down a photo. I'm choosing to blame, er, brain damage from standing too close to the Waco when they fired it up. That thing was LOUD. Here's Elsie's recent Heritage Minute: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stnMHGw8qkQ&ab_channel=HistoricaCanada ... View more

Some footage of an Iroquois being tested: https://youtu.be/Q-UHj-QOEOc I once was able to ask Gen Chuck Yeager about the AVRO, and he said it wasn't very good. The avionics weren't sorted out yet - but with more development, it could have been such a cool plane. I would love a Ford GT (built by Multimatic in Markham, ON) to wear the AVRO's livery.  I also read something from an AVRO test pilot who said they once buzzed a nearby F-86 Sabre squadron on the US side. As a high-speed interceptor (as you point out, not a fighter, mea culpa), the Arrow was overhead and gone before the Sabres could scramble. If this actually happened, I imagine it didn't help relations among the brass of both countries. ... View more

One of the flight museum's docents had been an air cadet in Ontario, and had actually toured the factory where the Hurricanes were built as a kid. They had a little display set up to Elsie in the hangar.  ... View more

Art sounds like quite the character and a great friend. ... View more

That's very kind, thank you. Although it *is* a little disturbing how I'm basically That Pony Guy now. ... View more

I took these shots at Porteau Cove, so yes, Howe Sound. We had a Bricklin along for the drive too, eh? ... View more

I mean, I'm Canadian, but: https://www.toyota.com/86/ It's Toyota's fault, really. It should have been called the 86 from the start, instead of the FRS and so forth. The name is an homage to the AE86, the "hachiroku", or 1980s Corolla GT-S, which was a pretty decent little car. ... View more

You know, the odds are that Tatra you saw belonged to one of these guys. John drove his down to Boston.  ... View more

Thanks so much! Believe it or not, these photos were shot with my old Canon T3i Rebel and the 18-55 kit lens. I am currently moving to mirrorless with a Sony A7 and a 24-105 for flexibility. Over the past few years, I used a Sigma 18-55 on a Canon body. The most important thing for any car photography, I find, is a good circular polarizer. ... View more