Most of us are familiar with the name Von Dutch, even if it is through the bastardisation of his name into a clothing brand. Many of us will also know the names of Ed Roth, John D’Agostino and Al Teague. Offerings of all of these and many other famous car builders were present during the Icons of Speed and Style Auction at the Peterson Museum, Los Angeles, September 26th. This huge collection of vehicles and memorabilia was under the ownership of just one lucky guy.
[more]
Over the years, he had cherry-picked some of the most stunning and sought-after customs, hot rods, and race cars ever built, but a growing family and a recession-hit industry played a big part in his decision to auction the collection off.

Having never been to an auction of this type before, my only experiences were from watching the Barratt-Jackson auctions on television, but suffice to say this was a very civilised affair, with none of the ‘whoopin and a-hollerin’ that I was expecting. In fact, the whole auction was pretty intimate with perhaps no more than 200 people in attendance and far fewer actually placing bids.

Whether it was a result of the recession, or the over expectations of the auction organisers, few of any of the lots reached near their estimated values once the hammer had dropped, indeed there were ‘bargains’ to be had. A 75% finished Ed Roth ‘Tree Viper’ original trike went for just US$3300 (£2062), and the stunning ‘La Jolla’ (pronounced La Hoya) 1951 Chevrolet Custom Coupe built by Harry Bradley only fetched US$24,750 (£15,470). Even the attendance of an original 1969 ‘General Lee’ Charger, used in the television series and signed by George Barris and John Schneider (Bo Luke) sold for a ‘meagre’ US$27,500 or just over £17k. When you look at the value some people put on General Lee replicas, with the heritage of this car, it seemed an absolute steal.

There were many famous faces in attendance, notably D’Agostino and Teague, as well as Larry Alexander, one half of the Alexander Brothers, famous for building the Dodge Deora concept truck which had been heralded as the star of the show, with even the estimated auction price being kept under wraps. Many whispers throughout the auction hall predicted that bidding would top US$750,000, however the Deora failed to claim the top spot with the hammer falling at US$324,500 (£202,820). The king of the auction went to the ‘Little Red Wagon’, the 1965 Dodge A100 wheeler-stander, which almost doubled its estimate with a final bid of US$550,000 (£343,750).

In total, the 80 vehicles and many memorabilia lots raised almost $7million for the owner, with many of the new owners getting the chance to talk with the original builders and drivers of the cars at the event. It was a genuinely inspiring occasion to be in the presence of such an eclectic collection. My personal favourite was D’Agostino’s Firestar 1961 Ford Thunderbird, which again fetched a very reasonable price of US$31,900, or around £20k. Given the huge sums of money that are passed around in America for Rods and Customs, it really does seem a lot of car for the cash.

Needless to say, my relatively empty wallet stayed firmly in my pocket, but at least I came away with a collection of photos and memories from a great day.  You can see the photos on the RSM Flickr stream.

 

Posted on: October 7, 2009 03:16

A few years ago the Japanese Classic Car Show had that 'local' look to it, which is no bad thing but as the years progress, the standard gets higher and higher and the rides keep getting better and better. The shots I've found this year are all saying the same thing - this show has grown to become THE place to see cool J tin. A few years ago would you have thought to go anywhere other than Japan to see the sort of cars we're seeing now at JCCS? I'll answer that for you: No.
[more]
JCCS 2009 took place last weekend (October 3rd) and the pictures and reports are coming in:

As ever, the guys at Japanese Nostalgic Car are on the button with part one of their report, part two following shortly, hopefully. 

Our next port of call has to be Flickr, where the sets are pleasingly common:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/maakuruii/sets/72157622394669275/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/llafranca/sets/72157622394148917/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/haigo_g/sets/72157622517573138/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/picturebot/tags/2009japaneseclassiccarshow/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/75986479@N00/sets/72157622510585836/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jojiluz/sets/72157622393428141/

Obviously those guys have an advantage over me in that they actually went, rather than viewed from the other side of the world. But just before I leave you to go and check 'em out yourself, I'm going to post a few of the faves that I found;

 

Hopefully one day, I'll be there taking shots myself.

Posted on: October 6, 2009 02:44

Some of you may remember the early days of RSM when we used to construct arty 'pages' as features, a practice now superceded by the combination of an entry here on RSM with a link to our Flickr account. The picture above is the front page of a feature on a California scrapyard shot back in 2007 when I spent four weeks out there. Whilst long-term RSM devotees have seen a few of the shots in the feature the rest of the set has lived on my hard drive - until now. 

This week should see the Flickr account endowed with two more sets from the same holiday - Bonneville Speed Week and Wendover by Night. In the meantime, get yoursellf over to Flickr and check out the first lot.

 

 

Posted on: September 27, 2009 02:18

There are a few things that can be divisive within our community and one of those things is definitely the Barrett Jackson auctions.  Held over a three days, from Thursday to Saturday, at different venues each year, the auction originally started out as the Barrett-Jackson Classic Car Auction, but as it gained more modern cars, customs and prototypes it changed its name to Barrett-Jackson Collector Car Auction.  That wasn't the first name change for this particular auction.  The Barrett-Jackson auctions in fact go as far back as 1971 so have a fair amount of history of their own.



The auction is really widely known for the star cars it turns out, high dollar customs, street rods and newer than new concept cars.  The event is so big now that television station Speed Channel cover the entire thing.  Checking out this year’s entries list sees some fantastic vehicles up for grabs, if you've got the money!  A number of the top items over the years have gone for over the $1,000,000 mark, with the top price paid for a car at Barrett Jackson being $5,000,000 for a 1966 Shelby Cobra 427 Super Snake, which was purchased by Ron Pratte a fascinating character in his own right.

People have a problem with Barrett-Jackson because it is perhaps a little soulless, sure it is amazing and sometimes thrilling to see the big bucks being spend on these cars, but it is also an exercise in showmanship as much as the cars value.  People will get high value street rods and customs built, take them to Barrett-Jackson and make money on their creations, which is kind of against the whole ethos of building a car you want.  As Jay Leno says "if you build a hot rod and you don't loose money on it, you've done it wrong".  The real big bucks vehicles would have made their top money collectors prices at any auction, but the spectacle of Barrett-Jackson makes these figures more entertaining somehow.  Another criticism that has been levelled at the auctions is cars being built specifically to sell at the auctions, often being fake recreations, as well as it artificially inflating the price of certain models.  The whole thing has become quite charged within the car community, particularly the muscle car community in the states.



That all having been said, I'm kind of glad it all exists, sure it sucks when cars disappear into collections only to be seen a few years later when they are moved on, but it is comforting to know that whilst my car will no doubt inevitably dissolve into a pile of oxidised metal, someone, somewhere has a nice heated carcoon in which they are keeping some very special cars.

The photos used in this entry have come from this Flickr photostream, from eliotgt, I hope they are cool with us using them.


Posted on: April 20, 2009 06:11