My first British car experience, what's yours ?

My neighbor who got me into antique cars in general arrived in the neighborhood in a black 1959 XK 150 roadster. I vividly remember sitting in between the seats driving down two lane roads and listening to that dohc six. Wow! during a year or so I was introduced to car shows and drove the Jaguar to most of them. The Jaguar was black on black leather with silver wire wheels, white walls and obviously a 4 speed. Wish I had a picture of it. Funny now that I own an MG and am looking forward to getting it on the road in a month or so with help from the club.

What's your first British car expierence ?

No rides from magnanimous neighbors here. Always admired from afar, I had to buy in to get my first real British car experience. Got my first LBC, a 77 Carmine Red B, in 1995. Never looked back.

I bought an old beat up 71 midget in 77. I was proud as hell and trying to impress a girl by driving her home from school. Traveling down the expressway the bonnet flew open and I screemed like a girl (no offense ladies) That was the last time she ever talked to me.

I learned to drive in mine. On my first driving lesson the brakes lost pressure and I blew right through a stop sign at 45 mph and had to follow that with a sharp turn to the right, getting the car sliding sideways and tires squealing. Some old guy flipped us off from his front porch.

I can barely remember the time that I didn't have an M.G. in my life. My first experience was probably being buckled into my father's '65 B, which is now my '65 B.

When I graduated from high school my parents bought me a brand new VW Beetle. Nothing against VW's, but they weren't exactly cool. Three years later, still a sophomore at Georgia Tech, I decided I wanted a cool car, and for some reason, I'm not sure exactly why, I decided I wanted an MGB. I was 21, it was 1974, and the last of the chrome bumpers, the ones with the sabrinas, were in the showrooms. My mom went with me to Buckhead, I think the place was called Atlanta Imports. I was wearing a white t-shirt and blue jeans and looked like I had just finished cutting the grass, but I guess because my mom was with me the salesman agreed to take me on a test drive. I was sold then. I saved every dime I could make at two jobs to pay for the insurance, sold the VW for $1700, and my dad cosigned my first loan at his credit union so I could buy a brand new bracken roadster for $4700 and change from Hix Green Buick. I worked two jobs in the summer and one during the school year to make the payments and pay the insurance, which was $2000 a year back then - since I was under 25 and had a couple of citations. I met my future wife a couple of months after I got the MG, and we dated in it. I kept it for three years and then traded it in for a Ford Fairmont!! [color=#FF0000]CAN YOU BELIEVE IT - A FORD FAIRMONT OF ALL THINGS!!![/color] [color=#0000FF]STUPID!![/color] [color=#CC0066]DUMB!![/color] [color=#FF0000]IDIOT!![/color] I'd give my eye teeth for that MG right now! My dream is to own a 1974 bracken chrome bumper MGB roadster with autumn leaf interior again before I die. MAN, I WISH I'D NEVER SOLD THAT CAR!!!!

After spending High school dreaming of a 57' Chevy, a friend asked me to help him work on an MGA (a rustbucket sitting in the woods) at his neighbors house. I ended updoing my first paint job, building my first set of SU carbs (out of a big box of parts), and a number of other things on a 76' MGB for his neghbor instead. I got to do alot of driving it around to work any bugs out. Recieved the MGA, and another even worse one as payment. Something about them just spoke to me, and I haven't wanted a 57' Chevy since, now I want more LBC's than I could ever hope restore.

My cousin came down the street in her MG TD in the late 1950s. It clattered and roared through its exhaust and was great fun to be in. I was too young to drive but my mother drove us around in it while my cousin was away. Later, I got a new Ford Anglia 105E in 1960 and enjoyed it immensely through my high school years. In those days it was possible to do amazing things with a girlfriend in a very small car. I won't discuss what those things were but they would be impossible now at my age.

The Anglia convinced me that English cars were the best and since then I've rallied through the late 1960s in a TR-4, seen a friend go end-over-end in a Jaguar XK-150 and survive, watched Bob Tullius at Marlboro, and settled on MGBs and a Sunbeam Alpine for my wife.

British cars are well built of thick metal. Just right to survive into the world we see around us now.

In 4th grade my best friend's next door neighbor had a TC sitting in his side yard. This would have been about 1964. The car looked to be in nice shape, but wasn't running. Many people approached him about selling it, but he refused. I moved, and don't know what happened with the MG. I should ask my friend, because we are still in touch. The TC might have had some influence on both my friend and I, because he now has two Rolls Royces!

Being brought home from the hospital in a Morris 8 right after I was born. :)

if you look at my avatar,, that was taken in 1973 with my wife to be
i married her in 1977 and had to sell my first MGB,, gorgeous teal blue 1966 Roadster
i told her then i wanted to get another one when time was right
well 32 years later... house empty of kids i bought a 1979 Roadster
i would love to get another 66
but life is great in the 79

Been driving em, and owning em, since age 16 -- which was just few years ago ;)

Kindergarten, walking to school one morning with my friend in the rain when his dad pulled up next to us in what I believe was a TR4 and gave us a ride the rest of the way to school (couple blocks).

Next contact was in high school looking for a car and ended up buying a 1965 MGB. My dad took me to get it and after I bought it he said "you drive it home". I learned how to drive a stick driving it home.

My Dad had a '71 MGB that he bought new. It was his every day driver, which is bad when it goes through salty Ohio winters. I was born in '66 so this was the car I remember well and loved. I would sit on the Columbus yellow pages so I could see over the dash. He put the car in the barn in '77, I think, mostly rusted away and about 110,000 on the odometer.

I asked dad in '81, when I was 15, if I could have the car. He said if I could get it running it was mine. "It was running when it was put in the Barn." I did all the work myself with my Dad's guidance. I learned alot and drove it for a year. I even put another engine in it from a loner car that my Dad got years before, but it really wasn't road worthy. If I would run through standing water and I would soak the inside of my leg from the holes in the floor.

When I turned 17 I had saved about $3,500 to buy a new used car. After about a month of looking at everthing from a beater '69 Camero to a used Honda Civic. I found him and it was even in a nearby town. The ad was simple '73 MGB covt. 20,000 miles $3,900. My Dad thought he might take $3,500 ,but if not and it was nice, he would loan me the difference. It was perfect and still even smell new to me, he took $3,500, and I still have it today.

Back in the mid 70s, our next door neighbors and my parents best friends had a XK120. I can remember that Jag going down the street the last time around 1975. I do know that he paid $100.00 for it in 1969. A couple of years later he bought a 58 TR3. As far as I know, 1975 was the last time the Jag has been driven. He still has both the cars in inside storage at his restaurant. They have been there since the early 80s. He is in his seventies and says he will restore them when he retires! I have tried to give him hints to at least sell me the Triumph! I can also remember the girl across the street had a boyfriend with a brown MGB. I remember the B and do remember that he had long hair. My first B was a 78 model when I was 16 back in 1983. I really wanted a Spitfire (cool hood), but my dad thought a B was much more solid. He was right.

Back in 77, my neighbor had a pillow dash roadster, primrose yellow. I remember he gave me and his brother a ride to high school one morning when it was about 10 degrees out.

Got my first MG experience and job at age 12.....cleaning bumper tape and inspection stickers off brand new MGAs (my neighbor was a BMC dealer). Got my first MG (1961 MGA) at age 17. Picture taken in fall of 1962.

Picture it , the year 1969 , Christmas , a little box under the tree. I was 14 years old . The box contained a key . Outside in the snowy driveway was Billys first car , a field car . My Dad bought me a 1959 English Ford Consul convertible . It took me a little over a year to destroy it. Then I bought my first MGB from a junk yard and fixed it up for when I got my drivers license. I drove that MG for 11 years.

Glad to see there's a few on the board in my age group.

1966 I was stationed in California and 2 of my friends had British cars, one had a 61 Bugeye Sprite - no heater or at least it didn't work in the mountains, but then the side curtains leaked anyway. My other friend had a MG Magnette, but I forget the year. Fast forward a couple years....I came home in 68 after my first tour in Vietnam and bought a 65 MG Midget. Sold it after I returned in 70 from my second tour in Vietnam. Spent many a year in between with mostly Corvettes and now I recently bought the 64 MGB to fix up and enjoy....top down and wind in the face.

My father drove a series of Anglias, Prefects, Ford Consuls and Zephers as I was growing up. My first car was a 1958 Buick that I bought smashed from the owner of the garage where I was working during high school. My first new car was a 1966 Sunbeam Alpine, sold for a 1968 Firebird Spring (OHC 4 barrel six) when I got married. Have had three MGBs since, a '63 Roadster and two '77s. Presently have a 77 converted to chrome bumper with a Rover 3.5. Resisted the urge to buy another Alpine a while ago but am now regretting it. Had lots of British bike experience back then too........AJS, Royal Enfield, Norton, BSA and Aeriel.

Dad had a 72 V12 Jag E for 19 years. Rode in it a bunch, just let it go about 8 years ago.

When I was a kid, I read a series of young adult books - one of which was called "Bucket of Thunderbolts" It was about a MGTF or MGTD and road racing. I got the itch then and bought a MGB thirty five years later. That was 10 years ago....

1960...best bud had a '58 MGA. Lived in it when not in school. 1963 bought my 1st car...'53 Morris with new motor. 1965...1st sports car, a Morgan 4/4 series v competition. 1966...1st MG, an MG 1100 sedan (the ign key was identical to the Morgans). 1976...1st MGB, a '67 roadster; still have it. 1999...1st MGB GT, a '71 with O/D; still have it. (The Morgan is currently co-owned with my bud and most pieces have been collected for complete restoration).

Great topic Steve:thumbup:

I rode with my Red Cross instructor to class in a TR4 which wet my whistle, and then in college, one of the guys in my dorm had a Grampian grey GT that struck my fancy. It was quite a few years until I got to own my own though.

In the early 60's my sister's boyfriend had a yellow TD - I fell in love with it, and in 1965 I bought my first one - a nice black TD for $1000 that I drove during my high school years in Florida. Even then Moss was the source of my parts, they had a small printed catalog and of course all orders went by mail to them (No 800 numbers or credit cards then). Shipping was either by post or railway express; I remember going to the train station to pick up the new bumper that I ordered.

The older brother of one of my high school friends had first Fiat 124 Spider and later an MGB. My friend got to drive them when older brother was away at college but he would never let me (or anyone else) drive them. It took me 30 some years but I just bought my first European two seat convertible just a weeks ago in late October. Funny thing is... if the guy selling a Fiat Spider hadn't sold it the day before I called him I might be on the Fiat forum.

Kevin

My parents had a Mk 1 Ford Consol (light blue with a beige top half = it looked terrible!) when I was a little kid in the '60s.
They sold it in '72 and bought a '67 VW Beetle (sloping headlights) which dad kept as his only car until his death two years ago (so same car for 37 years!!) and I got it in his will.

High School, 1972(ish), I took a ride in a friend's Midget. It had wire wheels and I thought it look soooo different from the muscle cars everyone else (who had a car) was driving. In the summer of 1973, I got a short ride in a black Lotus Europa. In 1975, my first OIC, a feminist 2nd Lt named Paula Thayer, gave me a few rides home in her MGB-GT. It was a maroonish color. We were based at Minot AFB, ND. I can remember them like it was yesterday.

Now, where did I put my pants...?

Here is Aust we mainly had Pommy cars. However my first real experience was my brother bought a white Bugeye with huge black racing stripes when I was 13. Boy I loved that car,we drove it on holidays with my brother and mum on the seats and me squeezed between them.
Bought my first sports car as an exrace car bugeye and spent 8 years rebuilding it for the street. Drove it for 13 years then sold it to a friend who still has it and races it.
Here is a youtube vid about driving it outback Aust to raise money for Parkinsons Disease.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCTRNTxlr-k

and here he is racing it

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2MGLmYRKX0


Am now building over the next 5 years my GT with a rover V8 etc..... My mate is also obsessed and is almost through a complete ground up no expense spared MGA resto after owning 2 Bs. My GT will possibly be my last sports car as I plan to take it to the grave with me...

In the early high schools days (I grew up in Hap's part of the world) my older sister's best friend was a very pretty blonde southern girl. She bought a new '67 red B that she would cruise around in, a quite fetching sight. Her job took her out of town at times and she'd hand the keys to me say, "Why don't you drive my car around while I'm gone?" I had a blast up in the hills with that car and it set the MG hook firmly. Never wanted a muscle car after driving that MG.

Was standing my post as a Marine Gate Sentry is South Carolina in 1982 when my buddy came back from a 3 day pass from his home in Richmond Virginia. He pulled up to the gate in a white 71B with wire wheels. What a cool car. My primary transportation was a motorcycle back in those days. By December of 1982 I found a 72B in Charleston SC bought it (first loan) and traveled everywhere I could.

Mark

My 1st MG was a 1967 almost new 1600 miles for some reason I became much more popular in high school. (picture taken in 1969)

Chuck

I used to hang out at a local gas station and one Sunday late morning arrived to find out that they were the tech inspection site for a road rally. I had never looked at sports cars up close before and was blown away. The drivers and navigators were all very friendly and answered my annoying questions, and I said to myself "I'm gonna get me one of those someday!"

Best topic in a long time, great stories! I was about 10 when I read "The Red Car" and asked my Dad, "What the heck is an mg?" He explained what it was and told me there was an old lady that had three mga's in her back yard in our town. So we went over and asked her if we could look at them. I was hooked at that instant. Never got the mga's, but in '98 I was finishing my last week of finals in law school when I found my '68 in the classifieds. I basically paid the $1,500 with my credit card, but I'm glad I did! I'm up to three mgb's and a hillman.

When I was in high school, a good friend of mine bought a Midget. It was so small I could hardly get in and out of it and hated the car.

Then, another friend was given a brand new 1975 MGBGT for a high school graduation present. It was a lemon from day one. The dealership finally ended up welding the oil pan onto the engine to try to stop the oil leaks.

On Memorial Day in 1977, a Psychiatrist that lived in my neighborhood was driving his brand new white, MGB to the local community pool for a party. However, he had already had too much to drink and managed to turn the car sideways and took down our mailbox and wrapped the car around the telephone pole beside the mailbox totally it. He then tried to sue us saying that the mailbox destroyed his car - he lost!!

I was never was overly impressed by MG’s. Then in 2000, a friend of mine gave me their 1973 MGB that had been sitting in a barn for ten years. I have been working on it ever since and it has been a fun toy.

MY FIRST LBC

When I was a young man of 19, just coming home from my six months of active duty in the Minnesota Army National Guard, from Fort Leonard Wood Missouri. And getting back into the swing of civilian life, doing the chores again on the family farm, working with my Dad building house’s, and other odd jobs. I met Ross Pugsley, a year or so younger than myself. He was the son of my Dad’s friend, Donald Pugsley. They had taken a job running a farm in Texas, with millionarire/philanthopist /earth mover manufacturer, LeTourneau.
They had worked there for about two years when they decided to return to Minnesota in Rush City, Minnesota.
Ross had bought a 1961 Austin Healey Sprite in Texas, and drove in home to Minnesota. When he returned, he had picked up some Texas slang. Quite a bit in fact, as he called the Sprite, a ‘Spraat’ When he told me what he had bought, I had to question him several times before I could understand what kind of car it was.

But then back when I was still in high school, and they were building I35 near Pine City, a road construction worker had driven his early 50’s Austin Healey Le Mans into town where I had a chance to see this car and talk to him. I was really hooked, as a young man had seen
and talked about owning and driving ‘foreign sports cars’ like MG’s.
Then later, in high school, read the book, ‘The Red Car’ It was about a MG TC that had been wrecked, rebuilt, and raced. This was far from the life I had grown up in, riding around in, and getting my drivers training from my Dad, in 1950’s Dodges with their fluid drive clutches, or non-syncromesh transmissions in his 1952 3/4 ton pickup.

Well to get on with the story of my first LBC. Ross’s car needed a engine rebuild, as it was smoking and leaking oil, and not running well. So he pulled the engine and sent it off to a friend who worked for one of the dealers in the city. This friend proceeded to rebuild the engine in his basement. And while Ross waited for this to get done, he kept pestering me to give him a hand putting it back together when he got it back. So being the car nut I am, agreed

Well it finally came, and we got ‘er back together, and running. But it was leaking fuel from those awful cork glands on the jets, and the water pump was spraying water back unto the ignition wires and cap. Needless to say it ran terrible. Ross’s solution was to ‘break it in’ by doing what Phil Ethier calls, an ‘Italian Tune-up’
Translated, means, revving the engine to high rpm’s and driving like mad. Well a few days later Ross let me know that in driving around town had skidded off the road into a telephone pole, breaking it off at the bottom. And as he couldn’t get it to run right and was very discouraged, disappointed that it didn’t have a bunch more power, decided to bail out of the car while he was ahead.

He offered to sell me the car!

Shocked and surprised, I didn’t think I could afford it, nor was I capable of rebuilding the wreck, to say nothing of getting this complicated, sophisticated ‘foreign sports car’ running right. After all, these S.U. carburetors were the ‘closest thing to fuel injection’ that you can get. As Ross had told me.
Wow!
This car has rack and pinion steering, and a four speed transmission, a tachometer, and other gauges, plus these sophisticated S.U. carburetors!

I gave it a couple of days, and told him on the condition that I could pay for it over a period of several months, store it in his Dad’s pole barn and let me work on it there.
His Dad agreed to those terms, and promised that he wouldn’t let my Dad know.
Whew!
Because I knew my Dad would never go along with this, and as I understood the law, couldn’t sign for the car myself, as I was not 21 years old yet.
[Don’t know if this was true or not in 1964]

Well the left front of the bonnet was pushed in quite hard, the lower control arm was bent, but the steering seemed to be OK. I proceeded to tear it apart, and to assess the total damage. And then made my first trip to ‘the cities’ to buy parts from the dealer and looked for an used bonnet. Well Han’s Auto parts had a bonnet that had been smashed in on the right side. So I drove down to Washington Avenue, at their old location, and brought that home in the trunk of my first car, a 1956 Plymouth two door hardtop. [Red and white] with the two speed pushbutton drive automatic. 270 c.i. V8.
And started to collect parts, and plan how to get this all done.
I found a body shop in Pine City that said they would work on it, and brought it into town. worried that Dad might find out.

Well this shop was located near the south end of town by the railroad tracks. But it sat and sat for what seemed like months to this then 20 year old. Finally, I asked them if they would do it, and they said they were too busy. So across town to another shop near the Plymouth dealer behind a service station. Where they got to work on it, and even let me help some. I did some of the sanding and other trim work. [what little there is on a Bugey] They proceeded to cut both bonnets, in two, and weld them together. Welded over the old antenna hole, and sanded and paint the car.
If only I could remember how much they charged me. If memory serves me, I think I paid $225 for the car, and still ,had less than $800 in the car when it was done. But please don’t quote me, that’s just too many years ago.

Well here’s where the story gets exciting. One day I told my folk’s I was going into town to take care of some business.
Well turns out Dad followed me to town, and as I was working, pulled in and got out of his car.
He asked me, ‘What are you up to?’
My answer,’working on a car’
He said, ‘Whose car is it?’
My answer, ‘mine’
So he comes in, takes a look, and not remembering all that was said, I do remember, him saying,
‘A Fool And His Money Are Soon Parted’

Nor do I remember if he asked me how and where I bought it. My growing up and becoming independent was difficult to say the least. Dad really wanted to control much of what I did, thought and believed, and owning a foreign car wasn’t in the plan.
After all, he was a ‘Dodge Man’
But to his credit, he didn’t make too much of a fuss. Mom was much more accepting.

By this time, my 21st birthday had come and gone, I had the car out by the freeway, south of town at the Sinclair station, [Hwy 70 & I 35] replaced the water pump, and fuel leak stopped.
By October, in frustration at not having any say in the farmin’ arguing with Dad about various things, decided it was time to leave.

So off to the ‘city’ found some college friends of my brother in-law & sister to live with. In a big old house between Portland and Park Avenue in south Minneapolis. $100 a month rent divided between 5 guys was cheap. Got a job driving truck/fork lift, throwing mail bags at Billy Graham Evangelistic Association.
Whole $1.25 an hour!
A few months later a friend from work rode with me and drove the Sprite to my place in Minneapolis.
And early the next year in February of 1966 traded the car for a year old ‘65 MGB. that car had wire wheels, was red and had about 12,000 miles on it. The salesman at B& K Imports was John Nardi, who still in his eighties sells cars for Downtown Jaguar.

Is there more to this story?
Is this a true story?
Yes, there is!
Will I tell more about later?
Only if I can remember.
Sincerely
Dwight McCullough

Now on to bigger and better things. 3/21/06

So in the mean time, I’ve sold my 1956 Plymouth, [which I wish I hadn’t]
Bought a 1961 Dodge Lancer. which was virtully the same car as a Plymouth Valiant. it had the 170 c.i. 6 cylinder engine and had a 2 barrel Stromberg carburetor, similar to hot rod Ford V8’s had. With a adaptor which pushed the carburetor up to the hood insulation so it didn’t need an air filter, nor was there room for one.
Needless to say, the gas mileage was awful. [choked off]
And a three speed transmission with a floor shifter. [Really sporty eh?]
The shifter would no matter how hard you tried hit reverse when shifting from first to second. ggggrrrriiiiinnnnnddddcahink.......!
But it was transportation, and warmer, [little] than the Sprite.
Then along comes 1966, and it’s getting close to spring, and I really like the MGB.

Like John English, I went to an import car dealer in Buckhead. What was the name of that place? They had all the British cars. 1970, I was a junior in high school, had saved up a few hundred dollars. I drove a new Midget and a '67 Healey 3000. The Midget was fun, the Healey was a blast! Couldn't afford it though. Bought a 62/63 MGB in iris blue from a used car dealer that had only one LBC on the lot.

Simply growing up in Southern California (LA area) as a small boy and seeing folks run around in all those funny little furrin' cars, a lot of them MGs and other British cars as well as just about anything else from anywhere else you could imagine. Walking up to them in a parking lot, on a street. Hearing them, seeing them pass by in traffic. As I once said to a friend, I started experiencing them at such an early age that I guess I never really thought of them as odd or foreign, just an extension of the car experience in car crazy Los Angeles. I didn't always live in LA, tho, but I do recall plenty of them around in OK and NC when I was in HS. In fact, the first XKE I ever saw was in 1961 in Charlotte, NC, waiting for the school bus. When I moved back to LA in 62, CA was even crazier about cars, and the range of cars seemed infinite. And in 1963, I got my first ever ride in one, a 1953 MG TD, driven by my HS physics teacher. After that, there was no turning back. My first Brit car was a 61 TR-3A, and many other Brit cars since.

My experience started in the early 1950s as a young kid of 7 or 8. I remember my father looking through the showroom window of a Chrysler /Triumph dealership . It was night time and he was looking at a new TR2. He was able to afford it but felt that with a family of four kids it wouldn't be justifiable. He had a dentist friend who would come up our driveway with a BRG Jag XK120. I loved riding in that car. In 1963 I was off to college in my first car of my own that wasn't the old family sedan. It was a used 1959 Austin Healey. That started it. I went from that Healey to another big Healey, an Alfa Romeo , a Sunbeam Alpine, Fiat 124 and then MGBs. Never owned an A, but got to drive one once from Iowa to Michigan and back to Iowa in the middle of Winter 1964. My father never did get his British sports car, but drove my second Healey for a few months. He bought a used Jag XJ back in 1978. What a lemon. Two out of three weeks it lived at the dealership. I felt so bad for him that his dream car ended up being such a lemon. He finally gave up, went to the Cadillac dealer, traded in the Jag for a new 79 Eldorado (Black with red leather...same color scheme as the Jag) Paid cash. When the dealer asked where the Jag was he told them that it was the black Jag on the hoist over at Taylor motors.

My first Healey...

A new blue 1967 Envoy Epic SL 90. What a piece of junk:X
The next ne was a new 1971 MGB. Enjoyed the car in the sun. Hated the water puddles on the floors when it rained. Too many pairs of soaked bell bottom pants made me sell it.

While working in my parent's grocery in 1967 I delivered to several folks. One of them was a gentleman in his mid-40s who owned a perfect 1957 XK140mc drophead coupe. It was black with a red interior and had only 12,800 total miles on it. He also had a '59 950s Turner. Alex was unable to drive due to severe arthritis and Menier's syndrome, a condition that affects the inner ear and impairs the sense of balance. He had owned dozens of sports cars previously including a couple of Ferraris (flying to Phoenix and driving them back to Michigan to sell), had an encyclopedic knowledge of F1 and international sports car racing and every issue of Road & Track ever published.

Alex monitored foreign short wave broadcasts for NBC news. The Beeb (BBC) was always on the old Hallicrafters or Hammerlund whenever I arrived each week. He had several acres along a beautiful creek and we canoed and fished together for several years. On the last of those trips his bamboo rod tip was broken. He claimed that I stepped on it but to this day I can't possibly see how I did. The rod had been a gift from his father on his seventeenth birthday while living on their sugar plantation in Cuba. He never forgave me and I stopped coming around. This was about the time I met my first wife which was lovely distraction (besides, she owned a TR4a).

His influence led to a lifelong obsession with foreign sports cars. Alex passed away in the '80s having been cheated out of a full and active life. No, he never drove again and I'm told the once stunning Jag literally rotted away in that garage. As Thomas Carlisle once said: "The tragedy in life is not what men suffer but what they miss."

My first was driving a friends 100-4 Healy while working for Eastern Airlines in Seattle in the late 60s. After the run I commented on the low first gear. He thought it was a 3 speed and had been starting off in 2nd for a couple of years....

My First British car experiene was being born into my father's family. He still owns a 1960 MGA that he bought when he was 16 in 1971 for $300. First LBC i've owned i stumbled into about a week ago. A 1971 MGB partially restored but close to running. Been with a '73 BMW for the past four years so hopefully this B will be much more forgiving. Also, i'm a 20 yr old sophmore of engineering at Clemson, so this restoration may take a while. Fortunatly, I'm literally right down the road from Gordon at the B Hive, who I've found extremely helpful. i'm sure a lot of you have done business with him.


Good to be a new kid on the forum.

-MG.Ben

in 1957 on Randolph AFB Freddy Freese's dad, Col. Freese, had a new MGA he had brought back from England/Europe. And I got a ride in it!!!!! Up til then I had been an avid devourer (if there is such a word) of Hot Rod and continually bugged my Dad to take me to Double Eagle Drag Strip on weekends but the MGA broadened my perspective. Several years later I unsuccessfully tried to get me dad to buy me a Singer roadster out of a junkyard. No luck. Finally several years later I parked my 1936 Ford 5W and with one of my first paychecks bought a TR3 but sold it a year later when I went overseas. Came back many years later and bought my current B in 1974 while on leave, and when i returned I bought my current Bugeye.

I had sex with my girlfriend back in high school in my Midget, does that count as an experience. Believe me it wasn't easy, and it was the first time in a LBC. :D

I've always been interested in cars. Then Dad built a VW Beetle-based kit car for some magazine years ago...and (according to my mother) it all went downhill from there LOL Every night, we'd go into the garage and work on it. Er, actually...*he'd* work on it. Being only 2 or 3 years old, meant that I'd get to hand him tools or get another beer from the kitchen :p Not helping the "car fever" were all the local shows that we took that car to! But, pressures of a growing family meant the kit car was sold in '79. Dad didn't go without a sports car for long...the 'real' MG (the GT I now own) arrived in '80 or '81. Forget which year, but I remember it arriving...after he'd flown out to my uncle's place in California and driven it back. When it finally arrived, it was like nothing else on the road--bright orange, very loud (the exhaust had been damaged somewhere in the desert), and followed by lots of blue exhaust. By then, my neighbor had bought one of the last roadsters to reach our shores, and many picnics usually featured both cars. Even with a knackered engine, that GT was still faster than the late roadster LOL

I remember my moms, can't remember the year, but it was a chrome bumper. Then years later my dad got a RB B. Wish i would have taken the interest to fix it up. He ended up getting rid of it after sitting in the driveway for a couple of years.

In the mid 70's I was going to college in Colorado and commuting 80 miles a day. I had a 62' Corvair that was on it's last legs and desperately needed another car. I keep passing by a 59' MGA that was sitting under a carport unmoved for at least a year. I knocked on the door of the house and a burly gentleman answered. Asked if he wanted to sell the car and his immediate response was " you bet I do. That POS has been sitting there long enough and no matter what I do I can't get it to run. Give me $200 and haul that English junk out of here". I brought the car home, did a tune up. adjusted the valves and rebuilt the carbs. It started right up and I drove that car year round, trouble free for 5 years before I found a 61' MGA to replace it. I had to give $300 for the 61'.