New issue of TBT is at the printer!
I recently stumbled across this picture, labeled 'pride of Mr De Giorgi', on my friend Davide De Giorgi's Facebook page.
I met Davide in Sicily on the first day of an Italian tour that had been booked for my rock and roll band. The promoter had booked us with an Italian group so that we could share equipment, and he assured us they were great. They were. The Introducers turned out to be four college kids from Turin- Davide was one of the guitarists. We spent two weeks traversing Italy with 8 band members, a promoter, 2 pals and a ridiculous amount of vintage guitars, amps and drums crammed into three cars. It was one of the best times in my life.
Davide and I hit it off right away. All of the Introducers soon became extended family, but Davide and I had the car thing in common. I think we figured it out when he and I both went apeshit at the sight of a Siata sedan sitting seemingly abandoned near the docks when we took the ferry from Sicily to mainland Italy. It was surprisingly solid for a car sitting that close to the ocean (actually all of Sicily is pretty close to the ocean), and I was fascinated- I'd never known that there were non-racing Siatas! Davide knew about Siata's racing heritage, but was surprised to learn that some had been built with US made Crosley motors. I took some pics (Davide's the guy in front- my pal/bassist/AMC Marlin-owner Stan's in the back) in a hurry since we were supposed to be getting on the ferry.
It wasn't long before I helped the Introducers come stateside for a tour of the West Coast. My house was tour HQ and we often travelled in my then-daily driver, a '62 Plymouth Valiant wagon, which Davide always referred to as 'she'. He enthusiastically pitched in when I had to do an emergency brake job before leaving for a San Francisco gig- the other guys were pretty nervous, but we got 'er done. One day we were driving around Sacto in the Valiant when a street rodded 50s panel truck pulled up next to us at a light. 'The motor sounds great,' Davide said admiringly. 'Probably a 350 Chevy,' I said. 'How do you know this?' Davide said, skeptical. 'Ask him,' I said. Davide rolled the window down and asked what kind of motor it had. 'Chevy 350,' the guy says. '350 tranny behind it?' I leaned over and asked. 'Yup.' Light changed, he drove off and the guys looked at me in total wonder. I never told them that pretty much any car the color of an Easter Egg has a 350 under the hood.
The De Giorgis' hometown is Torino- the Detroit of Italy. That everyone in Turin isn't a car nut is sort of astonishing to me given that it's the home of both Fiat and Carlo Mollino- one of those amazing 20th century industrial designers who drew up everything from lounge chairs to Le Mans racers. I got to see Mollino's bizarro asymmetrical racecar, the Bisiluro, in a museum show of his work when Liv and I visited Turin on our honeymoon. It's an amazing car, with the engine on the right side of the car, and the driver on the left. It was apparently hell to drive due to the weird offset, and retired fairly early in the 1955 Le Mans. Still- an amazing concept.
Looking at the Bisiluro's small motor got me thinking, of course. I can't find it now, but I did turn up an early design for the car with an engine that looks an awful lot like a Crosley. At the time Mollino initially started the project, a Crosley-based powerplant (maybe with a snazzy etceterini dual cam set up and the billet crank) would have been a very logical engine choice. The Crosley motor would certainly match up with a driver's weight better than most others, even Italian iron.
Davide still doesn't have any vintage tin of his own. But, he surfs Bring a Trailer daily, and often sends me odd automotive tidbits that he turns up in his other webtravels. It's funny to me that he and I have bonded over car stuff when we met halfway around the world for a completely different reason. Given the bad rap that car guys often get as knuckle-dragging morons, it's great to find the Davide De Giorgis of the world to keep the record straight. A salute to you and yours, my friend!
Django Reinhardt was born one hundred years ago today. One of the greatest jazz musicians who ever played, Reinhardt developed a signature guitar style that set the standard for those who came after him. His life was a series of triumphs over adversity; at 18 he survived a fire that left him with several useless fingers and a paralyzed leg, leading to a unique fingering approach that allowed him to play with the use of only two fingers on his fretting hand. Django was on tour in the UK with the Hot Club of France when war broke out. Though he was a gypsy, and thus under threat of immediate deportation to a Nazi concentration camp, Reinhardt returned to Paris. Paradoxically, Reinhardt thrived under the occupation, playing and recording constantly with little trouble from Nazi authorities, probably due to the influence of a Luftwaffe officer who was a secret jazz fan.
Dale Tholen was one of the crop of specials builders that did Crosley proud back in the fifties and early sixties. His first build (currently owned by Bonneville racer Gerald Davenport, I think) was not only a terror on the tracks of 1955, it was one of the best looking homebuilts of all time- good enough to show up on the cover of Road & Track!
As great as the first car was, Tholen soon began thinking of improvements, and had another car built and on the track by the early sixties. That car was the ThunderMug, another good-looking hmod special, currently offered up for sale here. Once again Tholen created an elegant design, although the ThunderMug appears to be much more of a stripped racing thoroughbred than the comfortable boulevard racer the first car was. Tholen's 24 pound fiberglass body appears to owe a nod to contemporary Jabro designs, especially in the rear.
This time out Tholen foreswore the Crosley motor in favor of a handbuilt engine assembly largely based on parts from 3 Maico single cylinder motors. I'm assuming that engine was problematical since the car eventually received a Crosley powerplant, although the original engine is included in the sale.
If the custom powerplant perhaps underperformed on the track, it was responsible for the car's singular name- the engine's unique gurgling sound supposedly mimicked the sound of a flushing 'thundermug' (old-timey nickname for a toilet)!
| Q: | Great car- amazing! Do you have any documents relating to the race or other history of the car? How long have you had it? | |
| A: | Hello,Yes I have a racing history that is written down by the 85 yr, old gentleman I got the car from.I have had the car for some time and thought I would sell to a collector rather than it just sit and take up shop space. |
