Bonus Episode: Brooklands New Year Classic Car Meet - 20 of your earliest car memories

Andy went along to the historic Brooklands Museum (home to the iconic banked race track of the 1930s) for their annual New Year Classic Car meet. 
It should have been the 1st January, but bad weather saw it postpone till the weekend. 
Meeting up with friend and automotive artisit, Steve from AutoLegends Autolegends.co.uk they spent the morning enjoying the sites and interviewing fellow show goers about their earliest car memories.
If you spoke with us, thanks, we really appreciate your time.
If you have found us because of the event, then hopefully you enjoy these stories, and we get to speak to you later in the year.
Find details on more Brooklands events here. 
Aviation & Motoring Events at Brooklands Museum
Including the next Classic Car day on April 19th. 
Brooklands Museum :: Easter Classic Gathering 2025

Transcript

>> Andy: 0:00

Welcome to My Dad's Car. Enjoy. Welcome to My Dad's Car. A podcast discussing our personal relationship with automotive nostalgia. And you know what, it doesn't even have to be about your dad's car. It can be your mom's, your grand, your parents, guardians or even a neighbours if it made an impression. Let's talk about it. What was it? Saturday? Sunday? Saturday. Wasn't it Saturday? Yeah. So sadly I couldn't make it because I was knee deep in home decorating. Is it all done now? You done your Lawrence llueewln Boeing? Yeah, it is done, yeah. So you've got the shirt on. yeah, this is due to it being sort of minus one at the moment when we were recording this. But yeah, decorating St. So unfortunately I couldn't make Brooklyns which is where you, you went on that Saturday. Yeah, my first time there, which is probably a bit bad really. It's kind of an hour, hour and 15 from where I live down on the south coast. And I guess it's. Yeah, its historical significance is kind of similar to Goodwood, if not maybe greater. So yeah, I should have been there before. Went up with my friend Steve who we saw up at nec. Drove up, met him kind of on the way and yeah, spent the morning kind of wandering around with him and Yeah, really cool place. Sort of museums in sheds I guess, sort of the old buildings that were there. you go in kind of one bit and there'll be a sort of thing about yeah old motorbikes and another bit sort of pre war cars. They've got a slightly newer building that's got kind of F1 cars type things through the ages. a bit of aviation there as well. Yeah, there's a Concorde there. There's a whole load of aeroplanes there which I think yeah up until very recently they ah, recently probably last 10 years or so they were landing planes there all right. Yeah, back in the day they were building planes there as well. So there was a big old Runway so I think. I don't know where the Concorde. No, Concorde didn't fly in. I read that they took it apart, brought it back. But there's some sort of, I say jumbo jets, I don't know planes, but that type of thing which has flown in and they're now kind of parked up. There's the Sultan of Brunei or somewhere sort of planain which is yeah super posh. There's some cargo planes and those are all open. You can kind of go up the steps, have A wander around which is pretty cool. there's a bus museum there I think. London bus museum space there. Again, I didn't go in it. I was kind of there for the sort of the cars that had turned up. Yeah. And grab some clips. But yeah, definitely. I think it's a place to go back. Probably take the kids really and yeah, make a day of it. Let them see the cars. You can pay, I don't know, 20 quid or something and go on Concorde which is pretty cool. I think they do sort of Concorde dining experiences and things a bit like you could do with like the Orient Express or whatever. But now you'll sit on there and they'll serve you up a meal and all the rest. Yeah, I might not go as far as that but I think notoriously back in the day when Concord was in operation, the food and it was economy class, wasn't it? On board? I think. I think it wasn't actually that nice. I mean the one that you might have seen it is potentially different but yeah, I didn't go on it. I don't know what, what level of sort of luxury it was I guess. Yeah, the fact it was supersonic or whatever. The think it was quite cramped by all accounts. Yeah, yeah, it was the fact you could cross to the US in a couple of hours, wasn't it? That was the, the selling point. Yeah. Rather than you re kind of lounged out with a fold out bed and five star dinner. Ye, yeah. So yeah, we'll play a few of the clips from the wonderful people I spoke to and then we'll have a little bit of a chat, shall we about some of those. Okay, Charlie, we found you by Ferrari. Mondiel, what's your earliest car memory? My earliest car memory is kind of school run, on the way to school called the Hazelmere Heights in the back of my friend'mum's Fiat 500 which was very bright red, tiny and I think had three of us cramped in the back around. Three in the back of a 500. That's quite a feat. We were little schoolboys in those days. Short trousers, mostly fighting. We used to call it World War 3 on the way to school, and just having a great time. Really good fun. Wonderful. Thank you very much. Thank you. I found a gentleman called Simon. Simon, what's your earliest car memory? U Fiat 125. Okay. Who did it belong to? My father. Okay, cool. And what colour? Red. Red, very nice. Thank you very much. No worries. Thank you. I found a gentleman called Craig. Craig, what's your earliest, car memory of going in my dad's a 55 Cambridge. My mum had only learned to drive and she couldn't reach the pedals. That's had blocks of wood on the floor. Fantastic. What colour was it? Black with the red interior. Lovely. And we found Gary Davis who I think owns this big massive Fleetwood. Okay, Gary, what's your earliest car memory? Car memory is 1960 Hillman Minx by my dad. MBF411. Wonderful. What colour? Blue. Cool. Colton. Just your father drive? Yes. Me, yes. No one didn't drive. Okay, lovely. Thank you very much. I found Keith who is the voice at ah, Brooklyn's today. Keith, what's your earliest car memory? It's probably a memory that's mine, but also my parents at the time is taking me to the zoo when I was two and me screaming because I didn't want to leave the car park. And I much preferred motorc cars to zoos. and we just went back to motor racing after that. And I started at a very early age, as you can see, with a stick on wheel on the dashboard on top. Fair enough. What car were you in? Do you remember what car you were in that day? I, think I was in a Jaguar 3.8. Oh, lovely. Which my mother had to drive on cushions at the time because she was too short. Fantastic. Thank you very much. I bumped into Kevin. He's just having a cup of tea on a bench here just around the corner. Kevin, what's your earliest car memory? well, thinking back to my dad's days, he originally had an old post office van. I can't remember what ma that was in old Aust in a 40. and a van, similar sort of thing. Did he have a van for work or is that just his choice or. no, no, no, for work. It's just his choice, I think. I can't remember why now. It was a long, long time ago. Fair enough. Thank you very much. Okay, mate, thank you. We, ah, found Julian who's got a part. Stand here, Julian, what's the company and what's your earliest, car memory? Hi. Well, this is Pot Parts Plus. we specialise in Anglias and Prefects and Popularace, of course. probably the earliest stuff would be, an auction that was just across the road from us. And I was fascinated by all these cars coming through. Every Tuesday night I remember was Tuesday night and at the time my dad didn't have a car and then first car we got was a standard eight. And the thing I always remember is that you could see through on the engine and I was used to my dinkies and you couldn't. So that really surprised me that, that's the thing I always remember. So you could see the engine from inside? No, no, you could see we open the bonnet you could see the ground which, yeah, you couldn't do that on a dinky toy. Okay, cool. Thank you very much. Thank you. I bumped into Fiona, Easterby. Isn't it? Cool. U Fiona, what's your earliest car memory? my earliest memory I think would be my mum's D that she had, I think it was a DAF 55 or 44. She did have both one time or another. But this particular one, pulled badly to the left and she was used to it and used to compensate for it. But it got stolen one night and the thief didn't know that the car pulled badly to the left and crashed it through a wall about 200 yards down the road. So they didn't get very far with it. That's quite a security feature. Yeah, I thought so. Thank you very much. I bumped into a gentleman called Mark. Mark, what's your earliest car memory? My earliest car memory is a Ford Anglia drive into Isle of Wight on holiday. Whose s Ford Anglia was it? It was my parents car. What colour? A dark blue. And who was in the car? me, my sister and my parents. Wonderful. Thank you very much. You're welcome. I bumped into Mike Stokes with his camera here. U Mike, what's your earliest car memory? probably my uncle's V8 pilot. he used to live up at Chessington. In fact he used to work here at Brooklyns. and he had a V8 pilot. And I used to remember rolling little Matchbox cars down the wing of the car. and the running board. Onto the running board. Yeah, yeah. So, and he had that car for many, many years. And what colour was it? It was black. Okay. Yeah, black. so that was probably my very earliest memory of any car. at that stage he had a car and my father didn't. Okay, so this was back in the 60s. Yeah, yeah. so yeah, he was probably the first one in our family to actually own a vehicle. Oh, fantastic. Thank you very much. You're welcome. I bumped into a lady called Jeanette. Jeanette, what's your earliest car memory? You mentioned a Humber Snipe, was it yeah, My dad used to have a Humber night when we were kids. And, he had a couple of them. I know that the inside was leather seats, grey leather seats. And it was walnut trim at the front. So, like all the Speedo and the casings and everything was obviously chrome and walnut. And in the back of the front seats, inside the seats, you see what I mean. Were, walnut tables. Nice. And we used to have picnics, you know, when we used to go out for the day. Obviously as kids, we used to have our food on the tables and that. But my grandad m. My nana. Granddad used to live with us when were kids. And, my granddad had a. He had an Anglia. It was definitely an Anglia, but it was like the old, green. It was a green one. And I don't know if it was beige or it was white with it, but it was. Yeah, that was like a really old one. We used to mess about with the indicators that used to come out. Semaphore. Yeah, yeah, yeah. My sister and I used to try and catch them as we went around the corner and that sort of thing. You know, we were a bit silly. U. but, yeah, we were very young, but, yeah, they were. You know, I remember my dad having older cars than that, you know, but my parents actually had a motorcycle garage up in, London. Yeah. So grew up with m. Motorbikes. Really? Fantastic. Okay, we've grabbed Chris, who's got a bright yellow Scamp. Chris, what's your earliest car memory? Minni, Whose Mini was? It was mine. What about your parents? You remember, earliest parents? Car parents. They had a green Morris, I remember, with a spare wheel on the back. my mum had a Mini. Wonderful. Thank you very much. Okay, I found James by two CV van. James, what's your earliest car memory? my parents. Voxall Colton. It was grey. Co est state or a saloon? Saloon. Nice. And, who was in this? Who was going out? And you got brothers and sisters? yeah, well, my brother would have been really young when we had it, so. Okay. Yeah, he would have been there. And my mum and dad. Yeah. Thank you very much. Okay, we found a gentleman called Nick who's got a Reliant Rebel 1600 GT, I think. Nick, what's your earliest car memory? My earliest car memories of my father's, an Armstrong Sidley Sapphire, silver over grey, I believe it was. There'always two tones said these were. And then he had Mark 2 Jaguars. Mark 1 Jaguars. He was a Juguar man, basically. And yeah, I was petrol head from there onwards and my first own car was the BMW Iza bubble car but it was the four wheeller Bo the two little wheels at the back which was. You had to have a car that was pre cool. Yeah. You had to have a car ln to drive it and it was tax as a car. Yeah. Then I went to a 35's and I had tuned up eight 40ts you all the boy racr stuff and things. Thank you very much. That's cool. There you go John. There was some some people. Very good. Yeah. Sounded like there was quite a few people there come out Dr. It was. Yeah. Steve reckoned it was less busy than previous years. It's normally New Year's Day. Yeah. The weather wasn't so great so they cancelled that, put it off to the weekend. But yeah, it was still a really good turnout. A nice diversity of cars. Yeah. A real sort of mixture of stuff. Some really m. Mint things. There was a. A lovely XR4i Sierra I think on an A plate silver one that looked, yeah, really good. Let's have a Matchbox. version of that. Same colour as well, I think. Yeah. Yeah. Probably still got that somewhere. Yeah. That looked really cool actually. There were some two CVs there after our recent conversation. Good job John wasn't there. Yeah. TCV's. Quite a few Porsches to be fair. Quite a few sort of nine four fours, nine two fours. Quite a bit of American stuff. A Bedford Rascal. Nice. Which was a blue one with some sort of stripes and stuff on it which was a vehicle for transporting like retro or vintage go karts around. Right. Which is sort of quite cool. Yeaheah. there was a newer section as well with sort of some supercars and things like that which couldn't get in some lancrs. We went have a wander around there. Bit of auto jumble. Yeah. And like some guys selling tin signs and ah, art prints. Andeah other bits like that. Not that much I think because it was that cold. Yeah. Ste not thinking of exhibiting there. Maybe in the future. Yeah, possibly. I think he was glad he wasn't at this one. Yeah. He got chatting to a guy about some art actually. He was trying to arrange a swap deal. Right. On a print of a 917 lemon car. But yeah, interesting from his point of view just to see how people were doing it and the amount of people it was still a paid gig. I think it was 24 quid or something for a ticket. So it wasn't a cheap morning out by any means, but it was nice. They had music on. There was a guy on a saxophone round one side. They'd got kind of a wartime type trio of ladies singing songs, sort of. They'd pop up every hour or so and do a bit of that. There was a guy who I spoke to actually. He was he was on a microphone kind of interviewing people and giving things a shout out. There was a DJ sort of playing like the Stones, that sort of thing. So a classic rock and rol in another area. Yeah. And yeah, you could sort of walk around. Went on the original race circuit and they've got a map there and it's massive. It's not all there these days, but yeah, about two and a half miles long. you can't climb up the banking because it's just really rubbish concrete, really like. Yeah. But there was cars parked on sort of the flatter part of that. But yeah, a really cool quantity of cars and some really interesting stuff. a lot of kind of American. I don't normally go much for American stuff, but yeah, interesting when you see ye either size of it. What was quite nice turnout of Rolls Royces actually. And bent these. They were all sort of parted in the shadow of Concorde almost. Nice. Yeah, from certain angles. It was a bit sort of rivals really, that kind of era of 80s excess. Ye yuppy culture y. Yeah, yeah, people have got that much money and there's sort of the premium iconic aeroplane of the time. A whiff of Filaxs about it. Yeah. And. And yeah, just a row of rollers. so, yeah, that was kind of special Rover 600 again, white one, completely stock L plate. That was just ye time warp. We're chatting to a guy who had a. I think it was a Reliant Rebel, which is like a little four wheelleds fibreglass thing but it had a like Ford Crossf FLW, I think 1600 GT engine in it. And yeah, the guy was saying he had E type M. He's had a manner of different stuff. But actually this little thing is a complete cue car like you wouldn't expect to sit. It looks a little bit like Wallace and Grommit delivery van. Yeaheah. But yeah, it weighs nothing. It's got about 100 horsepower and goes sideways and it's a real sort of weapon really. Yeah. So, yeah, he was out in that. It was quite interesting. Yeah. lady I spoke to, she was Remembering, I think Humber Snipes, I think is the vehicle that came to mind. She was talking about, like, picnic tables in the back and all these other things. so, yeah, it was interesting. It's tricky at those events. Kind of just going up to someone with a microphone and going, can I grab you for 30 seconds? Yeah. And it gets easier, obviously, as you know, when we were doing them at the NEC and stuff gets easier as you get into it. But the first few just. Yeah, you got to just get the. Yeah. Get back into the zone. Almost be better off just doing it with, sort of like stealthy microphones really. Wouldn't you, if you just sort of rocked. Up next, someone said, O sure'calm. Memory then. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's. But I suppose on the flip side, for everyone I spoke to then gave them a card to say, this is what I do. And that kind of helps to grow the. The reach and the rest. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Then that's a push for this year, really, is obviously to grow that and get that bit bigger. So, yeah, telling people what we're doing and why we're doing it. yeah, it was really nice and really. Yeah, really cool day out. I think they've got another one in the spring. I've wrote it down, actually. Give me a second. I'll give you the date. And, Yeah, we'll put that out. So if we can get to it. Let's see if we could, The next one. Saturday, the 19th of April. Okay. If you happen to be around, then, we could even take the kids, to be fair. Yeah, yeah. I'll put a little marker in my diary, try and make that work. Should be all right. Hopely be a bit warmer by then as well. Indeed. Yeah. Possibility. We won't need two woolly hats. Yeah. So, yeah, cool. That was Brooklyn. That's a little bonus on that one. Thank you to everyone who, gave me 30 seconds, 60 seconds of their time. Thanks to Steve for spending the, morning chatting and thank you to you, John, for having a chat about it afterwards. No worries. It's a good listen. Okie dokeie. We'll wrap this up. Cool. Good stuff. And, roll the credits. Thank you for listening to my love'cart. I hope you enjoyed the show. Please support us. Buy a coffee and subscribe and tell all your friends. Bye.