PEBBLE BEACH
In 1929, noble racer Earl Howe bought this Mercedes 36/220. In 2017, it’s Pebble Beach’s Best of Show
The concours-winning 1929 Mercedes-Benz
Bruce McCaw might never have won Best of Show at this year’s Pebble Beach Concours if he hadn’t come across a photograph showing the original rear end of his 1929 Mercedes-Benz 36/220, first owned by racing driver Earl Howe. The car had, after all, already been at Pebble Beach in 2012, in the unrestored class. ‘I’d had the car for five years,’ he told me, ‘and for a long time I didn’t want to restore it. But once I saw that picture of its long-gone boat tail I just knew I had to restore it as close as possible to what it had looked like when new.’ In Bruce’s case, that meant as near to perfection as humanly possible. ‘Otherwise,’ he says, ‘I wouldn’t have done it.’
The first owner of Bruce’s Mercedes 36/220 was racing driver Francis Richard Henry Penn Curzon, the fifth Earl Howe, who had been a motoring enthusiast almost as long as there had been cars. Yet he did not begin his competitive motoring career until 1928, when he was 44 and at an age when many racers would be considering retirement. The reason was simple: as his friend Sir Henry ‘Tim’ Birkin remarked, Earl Howe – or as he then was, Viscount Curzon – had ‘visited almost every police court in the land’ on speeding counts (he notched up 21 convictions between 1908 and 1924), and a magistrate, tired of seeing the peer so frequently in court, advised him to take up motor racing to assuage his need for speed.
It proved sound advice. Up to 1939 Howe had a successful racing career with a wide variety of cars and shared with Eddie Hall the distinction of having competed in every running of the RAC Tourist Trophy on the Ards circuit. The high point of his racing career was winning the Le Mans 24 Hours in an 8C Alfa in 1931; he later served as president of the British Racing Drivers’ Club from 1929 until his death in 1964.
As the Conservative MP for Battersea South from 1918 until 1929, when he entered the House of Lords following the death of his father, Francis Curzon had campaigned for reform of the speed limit, then still the same 20mph blanket set back in 1904. His promotoring stance had made him so popular that Tim Birkin had remarked: ‘If the Ship of State were a car, Lord Howe would have been Prime Minister long ago.’
Howe proved a more than useful member of the upper chamber where, during one road-safety debate, he remarked that he had very personal experience of crash helmets, because – once in Britain and twice in Italy – he would have died had he not worn one.
‘I have an idea that he would not like a car that got its speed through ugliness,’ wrote Ernest Appleby of
in 1934, adding: ‘His famous blue umbrella is typical of the man. Anyone else using a pale blue umbrella on race days might be put down as a molly, but Howe’s twinkling grey eyes save the situation.’
Howe was always immaculate behind the wheel of his racing cars, wearing a pale blue helmet and overalls – the precise shade is still to be seen on the iron gates in the gardens of Penn House, presumably painted with the left-over lacquer from his racing cars – and the umbrella was a matter of common sense. Why get wet waiting for the fall of the starter’s flag?
His cars, too, were always spotlessly turned out, and his abhorrence of ugliness was no better demonstrated than in the choice of body for his 36/220 S-Type Mercedes-Benz that, as Lord Curzon, he commissioned from Royal coachbuilders Barker of South Audley Street in the summer of 1928. The British designation ‘36/220’ represented the taxable and actual horsepower of the supercharged 6.8-litre overhead-cam straightsix: its German equivalent ‘26/140/180PS’ also revealed the local taxable rating and gave the power outputs both unblown and blown. The Mercedes-Benz supercharger system worked on the foie gras principle, force-feeding air into the carburettor throat when the throttle was flat on the floor with a wail like a circular saw trying to cut through concrete.
The order for Curzon’s chassis had been placed that June with British Mercedes Ltd of 127-130 Long Acre, through the intermediary of a Captain Miller. He was probably Captain Sir Alastair Miller, a racing driver and baronet with a luxury car agency in the West End of London, whose track record was as exemplary as his private life was egregious. It was revealed in 1961, when he was jailed for fraudulently taking away an 11-year-old girl, that he had been in and out of British courts many times since a divorce had ended his scandalous ‘child bride’ marriage to a 14-year-old schoolgirl in 1922. Thrice bankrupt and thrice divorced, he had a record that included convictions for bankruptcy, larceny and indecent assault…
However, Francis Curzon was faultless in his choice of coachbuilder. Barker – which had already bodied the Bentley 3 Litre he bought in January 1923 – had held Royal warrants since 1830 and was the favoured coachbuilder of Rolls-Royce, for which it had built a special lightweight body on aircraft principles on chassis 10EX the previous year. For Curzon’s Mercedes, Barker again followed aircraft practice but on a different path from 10EX’s. The wood frame was conventional enough, but the space between the frame members was filled by a latticework of thin metal strips that was then covered with a thin layer of foam rubber sandwiched behind the external aluminium panelling.
The slim two-seater body that Barker created on Curzon’s chassis tapered to a knifepoint boat tail. Torpedo-shaped sponson toolboxes doubled as steps, essential as the doors were less than half the normal depth, leaving deep sills beneath to maximise body
stiffness. W hile the body sides and chassis were painted in Curzon’s signature light blue, the bonnet and upper surfaces were highly polished aluminium, a tribute to his father’s old horse-racing colours of blue and silver.
As Earl Howe, he entered the Mercedes-Benz for the RAC Brighton Rally in July 1930, finishing first in class in the acceleration contest. The following month he crossed the sea to Ireland to take part in the Ulster Automobile Club hillclimb at Craigantlet, just after the Ulster Tourist Trophy in which Howe had raced his Type 43 Bugatti. He entered his Alfa Romeo 6C 1500 and Bugatti for the hillclimb as well as the Mercedes; he won the unlimited touring car class with the Bugatti and the unlimited sports car class with the Mercedes, which also made fastest time of the day.
These seem to be the only two competitions that Howe took part in with the 36/220. After breaking down during the TT he had spent time in the Mercedes pit, and so impressed was he by Rudi Caracciola’s winning 38/250 SS that he made a substantial offer for it. It was his within the week. That, too, went to Barker, which fitted a lightweight, Birmabright-framed body in place of the Sindelfingen coachwork. Howe used that car, which he loved, for touring as well as racing.
The ubiquitous Rivers Fletcher was lucky enough to try both cars, and recalled: ‘Leslie Callingham and I had had a fine morning’s drive with Lord Howe in both of his Mercedes. He wanted to compare the cars, so first of all Leslie and I went in the 38-250, Leslie driving, and Howe followed in the 36-220. We swapped around, changing places several times, and I was allowed a short drive in both cars. Previously, I had never driven either model and it was a revelation to me how very light the 38-250 was to handle after a Speed Six Bentley; it had wonderful acceleration, even without the blower, which I did not use being mindful of the fact that I shouldn’t overdo it in case I should spoil my chance of other drives for Howe. The 36-220 was heavier to handle and did not corner as well, presumably because it was set up for touring rather than racing, but I liked both cars very much indeed.
‘Howe was perpetually in love with the 38-250, he always kept it in touring trim and used it extensively even for business trips to the City of London. On such occasions he was attired in helmet and goggles when most of his fellow directors were in city suits and bowlers – and most of them half his age anyway!’
Nevertheless, he continued to use the 36/220 for touring as well, and in April 1931 he took it across the Channel on the maiden crossing of the Southern Railway’s car ferry TSS Autocarrier. By then the 36/220 had been fitted with a substantial towing hitch, presumably for transporting one of his racing cars. His second nephew, the current Earl Howe, tells me: ‘This occasion could well have been when he went to compete in one of the Continental races of that year with his Type 51 Bugatti (Monte Carlo in April, Montlhéry in June, Nürburgring in July) or with his Alfa Romeo 8C 2300 (Le Mans in June).’
In 1933 Howe sold his 36/220 to Hans Edward ‘Jack’ Rohll, a businessman with interests in the motor trade. Rohll, who was to own the 36/220 S until 1958, used it ‘most enthusiastically’ in racing and rallying, along with his 8C 2300 Alfa. During his ownership Rohll docked that lovely boat tail, replacing it with a rounded stern accommodating a spare wheel under a circular hatch, and painted the car maroon. When, with the factory’s blessing, a Mercedes-Benz Club was formed in England in 1952 – the world’s first club for this make (Earl Howe was a founder patron) – Rohll
became its first treasurer and later took on many of the senior roles in the club. For many years he organised the club’s annual pilgrimage to the Mercedes-Benz headquarters in Stuttgart, usually ending up with an invitation to conduct the local band.
When Rohll finally decided to sell the 36/220 after spending £2000 on its restoration, it was advertised at £975 – a huge sum for a vintage car in those days. Its next owner came from the far side of the Atlantic: George Wesley Huguely Jr of Washington DC, a prosperous lumber merchant who had taken over the running of the family business when his father had died in 1937, leaving a $1.7m estate. The company, founded in 1912, had prospered hugely from the housing boom as the capital expanded north and west.
George Jr was a member of the Classic Car Club of America until at least 1965; two years earlier he’d sold the 36/220 to Edgar Jurist, whose Vintage Car Store in Nyack, New Jersey, was housed in an elegant 1930s building that was originally a Packard showroom. An imposing figure over 6ft tall, Ed was an extraordinary character who had made several escape attempts from German prison camps during World War Two and was also a ‘Colonel’ in the Confederate Air Force.
Jurist sold the Mercedes on to Tony Hulman’s Indianapolis Motor Speedway Hall of Fame, where beneath the public exhibition are kept dozens more historic cars in a vast underground garage. It was now ivory white, and its tail had undergone yet more surgery that left twin spare wheels exposed. Then, in 2013, the Mercedes was acquired by Charles Bronson of the Boulevard Motorcar Company in Westlake, California, on behalf of Bruce McCaw.
Having decided to bring the car back to its ‘Earl Howe’ condition, Bruce entrusted the restoration to Steve Babinsky’s Automotive Restorations shop in Lebanon, New Jersey. Babinsky started his company in 1981 by buying his former employer’s tools and equipment to avoid any liability associated with buying the business itself. ‘I welcome all different cars as long as they’re pre-war,’ he says, adding that after the close of the day’s business he often keeps working at the shop until 11pm because he loves old cars so much.
While the forepart of the body was much as original beneath the paint, recreating the boat-tail rear called for new technology. ‘Charles Bronson located original images, so we computer-scanned the photographs to get a 3D image of the tail,’ says McCaw. ‘The aim was to restore the tail as near to perfect as you can get.’
Babinsky’s team got the car finished for Pebble Beach with just a week to spare. With only three test miles on the clock, it competed the 70 miles of ‘The Tour’ before beating McCaw’s brother John’s 1957 Ferrari 315 S Scaglietti Spyder for top honours at Pebble Beach. The 36/220 Mercedes also carried off the annual Gran Turismo Trophy award.
But McCaw thinks the real victor was the man who originally commissioned the car: ‘He was passionate about motor sports,’ he says. ‘Lord Howe gets the credit for this car.’