Lot number | 58 |
---|---|
Hammer value | £6,050 |
Description | Morris Minor 1000 Two-Door Saloon |
Registration | 161 EVJ |
Year | 1957 |
Colour | Black |
Engine size | 948 cc |
Chassis No. | FBA11/538708 |
Engine No. | H104713 |
Documents | V5C; one old MOT |
For those of you who are too young (or too old!) to remember, 1957 was the year when skiffle was king and Lonnie Donegan was a god. It was also the year this lovely 948cc two-door Morris Minor 1000 was produced.
161 EVJ (as any number plate obsessive will tell you) was first registered in Hereford and the car was supplied to a citizen of that fair city: John Albert Bridges, of Clive Street. Mr Bridges owned the car until his death in 1982, when it was bought by our vendor, who took it on as a restoration project although he did not put the car in his name until 1987.
Thirty years later – 30 years! – the car was finished. It’s not that the car was so bad, or that the vendor was so slow, it was just that, well, he wanted the right people to work on it, they were often busy and life got in the way. As it does.
The engine was overhauled (it only really needed new shells and rings and a new clutch), a remote brake servo was fitted and, in 1986, four ‘new old stock’ wings were found and fitted and the car received a complete respray. In the late ‘90s the seats were retrimmed in dark red leather piped in white and so the work continued.
In 2012 the car was finally finished and passed its MOT with flying colours and no advisories. The recorded mileage was 75,417 (believed to be correct) and, six years later, it has only advanced to 77,102 miles: for some people the journey is more important than the destination (as the intensely irritating presenters on television programmes are inclined to say).
The vendor is now faced with an imminent house move and the Morris has to go. A sad parting after 36 years together, but he has derived much pleasure from the car and can take pride in having saved it for future generations to enjoy. Now it is time for a new owner to step forward. We are sure that there will be no shortage of applicants. The icing on the cake is the nice transferable number. Not that you would, of course.