Classic cars forum & vehicle restoration.

[Old Wrench]

An interesting restoration story.

In 1971 my wife’s late uncle, Harry Bolton, a legendary figure was retired and living in Long Island New York State and frequently visited the UK to catch up with relatives. His trips over became so frequent, he purchased an old Ford 100E, which kept in a local garage to a property he owned and my garage was given the task of collecting it, servicing, charging the battery and MOT when he was coming over. He would send me a very short telegram, via Western Union.

He and my wife’s late father (Harry’s younger brother), had built for their parents a timber-framed asbestos clad (yes I know!) bungalow on a large plot of land in what was then countryside, nearby. For many years, this was rented out as Harry owned it after their demise. Harry decided, surreally, to restore the house and then sell it.

One fine day he telephoned me and asked for a couple of hours of my assistance: yes indeed, the famed “couple of hours”!

When I arrived he explained: he had “parked” one of his cars, a GN of circa 1917, down in the garden of his parent’s house. This would have been around 1936. Harry had hacked away at the Hawthorne hedge which had grown over the car and now wished to dig it out, take it into the house and he planned to box it up and ship back to his splendid split-level house in the States, in which the basement enjoyed a super workshop. “In your dreams, Mate!” I thought.

All that was left of the car were the dashboard and aero-screen, steering wheel, engine, transmission, no body and a horribly rusted chassis frame. The Rudge wheels consisted of heavily corroded rims, no spokes at all and crumbling bits of tyres………..

Clearly, I underestimated Harry’s tenacity, determination and skills!

Here is a picture of the GN restored to her former glory, some years later.

http://s461.photobucket.com/user/PercyPee/media/GNAfterRebuildlate1970s01_zpsc94f0830.jpg.html?filters[user]=82614560&filters[recent]=1&sort=1&o=2

Out of further interest, here is a picture of Harry’s special, built from who knows what, but most interestingly, motive power from an aero prop at the front! Circa, 1928.

http://s461.photobucket.com/user/PercyPee/media/HarryBoltonCars02_zpse1a737bf.jpg.html?filters[user]=82614560&filters[recent]=1&sort=1&o=1

Apparently, he used to tear to tear it up with the local boy racers along an arterial road locally and beat the rest!

If you would like to read more on this amazing man then please say so.

[peter scott]

[Rick]

Yes, please keep typing

RJ
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[Old Wrench]

Harry Bolton Born 1904 at Leigh-on-Sea, Essex.

He grew up with a passion for things mechanical and soon moved into aeronautics.

Legend has it he built his own light aircraft (the prop-power car was probably a prototype!) and flew it off some local high ground at Leigh-on-Sea, overlooking the Thames Estuary and Canvey Island. Sadly no pictures were available; (more on the subject of pictures and documents anon.)

In 1938 he became Chief Inspector on Aircraft Works at the Gramophone Company Ltd (later HMV) at their Hayes Middlesex plant, at £9 per week. He was also by then an FAEA (Still researching which now redundant professional body). Apparently, as with so many companies involved in making equipment from wood (such as radiograms!) they were involved in sub-contract aircraft manufacturing. The towering hero, Nevil Shute Norway’s company Airspeed, only ever manufactured wooden aircraft: until Shute left.

During World War Two Harry became a pilot with the RAF Air Transport Command and finished up flying Liberators to the UK etc.

http://s461.photobucket.com/user/PercyPee/media/HarryBoltonCars03_zpsb3dc9c18.jpg.html?filters[user]=82614560&filters[recent]=1&sort=1&o=0

After the war ended he established his own airplane company, in the late 1940s. This was the Hawkridge Aircraft Company Ltd

Despite his usual objectivity and tenacity, fighting with the then Ministry of Supply (A wartime government body who regulated supply and demand for materials, including woods and metal), he threw in the towel and migrated to the USA circa 1953. After a year or so establishing himself, his wife and young son followed.

In America, Harry prospered. He eventually became a consultant crash investigator for the Pentagon and also worked for NASA and with Werner von Braun.

When I first met my wife to be, (early 1960s), Harry, her uncle used to regularly travel to what was then West Germany, to investigate Lockheed Aircraft Corp Starfighter crashes. The Starfighter was known as “The Widowmaker”, as they crashed with monotonous regularity…

On one trip he bought us dinner and recounted the tale of a dinner he had had with an old friend, a five start general in the USA Airforce. The General informed Harry, the Vietnam War was being fought from the White House, rather than the Pentagon; and the General was in tears over the young men he was sending to the Vietnamese War, who were being slaughtered from inexperience by Russian MIG pilots. Sobering for a (then) young man, like myself.

In the 1960s, Harry spotted an advert in a US paper, by an attorney offering an “Austin-Martin” for sale in California. So he booked a cheap internal flight (They have always been cheap in the USA) and flew down to California and LA.



The “Austin-Martin” turned out to be an Aston Martin DB4 GT: the rather nice one with the five speed ZF box, LSD, Borrani triple-eared chrome 60 spoke wire wheels (then racing spec wheels: normal Dunlop e.g. wires had less spokes: from memory 48 per wheel. I ought to remember since I was an appointed Dunlop distributor!) and triple Weber side-draught carburetors, in Carmen red with white Connolly hide leather……

Apparently, the car had been purchased by a young starlet in the full flush of beginning stardom fame and fortune, who had driven it around the block, frightened herself to death and instructed the attorney to get rid of!

Harry, lucky blighter, bought it for a song, as clearly the attorney hadn’t a wee clue of the car’s actual worth. He then cashed in his return air ticket and drove the car right from California back to Long Island New York State.

Unfortunately, wherever he drove the car, locally, kids would rush out and people would climb all over it and he was afraid of damage. So he left it in his basement garage covered in a dustsheet and hardly, if ever actually drove the car!

In 1989, our son was in the USA, teaching golf at a Summer Camp for three months and managed, at the end of his contract, to visit his Great Uncle and stay over; and he told me the car was utterly pristine as if it had just rolled out of the Aston factory.

Towards the end of the nineties, Harry passed away. And the Aston was sold by his only child, John when he cleared up his father’s estate.

The huge loft in is father’s estate in Long Island was jammed full of papers and documents: Harry had thrown nothing away – ever!

John even found bus tickets and hotel bills from the late 1930s…….

John himself is an interesting study. In the fifties, he worked as a mechanic for the Jaguar (USA) and Maserati racing teams. An artist by nature, in the 1970s he worked all over the USA at custom car and bike shows, painting one-off graphics on cars, panel vans and bikes.

Presently, he lives in Virginia and having lost his wife, seeks to sell his sprawling country home which would make an ideal base for a car restorer; even boasting a spray booth!

Page through John’s site.

http://eastcoast-studiogallery.com/

[peter scott]

A fascinating account.

I couldn't find any reference to FAEA but the Hawkridge Aircraft Company features in quite a few web locations:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dart_Aircraft
http://www.dunstablehistory.co.uk/Newsletters/Newsletter38.pdf
http://www.nurflugel.com/Nurflugel/Papers/letter_from_Blackburn_and_Gene/letter_from_blackburn_and_gene.html

Thanks for posting.

Peter
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http://www.nostalgiatech.co.uk
1939 SS Jaguar 2 1/2 litre saloon

[Old Wrench]

I could trace no reference to that professional body or qualification, either, Peter.

Thank you for the other webrefs for Hawkridge.

BTW, I forgot to mention, Harry regularly travelled to Germany to investigate Lockheed Star Fighter (Known to pilots as The Widowmaker) crashes of the Luftwaffe, on behalf of the Pentagon; and we used to see him, en route. NATO and the USA would only allow the newly formed Luftwaffe these airplanes apparently, until the new West Germany was politically and economically stable.

He spoke fluent German (and the partners in Dove were of course, German) and had many connections in Germany. Indeed, his forbears were German.

Harry's Great Uncle (Mother's father's brother) was Johann Georg Eccarius: who was a great chum of Engels and Marx and one of the founders - with Marx - of the first Workingman's International, of which Eccarius was also Secretary. Thus Johann Georg was my wife's great great Uncle. We are researching this history at present.

https://www.marxists.org/archive/eccarius/index.htm

My sort of cousin, a retired microbiologist and Prof is also a very skilled amateur genealogist, has assisted in creating a detailed family tree for my wife's side. Fascinating stuff.

We suspect (as does Harry's son, John) that Harry was something of a secret agent..................... indeed, John discovered when settling his estate, a numbered Swiss bank account!

A complex and very secretive man was our Harry!

I would dearly love to afford the time to visit John in West Virginia and trawl through all the papers he holds.