Another photo-find from Les. This pub (The Star - an Ind Coope establishment) already appears on this site, but with a Morris pickup parked outside, and not a aristocrat like the Silver Cloud shown above. Rolls-Royce built Silver Clouds from 1955 through to 1966, by which time the square-shouldered Silver Shadow was ready to take over the reins. The Silver Cloud was the last R-R to feature a separate chassis, which, as with earlier models, leant itself to coachbuilt bodywork by specialist outside bodybuilders. Perhaps the most memorable was the 'Chinese Eye', by Mulliner Park Ward. The car shown parked outside The Star is a standard steel production saloon.
The first Silver Clouds were propelled by a 6 cylinder engine of 4.9 litres. This would be replaced in the Silver Cloud 2 of 1959 by a 6.2 V8 which gave the Rolls a decent turn of speed, although at the cost of increased weight. Up until this point the Silver Cloud featured a single headlamp at each side, but the Cloud 3 of 1963 swapped to a twin headlight arrangement, a styling cue that would pass to the new Shadow in 3 years time. A look at the DVLA website shows no sign of Rolls-Royce 91 TNY (or YNY) still being in existence. Perhaps it was broken for spares, written off in an accident, or somehow lost its registration over the years and now carries a fresh id, perhaps overseas.
Parked alongside the Rolls is a stalwart of 1950s and 1960s Britain, the Morris 1000 Traveller. Quite where the location of this photograph is I don't know. Maybe The Star still serves a fine pint, who knows? I think if I owned the Rolls shown here, I'd be slightly wary of the wonky-looking chimney pot balanced on the lefthand chimney stack...
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