Classic cars forum & vehicle restoration.

[miracleboy]

Hello everyone - hope someone can help me. Bit of a long shot but I am doing some family history research and am looking at my Great Uncle. He was killed in WW2 and we have virtually no info on him, but I recently obtained a letter from the pilot on his bomber writing home at the time telling about his new crew.

Well anyway, of my GU he said and I quote;

"he has been a sports car and motor cycle specialist and a motor correspondent to magazines"

So what I want to know is - is there any chance anything he wrote would still be in existence and if so how to go about finding it? What motoring magazines were there around before the war and do copies still exist (does anyone have any!?).

His name was Alexander McDonald Young.

Many thanks for any help!
Matt

[peter scott]

Welcome to the forum Matt,

The biggies, The Motor, The Autocar and Motor Sport were all running pre WW2. You could try an enquiry to the current editors.

With Motor Sport you have the additional benefit of CDs covering the set of pre war magazines. Should be easy to search too. http://www.motorbooks.co.uk/notes.asp?bookid=91148

Sorry, I don't have a copy of the CD or I'd search for you.

HTH

Peter
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[Rick]

Might be worth speaking with some of the dealers in old literature, Pooks for instance (google with bring them up).

Interesting story. Sometimes contributors to the early magazines wrote under a pseudonym rather than their own name, just to make life even more difficult!

Rick
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[Scotty]

It might be worth finding out what the local motoring magazines were in the area where he was living during the period your uncle was writing.

In the Glasgow area there were a few of periodicals focused on motoring, for example Top Gear was a very much a west of Scotland production right up to and beyond the Second World War. A lot of writers contributed frequently to their "local" magazines, far more than to the big national ones, George Oliver, a motoring historian and author being a name that springs readily to mind, who lived in Edinburgh and latterly Glasgow.

You uncle has a very Scottish sounding name - was he born and brought up in Scotland and could he have been living here during the time he started writing?

[Rick]

"The Motor World" was another Scottish title that ran either side of WW2, see:
http://www.oldclassiccar.co.uk/motor-world.htm

RJ
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