By Dean Sprague

I am sure you remember your first car. I know I do. It took hundreds of hours bagging groceries at $1.25/ hour. It was a 1955 Triumph TR2. It was rusty and tired but to me it was the greatest car ever because it was mine. It represented a new birth of freedom and identity. I could drive it to school (no more bus) when it ran and I could take my girl to the drive-in or anywhere close by. There were some reliability issues. I was happy until I saw a friend of mine’s car. I think he got all A’s or something. His mother bought him a brand new 1965 MGB. It was beautiful and the bright red leather interior smelled like the Florsheim shoe store down town. Suddenly, my tired TR 2 lost much of its luster. It’s a relative thing you know.

Another high point in my automotive life was when I finally acquired enough resources to buy my first actually new car. It was an end of the year demo special, a 1967 TR4A irs. I had never seen such luxury; a polished real wood dash, a permanently attached top and roll up windows that didn’t leak (well not very much), a rich deep blue leather interior with white piping and light blue complementing carpet with the most beautiful powder blue body wrapped around it. I was in heaven. You see the TR 250 had just arrived at the dealership, which is why I got such a good deal on the 4A. I felt like I had finally arrived even though it came with the first car payment I ever had. $65.29/ month, a huge responsibility but well worth it. After all the girls loved it-therefore life was good.

All was well until a friend of my sister who owned a 1963 Corvette split window coupe decided he had to sell it along with most of his other frivolous possessions for school money. Suddenly my TR4 paled by comparison (a relative thing) so I sold the Triumph and bought his Corvette along with his Nehru jacket and several gold chains. What can I say I looked good, well cool anyway; it was the sign of the times.

Another high point in my car life was when I bought my first new “dream“ car. I had owned several used ones (some very used) but never a brand new one. What car you ask? Why a Jaguar XKE of course. This was after my stint in the Navy and while still in college. I had another beautiful paid for 1968 TR4A and really liked it. It was not really my fault. I had a day off from the Post Office (great school job) and no classes. My now ex-wife (I got married in the Navy) was working before she went to class so I was alone and left to my own devices (this is what you’d call fore-shadowing). I was just driving around San Diego. My last duty station was there so when I mustered out we just stayed and went to San Diego State University. Anyway back to my story. I was driving around and somehow ended up in front of the Jaguar dealer (I can’t imagine how). There it was sitting right out front with the sun dancing off the chrome wearing a big discount sign, a brand new 1970 (left over again) Jaguar XKE conv. It was blue silver with dark blue leather, a dark blue top and chrome wire wheels. I just stopped, stared and pined at her for the longest time. I don’t remember how it happened (I really don’t) I just ended up buying it. I never called my ex-wife to get permission or even to discuss it. I just bought it. The payment? Well, lets just say it was higher than our house payment. Note to self; if you are going to do this buy a really comfortable couch (at least 6 feet long) because you will spend many nights sleeping on it. Of course, I had great remorse for my stupidity but this was with out question the most beautiful car I had ever owned. I think I spent the entire first night just sitting in her smelling English leather. I couldn’t believe I actually owned a new Jaguar XKE! Actually it turned out to be the worst Jag I ever owned. In the beginning it spent more time in the Jaguar garage for repairs than it did in mine but eventually it settled down somewhat, but despite it all, I loved it unconditionally.

PS: I finally got off the couch when my ex-wife had to drive it one day when I blocked her in. After that I still got to drive it sometimes but usually I was relegated to the family slug, a Peugeot 504-what fun.

I had a friend Randy who worked for the Ferrari garage in Los Angeles. They were constantly doing valve jobs on the V12s because they would carbon up so badly in traffic they would hardly run. Since most of the people who could afford to buy these things were sports and movie stars and they gave little regard to the breaking- in requirements of new valve jobs. The problem became so prevalent that the Ferrari garage decided to drive the cars the required 500-mile break-in, do the final adjustments, and then deliver the car to the customer. Since Randy lived in San Diego he would usually get the job of driving the car home from Los Angeles and around until he had put the required mileage on the car. Sometimes he would call me to see if I had time to help him do this. It was a nasty job (yea right) but I would always drop everything to help him out. This particular time I drove the Jag to his house to meet him. He pulled up in a beautiful bright red 1961 Ferrari 250 GT California Spider and we went joy (I mean break-in) riding. It was a dream to drive. The gearbox shifted like it had butter in it and the engine revved so freely I could see why they had trouble holding the revs down to seat the valves. Incidentally, one sold just recently for over $10.5 million, who knew? I drove the car for the last hour and pulled it into his garage, said my goodbyes and left to go home. I opened the door of my E Type and as I seated myself I suddenly noticed it was not quite as comfortable as I remembered. When I fired her up I noticed it was not quite as smooth as before and the shifting was positively crude. What had happened to my Jag? I then realized everything in life truly relative.

My advice, don’t lose your boundaries. Stay grounded by remembering everything is beautiful in its own way. LBCs are still the most fun and affordable so just love the one you have. I know they put that to music somewhere but its still true!