VSCC FILM NIGHT T
he VSCC Driving Tests in late January are traditionally preceded by a film evening and,
as in previous years, this was strongly supported by VSCC members. The films for 2018 were effectively split into two; first an approximately 45-minute BP film recording the 1956 Grand Prix season and then a variety of Brooklands clips, mostly from Pathé News. Watching the BP film, it was interesting to make the contrast with today. When people hail Lewis Hamilton as ‘the greatest British racing driver’ because he has won more GPs than any other British driver (62 at the time of writing) they overlook the fact that there were only eight races in the 1956 season (one of which was the Indianapolis 500) compared to around 20 today. In that 1956 season our Brooklands Trust Members’ President Sir Stirling Moss, leading the Maserati team, won two GPs (Monaco and Monza) and finished second in the championship to Fangio in a Ferrari. Peter Collins also won two races and Colin Chapman participated in the French GP at Reims.
The delights of these film nights though are the clips of Brooklands in period, often revealing items about the Track that one was not aware of. The 1929 six-hour race began with a Le Mans start and the drivers and co-drivers were required to put the hood up at the start. The race was won by Woolf Barnato and Jack Dunfee. A piece on the 1933 Light Car Club’s international relay race showed MGs receiving instructions by radio
News
during the race, said to be a world first. Of course it wasn’t all cars but it was rare to see cyclists taking part in a 68-mile trial (18 laps). We also saw Malcolm Campbell describing the upgrades to Blue Bird for the 1934 record breaking season, undertaken of course by Thompson and Taylor whose premises were within the circuit. On an amateur film we briefly saw John Cobb with the Napier-Railton.
Items also included the weird, eccentric and just plain daft. Matching all those descriptions was the ‘Dynasphere’, a giant motorised wheel in which the passenger sat inside, somehow manag- ing to steer the thing. Judging from its giddy progress down the Finishing Straight one wonders who thought it would ever be safe on the road – look it up on YouTube [or the March-April 2012 Bulletin]. Perhaps more likely was the early Gyrocopter flown at Brooklands. There was also a 1940 piece featuring a gas-powered car with a huge tank-bag on the roof (they did that to Jones’s van once in Dad’s Army).
The night finished with a film supplied by the daughter of the Honourable Victor Bruce – members may remember we recently had a BTM talk about his wife. Bruce was an AC man and the film included not only footage of his Aceca on the 1926 Monte Carlo Rally but also him breaking the Test Hill record (7.74 second) in the ‘AC Wonder’, literally flying over the top of the Hill. The film night is open to all and members are encouraged to give it a try next year.
Gareth Tarr VSCC NEW YEAR DRIVING TESTS News
Andrew Messent in his 1934 Morgan Super Sports on the Banking (Katharine Allen).
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