It was a humid spring day in 1992. I was standing at a rent-a-car kiosk in Fort-de-France, Martinique. We had decided to take a family vacation to the Caribbean. My daughter Alexandra was less than a year old. We expected terrific French food in addition to the delights of the […]
Shifting Gears
Wait and Pounce
“If it’s not really the car you are looking for, pass on it and keep looking.” Those were Miles Collier’s words to me as I was engulfed by the red mist. I was at a Silver auction in Portland when I spotted a handsome 1969 Alfa Romeo Spider. I recall […]
Blasts From the Past
Soon you will have the entire contents of 35 years of SCM at your fingertips. We are about to unveil a project we’ve been working on since the very first issue was created. This magazine was born in the midst of a revolution in desktop publishing and database management for […]
A Date to Remember
January 6 was the fourth anniversary of my stroke. That day in 2019 started like any other. I was up at 5 a.m., put on my Hoka running shoes and pounded out a relaxed 5k along the Willamette River. I had just turned 68 years old, and I was trim […]
It’s Not a Restoration, It’s a Build
Let’s make one thing clear right from the start: A car is only “as-born” once. It can never be returned to that state. Any attempts to do so result in a fictional re-creation, done to please the owner and whatever standards he is aspiring toward. And that’s okay. We can’t […]
From Vague-O-Matic to Cash-O-Matic
In all my years of selling cars at auction, I have never had a “miracle moment” where the bidding went far beyond my expectations — until our 1971 Citroën DS21 Pallas sold this past fall. When I saw the car offered on Bring a Trailer in August 2021, I was […]
“This Fool Has Now Set Off To Find His Grail”
I was recently doing my three-times-a-week stroke and cardio rehab at Oregon Health & Science University. My post-exercise resting blood pressure is down to 88 over 58. I haven’t had those numbers since I was a Juilliard dancer. Mobility and shifting are still challenges, but I persevere. To while away the […]
The Guns of August
The confetti cannons fired as owners Lee and Penny Anderson were presented the Best of Show trophy by Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance Chairman Sandra Button. The swirling bits of colored paper marked the culmination of Monterey Car Week, the largest car-enthusiast celebration in the world. On Sunday, August 21, their […]
Two for 2022
Sixty-six thousand. That’s how many miles cars wearing an SCM 1000 roundel traveled last summer. And we’re just counting the entrants. The tally doesn’t include the dozens of support staff and amazing volunteers involved who kept the events running like a Halda Speedpilot. The SCM 1000 AMG Invitational was held […]
The Original Jaguar
This is all Miles Collier’s fault. I attended one of his early symposiums on collecting. I was the guest of noted collector and Lamborghini expert Simon Kidston. During the seminar, I was first introduced to the notion that we were not owners, but just the current caretakers of our cars. […]