VIDEO: George, 1969 Jaguar E-type
WONYC: What is the story of this car?
George: The story of this car? This car was purchased in 1971 by me, from a guy who owned it on Long Island, Queens Boulevard, actually on a Sunday morning. I got the car from an ad in the New York Times. And in order to be the first person to see the car, I picked up the Times on a Saturday night, which was the Sunday edition. And that was when the New York Times had a classified section for cars only. So I saw the car the night before, call the guy up, and was the first one to come and see the car the next day, Sunday morning. Needless to say, it was love at first sight again, because I had seen them and I purchased the car that morning.
WONYC: Why of all cars did you pick this one?
George: When I got into cars, my first experience with something that I really liked, the style, shape, and performance of cars was the English sports cars. My first car being an Austin Healy 100 and then an Austin Healy 3000 after that. And then I saw the JAG. A young lady who graduated from the same college I did and who I had a brief relationship with happened to have a Canary yellow E-type JAG. I was fortunate enough to be able to drive her car from Washington DC to New York City. And that solidified my desire to own this particular model of Jaguar. So at that point, I began my search for this particular car.
George and his Jag
WONYC: What is the most memorable moment with the car?
George: One of the difficult questions that I have is about memorable moments. There are too many memorable moments to name. One would be driving from New York to California, specifically the George Washington bridge to the golden gate bridge in 58 hours and returning in 56 hours, three weeks later. Another memorable moment would be driving across the country for six weeks and putting 10,200 miles on the car from start to return to New York. And one of the highlights being driving from British Vancouver to Tijuana, Mexico, straight down the west coast. It was an awesome experience. The scenery was like none I'd ever experienced living on the east coast. The roads were great. The highways were pristine and smooth, and the sun was constantly out on this trip for six weeks. Although the car is a convertible, I was able to keep the top down for the entire trip. So for six weeks I never put the top-up. It never rained.
The Jag in one of the cross country trips
WONYC: What is the biggest misconception about this car?
George: The biggest misconception about this car is the reliability of the car, partially due to the Lucas electrical system, which seems to be a plague for British sports cars, but has not had that much of an impact on my ownership of the car. My philosophy has been, if you change the oil and keep the motor intact and the suspension, then you don't basically have any problems. And I have always told my mechanic that if you find anything or see anything that needs to be fixed while you're fixing something else, please call me or just fix it because it's gonna need to be fixed at some point in time. So on the trip that I took that covered 10,000 miles and six weeks, the only thing that went on the car was the fan belt. And that was on my way to the grand canyon. And needless to say, I had an extra fan belt in the trunk, and half an hour later, I was able to be back on the road, continuing my trip to the Grand canyon.
WONYC: What role does this car play in your life?
George: That's an interesting one. The role this car plays in my life is that it is a car that has become part of me because it's such a beautiful looking car and it performs so well. And it does everything on the road that I need it to do with my particular style of driving, which is more aggressive and I would say going as fast as I can get away with. So before I had a son, I was so enamored with the car that I thought that when I died, I would have a crew bury me in the car at some distant location, and I would always be with the car. But then I thought that if I did that, I would then have to do like the old pharaohs did and kill all the people that buried me so nobody would know where I was.
So I thought the better thing to do was to have a kid so I could leave the car to my kid. And as luck would have it, I had a son who is now a big car guy and loves the JAG also but is more into the cause of his era. And one of the things he's said to me is that when he drives the car, he always thinks of me because he's so used to being in the passenger seat and looking over and seeing me driving. So when he drives the car, he will think of that image and I will always be in the car with him.
WONYC: That's beautiful.
George: Yes. And that's true. That's what he told me that ‘you'll always be in the car with me, dad, because that's what I grew up in’. Well, <Laugh> that's a nice thing to hear.
George and his son
WONYC: What are your happiest moments in the car?
George: Oh, gee. My happiest moments in this car are driving the car and driving it aggressively and driving it at speed. At one point I was going somewhere maybe to Florida, and I decided that I was going to drive the car and very few people were going to pass me. And believe it or not, I think only three people from here to Florida passed me. And one of those was, as I like to call an exit racer, he had come on the highway and he went for maybe four exits and at right next speed and then he pulled off and went to an exit. So that kind of didn't count.
Driving up to the bear mountain and down the Blue Ridge mountains was a blast for me and my son. So these are the things that for me, get my adrenaline flowing and put a smile on my face from turning the key to jumping out of the car. When I go on vacation with this car, my vacation begins as soon as I get in the car and turn the key, not when I reach the destination. And then when I'm leaving, the vacation is not ended, I'm looking forward to the drive back however long it is. And the vacation ends when I pull up in front of my house and turn the car off, then the vacation's over.
Photo by: Nick Weisner
Photo by: Nick Weisner
Photo by: Nick Weisner
