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A 1908 WHITE MODEL "L" STEAM CAR
THE RESCUE - continued
by Austin P. Farrar
by Austin P. Farrar
My spell at
Southampton was coming to an end, and I was due to return to the
National Physical Laboratory at Teddington; so the plan was to get
both cars to Teddington, where I could rent a garage for them. With
today's chaotic railway system, it seems to be extraordinary that
during the war the railways, and particularly the Goods system,
were highly efficient. There was virtually no road transport, with
very little petrol and few vehicles; but there was plenty of coal
for steam locos, and goods could be transported quite quickly by
rail; and, for instance, it took only a few days to send a truckload
of rigging shackles from Portsmouth Dockyard to Greenock. There
was a railway line inside our shed at the docks, so we had a truck
shunted in, wheeled both cars onto it, roped them securely into
place, and dispatched it to Teddington goods station, where it arrived
at an end-loading platform two days later. Then, with help from
the local kids, we motored the Bentley, towing the White, a few
hundred yards to their rented garage; where they stayed for some
time before I could organise the next move home.
In 1944 things
got complicated; my mother moved from Felixstowe to a house on the
Shotley peninsular which, in addition to a double garage for her
and my brother's cars, had a 60 foot barn which had once been a
wheelwright's shop; big enough for the Bentley and the White. Then
in August 1 was suddenly moved; with the whole of my department,
up to the Clyde.
In 1945, when
I came south for some leave, I got the Bentley serviceable enough
to drive home - albeit with a stack of torch batteries to work the
coil ignition for starting - and then returned to Teddinglon and
sent the White off by rail to the nearest goods station to home;
coming home myself by train. All it needed then was to enlist a
friend to help unload the White from its truck and tow it behind
the Bentley the five miles through the lanes to Stutton and the
barn. At the end of my leave I drove the Bentley up to Scotland
-- but that's another story.
After the war
I had great ideas about rebuilding the White, and read up all the
information I could find about Steam cars. But somehow, what with
trying to run a boatyard, I never had any spare time. I was introduced
to Alec Hodsdon who wanted to buy the White and after putting him
off for several years, be said "You are never going to have time
to do that job as well as your own-I'll give you £400 for it now
and a ride in it when I have it finished."
I never got
my ride, and some years later I heard that he had never made any
progress and had sold it; so I assumed it had gone out of my life.
Then in 1994
1 had a phone call, "Are, you the chap, who used to have a White
Steam Car?" "Er -- Yes". "Well I've got it, and it's running" This
was Bob Dyke, phoning from Penzance, and the rest of the story is
his, but I had had my ride on the Norfolk Steam car Tour in 1996
and the satisfaction of having saved a piece of mechanical history.
NEXT
PAGE - LUCY'S REJUVENATION
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