Lack of time prevented me from writing about a splendid day out spent earlier this year at Brooklands, in the company of Charles Dressing and Paul Tarsey. We were hosted by the ever-enthusiastic and knowledgeable Allan Winn, the CEO of the Brooklands Trust, which looks after the Museum and the site.
The phrase ‘looks after’ hardly does justice to what Allan does – Brooklands is in the process of a grand plan for re-engineering, which will include a restoration of the Finishing Straight. If you are at all interested, I suggest you visit the website and then arrange a visit for yourself. You surely won’t be disappointed.
However, while digging through my memorabilia shortly afterwards, I came across the following, which was sent to me (I forget by whom) more than forty years ago. It is from a diary written in 1907, and apart from its content, I just love the period feel of the prose.
We went down to the Barnes’s at Fox Holm near Weybridge. Mr and Mrs Locke King came to dinner. They have been building this awful motor track and are so hated by their neighbours, many of whose houses they have simply ruined, that hardly anyone will speak to them. I was rather uncertain whether I had better go and see this horrid motor track, but as they offered to take me in the Fox Warren motor I thought it would be stupid of me not to go. I was well rewarded for going by having a nice talk with Mrs Wilfred Ward, the clever Roman Catholic (formerly Miss Hope Scott) who has written novels (One Small Scruple, Out of Due Time, and others). I made her acquaintance, first at Mrs Cave’s, at Ditcham, long ago.
The motor track is a perfect nightmare. It has cost more than £150,000 to construct; a great oval of cement 60-100 yards wide and more than 2½ miles round. It is for motor races. Within it stands a ruined farm and cut down trees, mere desolation. A more unenjoyable place to come to on a hot Sunday afternoon I cannot imagine. The beautiful Surrey landscape looks down into this purgatory of motor stables and everything that motors require, seats for thousands of spectators cut in the side of the hill. There were some twenty of these snorting beasts, and Mr and Mrs Locke King were there looking most depressed. But as she offered to drive me round in her motor I got boldly in and sat by her on the ‘box’. She put it to 43 miles an hour – I felt my eyes pressed in by the air at that terrific speed, and I could hardly breathe. I went round again in the Fox Warren motor, much slower. I find I don’t care to ‘go round’ – what I like are the lanes and roads and views, and the getting to one’s destination so quickly and easily. The enormous size of the arena, almost like a great Roman work, and the controlled strength of the motors, prevents this great horrid place from being vulgar. I might have felt differently last week when 20,000 spectators arrived, and 1,200 motors. No wonder the neighbours thirst for Locke King’s blood.
From A Victorian Diarist: later extracts from the journals of Mary, Lady Monkswell, edited by the Hon. E C F Collier, 1946
The phrase ‘looks after’ hardly does justice to what Allan does – Brooklands is in the process of a grand plan for re-engineering, which will include a restoration of the Finishing Straight. If you are at all interested, I suggest you visit the website and then arrange a visit for yourself. You surely won’t be disappointed.
However, while digging through my memorabilia shortly afterwards, I came across the following, which was sent to me (I forget by whom) more than forty years ago. It is from a diary written in 1907, and apart from its content, I just love the period feel of the prose.
We went down to the Barnes’s at Fox Holm near Weybridge. Mr and Mrs Locke King came to dinner. They have been building this awful motor track and are so hated by their neighbours, many of whose houses they have simply ruined, that hardly anyone will speak to them. I was rather uncertain whether I had better go and see this horrid motor track, but as they offered to take me in the Fox Warren motor I thought it would be stupid of me not to go. I was well rewarded for going by having a nice talk with Mrs Wilfred Ward, the clever Roman Catholic (formerly Miss Hope Scott) who has written novels (One Small Scruple, Out of Due Time, and others). I made her acquaintance, first at Mrs Cave’s, at Ditcham, long ago.
The motor track is a perfect nightmare. It has cost more than £150,000 to construct; a great oval of cement 60-100 yards wide and more than 2½ miles round. It is for motor races. Within it stands a ruined farm and cut down trees, mere desolation. A more unenjoyable place to come to on a hot Sunday afternoon I cannot imagine. The beautiful Surrey landscape looks down into this purgatory of motor stables and everything that motors require, seats for thousands of spectators cut in the side of the hill. There were some twenty of these snorting beasts, and Mr and Mrs Locke King were there looking most depressed. But as she offered to drive me round in her motor I got boldly in and sat by her on the ‘box’. She put it to 43 miles an hour – I felt my eyes pressed in by the air at that terrific speed, and I could hardly breathe. I went round again in the Fox Warren motor, much slower. I find I don’t care to ‘go round’ – what I like are the lanes and roads and views, and the getting to one’s destination so quickly and easily. The enormous size of the arena, almost like a great Roman work, and the controlled strength of the motors, prevents this great horrid place from being vulgar. I might have felt differently last week when 20,000 spectators arrived, and 1,200 motors. No wonder the neighbours thirst for Locke King’s blood.
From A Victorian Diarist: later extracts from the journals of Mary, Lady Monkswell, edited by the Hon. E C F Collier, 1946
Which goes to show that you cannot please all the people all the time. Sadly, Lady Monkswell died in 1930, but I wonder whether she was ever won over to the sport? I fear probably not. Now if they would have visited Le Mans, it might have been a different story...
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