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Meet Peter Helck (1893–1988), one of the great automotive artists of the 20th century. Fascinated by cars from childhood, Helck captured the raw excitement of early motorsport in paintings filled with mechanical detail, flying dirt, and fearless drivers pushing the limits.

Peter witnessed the early days of racing firsthand, attending the 1906 Vanderbilt Cup race as a young teenager.

His artwork is more than beautiful car art. It’s a window into a time when every race was an adventure and every machine was a mechanical marvel.

Take a look at his work.

https://artcontrarian.blogspot.com/2018/11/peter-helck-painter-of-ancient-car-races.html

Recently got to visit the Don Garlits Museum of Drag Racing in Marion County Florida.   Super interesting museum which has a combination of collector cars and drag racing cars many of which were owned by Don himself.  Each car seemed to have an interesting back story.    The museum is spread across two buildings.  Once contains the "antique" cars which includes stock antiques as well as period hot rods.  The other contains the drag racing cars including super cool variations back into the earliest days of the sport.

Now here is something I’ve never seen before.  It’s like a Bulldog with that nose.

Last week I visited the Toplands Farm annual tractor show in Roxbury, CT.  What a treat to see these gas and steam tractors and other farm equipment in action.

Interesting photo, and a fantastic town car. All Pierce Arrow’s of the early 30’s.

The internet told me nobody can do this anymore.

It’s usually rare barn find cars that you can’t believe were still hiding away somewhere but other automotive artifacts can be just as surprising. I just got my hands on a couple of Hupmobile promotional filmstrips from 1928. Somehow these rolls survived in a drawer somewhere all this time and they’re still in great shape. I just finished digitizing the first one, which was intended to promote the brand to prospective dealers. It gives some insight into how they were trying to grow the brand at their peak of production and sales. At that time, they wouldn’t have been able to imagine that in ten years time, the company would be on the verge of going under.

As I get older, my tastes seem to be drifting further in the direction of the dawning of the automobile era.   I find myself looking more and more at brass cars, but I have very little experience being around them or having close car buddies (only a couple friends have them and the are distant from me) who can share their experience with me.

I can see a lot of wisdom in grabbing a brass model T….. for all the obvious reasons.  I’m wondering if you had a little more expanded budget and were looking for something well built but larger with more horsepower, what opinions are out there on a great brass car platform in that 35K-50K price range?

Asking for a friend….? 😊

We attended the New England Concours Saturday and it was a great time despite a dry but really blustery day that didn't get over 50.

To be clear this isn't a major concours but a local event in it's third year that is  gaining steam.  It's organized by some great folks and this year's participants included Dick Shappy who brought his Duesenberg Model A and a fantastic Ferrari 275 GTB that won at the Boston Cup a few days earlier.  

Positives included super organization, classes that made sense, traffic and people moved efficiently and a very welcome atmosphere to all participants.  Judging was casual but done by a team of car folk many of whom have judged at bigger events like Audrain. MB, and MB w123 was featured this year, Corvette the previous year.  Pressing for Packard next year...

On the cars themselves, something for most everyone.  I also saw some local cars (we live 3 miles from the venue) I hadn't seen before - a testiment to good events ability to draw interesting cars.

Here are some pics -  hope you like them!