Library Notes

Activity in the Library has been relatively quiet in recent months. The volume of books on loan has been relatively quiet and the quantity of books received into the Library is also noticeably down on recent times. On that note, we should remind members that we are always ready to receive donations of surplus books from members libraries, should anyone be wanting to have a clean out at home. As our collection continues to grow, (despite the physical space for more shelving being restricted), evermore ingenious shelving solutions are more difficult to find. It is therefore surprising that the team have come up with yet another fix and a relatively significant amount of shelf space is currently being ‘shoehorned’ into place. Barry Birchall is about to have printed the most worthwhile book he has been working so diligently on. His book is about the early history of the motor trade in the Auckland area. Barry notes that a significant amount of the information he has compiled has been unearthed from the shelves of our Library. A ‘food for thought’ item came across our desk in recent weeks in the form of a ‘Brooklands Books’ publication on the Mini-Cooper 1961-71. This is one of a series published over the years and they covered a wide range of (mostly) British cars. The contents of these books are collections of contemporary road-tests and articles extracted from magazines such as Autocar, Motor, Motor Sport, Wheels, etc. In that regard, each book is a ‘time-capsule’ of how the cars were seen at the time. If our readers were lucky enough (as one of our group was) to have owned one of these cars from new (now 60 years ago), we can thoroughly recommend the walk down memory lane which awaits you at the Library. We are pleased to record that Richard Green is a very welcome new member of our team.

Chris Wood and the Library Team—Barry Birchall, Richard Green,

Owen Hayward, Barry Robert and John Stokes,

Veteran Notes

As it was Queens Birthday, there were quite a number away. Russel Vincent reported on making new valves for the 1905 single cylinder Cadillac, out of valves supplied by the Branch Spares. Dennis Lowe produced a write up of his 1903 Oldsmobile at an event near Katikati. Dennis also showed us a 1960/'70's Gunson Colortune apparently still operational. David Lane mentioned that condensers were getting harder to find at places like Repco and Supercheap. This is probably because it’s getting on for thirty five years since cars had points and condensers. Once again the Branch Spares helped out. David also mentioned the barn find 1913 Overland, ex David Porter, possibly now in the Pointon collection in the Wairarapa. That's it for the month of June.

John Stokes

For those who missed my presentation at the AGM, below is our PROPOSED new logo for the Club nationally. More detail will be emailed as space and timing prevented more in this Bulletin. Please contact me with any feedback you would like taken back to the Executive meeting in August. Tracey Winterbottom