Do you remember the series of Heineken TV advertisements from 1974? Here’s one of my favourites:
Well, I’m not proclaiming this boast for TTT 2’s trace and track service but we have a pretty good record of researching and tracking down car history.
So when Des Johnston from Bangor in Co. Down Northern Ireland contacted us and asked the following:
In 1961 I sold a TC to a Medical Doctor in Detroit. I think his name may have been Middleton. I still have the original receipt or bill of sale dated 1st Feb 1949. The chassis number is TC 7134 and the engine number is XPAG 7778 I wonder is this car still anywhere in the world and if so I would love to get in touch with the owner as I also have some 8mm cine of same taken in 1960?
…….we asked the question of the tabc list and discovered that the car is still in the USA. Thanks to LaVerne Downey who took the trouble to respond and tell us that the car was (at the time) in his ‘shop in Colorado.
Prior to the arrival of the car at Laverne’s workshop, TC7134 had been put in storage for 40 years. The following YouTube clip shows the owner, Bill Patterson starting the car and driving it after all those years in storage.
Bill plans to give the car to his son Tom, who lives in the Palo Alto area of California.
Here’s a photo of the car when it was still in Northern Ireland:
When we told Des Johnston that we had managed to locate TC7134 he was absolutely amazed, as the following quote from him shows:
I cannot believe that you have got a reply and so quickly! I sent the car on a Headline ship from Belfast across the Atlantic and up the St Lawrence to Detroit in 1961. I needed the money to get married as I was young and foolish! I am still married to the girl I met when I had the TC.
If the present owner could contact me or send me a picture of the plate on the firewall I would be delighted.
We duly arranged for Des and Bill to exchange e- mails and Des sent us an updating e-mail:
I made contact with Bill Patterson in Colorado, the present owner of TC 7134, and have sent him the receipt for same. His father bought it from me for him in 1961 when he was at medical school and he has owned it ever since.
He added:
Bill’s father had a brother Andy living here in Ireland and he approached me in the town of Newtownards, County Down one morning and asked me would I sell the car as his brother in USA wanted one for his son. A price was agreed on the spot and Andy got me the money from the Bank outside where the car was parked. It had taken all of 5 minutes. He took the car and I had to proceed on to work in Belfast on the bus. That lunchtime I bought a 1957 Goggomobile T300 with exactly half the money I had got for the TC and what a disaster the Goggo was but that is another story…
Des gave us details of the history of TC7134 prior to him owning the car:
TC 7134 was bought new by a Sam Jeffery, who was serving with the British Army in Germany (in what capacity I do not know) He was able to buy the car less purchase tax as a serving member of the forces.
In the early 1950s he brought the car back to Northern Ireland and sold it to a car dealer by the name of Kelly who had it registered with the Belfast number OZ 1032 and who gave it to his daughter who owned it till I bought it in 1959.
It was rather odd how I got the receipt for the car. Sam Jeffery, on returning to Northern Ireland, joined The Royal Ulster Constabulary and in 1960 he was serving as a Detective Sergeant in Newtownards, Co Down where I was living at that time with my parents. Well, one evening at home my father answered a ring at the door and came to me saying ” What have you been up to now, there’s a policeman in the drawing room and he wants to speak to you”. Two of my friends had TCs at that time and it was not unusual for us to break the 30 MPH speed limit and a lot worse at the time so I immediately assumed the sergeant had a court summons for me but no, it was the receipt he had in his hand. He told he had seen the car parked in the Town Square one night and wondered was it the same car he had brought back from Germany, so he took the liberty of lifting the bonnet and checking the chassis number, confirming that it was indeed as on the receipt. The car was an export model but the only difference I could see was the addition of flashers on the body near your shoulder which I see from your photos have been removed. The colour was Reno Red or maybe called Emgee red. I added the Brooklands steering wheel and rear 16 wheels but now I can’t remember if they were on it when it went to America. I think it may have had an old valve or tube radio.
I always regretted selling it and about 20 years ago I bought the remains of another TC with the idea of getting it to look like 7134. The project is well on but due to advancing years, reducing financials and increased immobility its very slow! It is of course also Reno red with red upholstery.
The original sales receipt for TC7134 for £452.10 (no purchase tax). This amount was paid by draft to Nuffield Exports Ltd. The small receipt is for D.M. 40 in respect of clearance fees at Cologne docks.
TC7134 in LaVerne Downey’s ‘shop in March 2014.
Ed’s note: The reference to Sam Jeffery lifting the bonnet on TC7134 brought back a memory to me which I look back on with laughter, albeit it was not so funny at the time. I was chugging up a steep incline in my Series 1 Morris 8 when I crawled past a Police Constable who was pushing his bicycle up the hill. He tapped on the roof of the car and said “Pull in up there lad!” Yours truly, 18 at the time, got booked for a noisy exhaust and bald tyres.
I wonder where the TC is now