Shifting Gears

A Father’s Day Note

The 1960 Bugeye I bought for my 10-year-old son Bradley 18 months ago is finally home in the SCM garage. When I bought this Bugeye, I accomplished two goals with one car. First, I was paying a tribute to my own beginnings in sports cars. My first car was a […]

Join SCM’s Bonkers Miami-to-Monterey Drive

We’ve come up with the ultimate SCM road trip. We’re combining perhaps the most insignificant collector car with the longest possible trip. Here’s your chance to become a part of it. We’ve acquired a 1974 Bradley GT. My 9-year-old son is named Bradley; how could I resist? Think how much […]

The Millennials Are Coming! Vote Today

We at SCM believe the car hobby is thriving and growing, and new generations of enthusiasts are becoming a part of it all the time. Here’s your chance to help us recognize them. Later this year, SCM will name 40 enthusiasts under 40 years old who are making a difference […]

Cool Runnings

We do these things to ourselves. On purpose. It’s part of our old-car madness. When American Car Collector contributor Michael Pierce and his wife, Linda, invited me to spend Christmas Day night with them, it became an excuse to give an old car some exercise. They live in Carlton, OR, […]

Three Cars Calling to Me

When I start fidgeting around wondering which car I should get next, my friends call it “car knitting.” Currently, I’ve got a tidy, tightly focused collection of Alfas, ranging from a 1958 Giulietta Sprint Veloce to a 1967 Duetto. All the cars are in fine fettle or approaching it. The […]

Death Waits for No One

The email arrived on July 1, 2016. It was from my oldest and dearest friend, Bjarne Holm: Hi Keith. Bad news on the health front. I was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer early last month. My prognosis is a few months to a few years, depending on how I respond to […]

From Chateaus to Lava Fields

Each August and September, the collector car world hits high gear. Everything that happens before just anticipates the explosion of activities that mark the end of summer. Normally, this is a busy time for me — and the gang at SCM. But this year, hectic, frenetic and “my hair was […]

Monterey Week Isn’t Just About the Money

The pundits didn’t wait for the Monterey Car Week auctions to end before weighing in with banshee-like wails of market distress. “Saturday night auctions fail to meet 2015 levels” The Los Angeles Times headlined before the Gooding auction on Sunday. Bloomberg weighed in on Monday, “Monterey Auctions Continue to Slide […]

Money is Big, But Passion Drives the Hobby

Each year, this issue falls in the lull just before the great Super Bowl contest that is Monterey Car Week. Each of the auction companies on the Peninsula has its lineups set. All the seven- and eight-figure, market-defining cars have been extensively promoted and the potential bidders courted. Within a […]

Why We Do the Things We Do

According to Jerry Tilley, captain of the Aleutian Ballad, a crab boat featured in TV’s “The Deadliest Catch,” the scene in which a 60-foot rogue wave catches his 107-foot boat broadsides and flips it onto its beam end is one of the most-watched excerpts of the hit show on YouTube, […]