Track heritage

Marvellous that the Heritage Lottery Fund, in giving £1.5 million to the Brooklands museum, has recognised that the first-ever Motor Course is indeed a National Heritage. Marvellous that, with 25% of outside finance, the Museum has been able to buy the Napier-Railton, the racing car most important to it, even if the quoted description of it as the “greatest pre-war racing car…” may not meet with universal approval, but certainly one of the greatest track cars. The Lottery money is to go to extending what the Museum calls the ‘Motoring Village’, those Paddock buildings which were never ‘the village’ in my time, the term ‘Flying Village’ applying to the sheds on the Aerodrome. No matter, this is more good news, even if the late Robin Jackson, who never built an F1 car, might be surprised to find the ‘Robinery’ exhibiting such cars.

So an enormous uplift for the museum which Morag Barton, its tireless curator, has developed from small beginnings, even if the money has come too late to save the Track itself. It is now described as the ‘Ascot of motor sport’, today a more acceptable slogan than ‘The Right Crowd and No Crowding’, although those on the rails at the horse-race course might not agree; perhaps the new title refers to ladies’ fashions at both race-courses…

The new funding will enable a Brooklands-built Hurricane, brought back from Russia, to be restored if another £150,000 can be raised. Many great names are offering additional finance, including the Brooklands Society, which started the post-war re-interest in the Track, so this is a generous gesture. I am so glad to see this as an extended tribute to the memory of Hugh Locke King who built Brooklands 90 years ago.