New new Shelby book by veteran writer

[Historybuff]

Have only fragmentary info. at this date

Title: Unknown
Theme: Shelby's racing career (when he drove Allards, Ferraris, Maseratis, etc.)

Author: Art Evans, the
same man who wrote the book on Ken Miles.

Publication date: this fall

Country of origin of book: South California

Binding: Probably softbound

Price: $29.95

Art goes back to the original race era of the Fifties so no doubt will have some good stories to tell. He has an organization called Fabulous Fifties that throws car-oriented events for charity

Will update as soon as info. becomes available

[Historybuff]

The author of the new book on Shelby's career as a race driver will
probably be at the concours his group, Fabulous fities is sponsoring.
October 11, 2008 at the South Coast Botanic Gardens in Palos Verdes, a peninsula that sticks out into the ocean near LA harbor. A beautiful location and lots of great cars and drivers.

Many of the Fabulous Fifties Group areguys and gals who raced and wrenched in the 1950’s . It will be held on October 11, 2008. If I get one of the newly published books, I'll send a book report to the CC site.

[Historybuff]

Looks worth the money, if you prize rare pictures of Shelby as a younger man.It's mostly a picture book but does have a few pages of copy.
The guy that was reading it when I peeked over hus shoulder was one of the photo contributors but even he can't get his copy until the bulk shipment arrives later this month. Here's the descripton off amazon or somesuch book vendor site


Shelby, the Race Driver: With Remembrances by Carroll Shelby
$29.95
by Art Evans
Before a Cobra was even a gleam in his eye, Carroll Shelby was a great race driver, one of the very best Americans driving during the 1950s. His career behind the wheel is told for the first time in this new book. It includes remembrances written by Shelby himself along with many never before published photographs. Among other achievements, Shelby won Le Mans in 1959, was twice the Sport Car Club of America National Champion and was chosen Sports Car Driver of the Year two times. The book details a large number of his races as well as his relationships with Juan Fangio, Phil Hill, Stirling Moss, Jack Brabham and John Fitch among many others. Shelby had World Championship ability, but unfortunately, his racing career was cut short after the 1960 season due to his heart condition.

192 pages. Due late October 2008.

[Historybuff]

Hence the review,



Title: SHELBY, the Race Driver
With Remembrances by Carroll Shelby
Publisher; Iconografix Inc.
Type: Horizontal format, paperbound
Author Art Evans Price: $29.95

I don't know if there are different markets for Shelby books; for instance, will Cobra and Shelby Mustang fans buy a book about Shelby that doesn't touch upon those cars (other than one picture of each)? I think they will if they get a chance to leaf through it because it becomes apparent on looking at this book that the Cobras and Shelby Mustangs might have never existed if Carroll Shelby hadn't had the exciting race driver's career that he had.

Carroll Shelby gets so much publicity about his Cobras that it is relatively unknown that he made his name in Maseratis and Ferraris.

Up until now, there have been several books about Shelby’s career with Cobras, Ford GTs and Shelby Mustangs, but none devoted solely to his life only as a race driver, a short but meteoric career that began around 1954 when he was still a chicken farmer in East Texas.

Dr. Art Evans, who has previously chronicled the life of ace Shelby's ace driver Ken Miles, put this photo archive together but added to the usual mixture of photos by quoting extensively from Shelby’s own book The Cobra Story (written with John Bentley) published back in 1965 and adding his own words as well. For those who have not read that long out-of-print book, it has a lot of good stories told in Shelby’s colorful language. You can almost hear the Texas twang as you read it. (you can still find dog-eared copies on ebay--I had to pay $50 for one from a specialist book dealer)

This new book really shows how good Dr. Evans, who has earned several degrees, is at research. He has unearthed pictures that go back to Shelby’s first day in a sports car, when he drove a borrowed MG-TC to victory in Texas. He then has pictures of Shelby in an Allard, Aston Martin, many different Ferraris and Maseratis. Many of the pictures were taken by Dr. Evans, a stalwart of sports car racing in California for over 50 years.

Oddly there is no picture of Shelby in a Cobra, other than one taken when he took his secretary , Joan Sherman, for a ride around Willow Springs Racetrack in the first Cobra—polished to look like chrome--as a promotional stunt. But then the Cobra didn’t come around until 1962 and Shelby’s race driving career ended in 1960.

Especially interesting is the shots of Shelby’s two most supportive Stateside sponsors, Tony Parravano and John Edgar. Consecutively, they both sponsored Shelby when race wins in sports cars couldn’t win money in the U.S. but toward the end of Shelby’s driving career race race promoters began to pay cash awards in the U.S.

If there’s one quibble I have with Dr. Evans research , it’s his assertion in the part of the text where he wrote that Shelby’s first big money sponsor, Tony Parravano, who Dr. Evans says went to live in Mexico. I’ve read before that there was a murder investigation that followed Parravano's sudden disapperance, so it seems unlikely to me that Parravano would flee the IRS to Mexico at a comparatively young age and never again contact his family when they were only a phone call away. Maybe coming from the academic world, Dr. Evans didn't want to indulge in half century old gossip, but I think it's pretty well agreed in the racing community that Parravano, perhaps due to loan sharking and other neferious activities, didn't live to the end of his days in Puerto Vallerta sipping tequilas...

Back to the book, the pictures of Shelby’s various wives are also illuminating, particularly the ones where he kisses a race queen, Jan Harrison, and then, a few pages later, is seen on his honeymoon with her as his new bride!

The perils of racing are also shown such as Shelby’s wrinkled Austin-Healey after he went end over end in the Panamericana race in Mexico.

Shelby’s racing buddies also get their pictures in there—Masten Gregory Stirling Moss, Fon de Portago, and Phil Hill among them.It's obvious that Shelby drove with the best there was in sports cars and was competitive with them all, though not nearly as successful in Grand Prix, where, aside from Aston Martin, wasn't racing for the works.

Probably the most fun to see pictures are from when Shelby won at LeMans in ‘59 for Aston Martin. Shelby is shown still wearing his chicken -plucking driving overalls.

The book is 192 pages and though it’s only in black & white, this reviewer thinks it is worth the $29.95 list price. It is a pity that , though some of the pictures were probably available in color, that none are printed here in color, but I consider this book to be just the first edition and perhaps a later edition can include color, albeit that inclusion will probably lead to a higher price.

Really invaluable is the list of all of Shelby’s races, a list composed by Monterey-based sports car author and historian Michael Lynch, and Jim Sitz (though Sitz is uncredited). One can see how Shelby had the experience to build the Cobra when you see all the marques he raced before the Cobra project occurred to him. It’s obvious that Shelby –at least when he left Edgar’s employ--wasn’t no longer driving just what he was offered, but driving certain cars to learn all about those cars and how they handled. He was in effect a future manufacturer doing research on competitive marques and having a whale of a lot of fun along the way….
All in all, although I look forward someday to the 10-lb. coffee table book covering everything Shelby coming out in a few years, this book provides some good entertainment until that comes along and is reasonably priced to boot.
Published in mid-October, the book will no doubt soon be at Barnes & Noble, Borders and other chains though can also order it from Ford memorabilia dealers like Jim Demick in Peralta NM or if you want to order several to resell you can get a bulk discount from the distributor, Iconografix.
Now we would like to see the same type book on Dan Gurney!

[Trevor Legate]

Had a swift scan through a copy at Motorbooks in London (we're on the ball over here you know! B&N - huh!) Looked reasonably interesting and considered buying it until a lady brought in some books to sell - one was The Certain Sound by John Wyer. I was offered it for a 'reasonable price' but it did deplete the coffers so I had to pass on Mr. Shelby's tome....no contest.