REVIVAL REVS UP
WHEN Melburnian Tom Sloan purchased a brand new Adams car in 1912, he could not have conceived it would be on display more than 100 years later in Geelong.
Lifelong motoring lover Graeme Anderson (pictured) was one of thousands of car enthusiasts who flocked to the waterfront for the much-loved annual Geelong Revival car festival over the weekend.
Mr Anderson’s great-great-great uncle, Tom Sloan, bought the Adams in 1912, a few years after he founded Bulla Cream. Mr Sloan sold the car to his brother-in-law who stored it in Bacchus Marsh.
Mr Anderson’s father, Tom, was born in 1928 and eventually inherited the car, which was passed down to Mr Anderson decades ago.
“The car is my life,” Mr Anderson said. “My wife tells me I have two loves — her and the car.”
Geelong Revival director Nicholas Heath said thousands of car lovers enjoyed the event which had a larger-than-ever hill climb.
“It’s gone very smoothly. We are in the racing business — you do have the odd incident, but fingers crossed everyone goes home safely,” Mr Heath said.
The track’s safety system was put to test on Saturday when the driver of an Audi smashed into a barrier. “He took out the fence — but we built the track for a purpose and we have a lot of barriers and safety devices to protect the crowd. In this case it did catch that errant vehicle and the driver walked away fine,” Mr Heath said.
“I checked in with him this morning and he was a little stiff but absolutely fine. You can always buy another car.”
Revival first-timer Shaun Matheson spent the two-days sharing his new ARK of Veterans project with the wider community.
The RSL-backed project has Mr Matheson working with returned veterans on projects such as car repairs to help them readjust to civilian life.