BOOTED FORD HAS ITS OWNER WONDERING Y

Stuart Perren owns an unusual 1936 Ford Model Y ‘Tudor’ with an enclosed steel boot featuring a hinged lid, and a glazed numberplate and tail-light cluster as found on period prestige cars such as Rolls-royces and Lagondas (below left).

When he was a child, Stuart’s family had a 1936 Ford 8 Y ‘Fordor’, and he served his apprenticeship as a technician at a Suffolk Ford dealer before becoming an insurance assessor. Having built and restored a number of competition cars for autotests and trials, he was looking for a project and found this example in Stockport through the Ford Model Y & C Register. Its previous owner, Bill Plevin, had died six years earlier, having owned the car for 30 years and carried out some restoration. His widow then kept the Ford in her garage until the time came to move house. As soon as Stuart saw the boot, he had to have the car and a deal was done.

There is very little history with the Model Y, however. BUR 896 was registered new in Hertfordshire and, according to a duplicate buff logbook issued in 1963, had only two keepers listed in Cheshire. “The unusual boot appears to have been fitted early on in the car’s life,” says Stuart, “and was likely a generic accessory that could be adapted to fit similar cars with a curved rear panel, such as a Morris Eight or Singer Bantam.” According to Tippers Classic & Vintage Plates, the lightbox is for ACE translucent digits, which were backlit and featured on a range of vehicles, from small ACS to the big Bentleys, up to the 1950s. Stuart would love to know if anyone can shed any more light on it.