Car Number Classics
NICHOLAS YOUNG, Pieters & Young Ltd, £39, ISBN 978 1 527230 46 0
A book about car registration plates: sounds a bit, well, anoraky? Even the author admits in his preface that displaying one’s name or initials on a car is a ‘childish practice’. But this massive doorstep of a hardback – it runs to 1312 pages – is anything but lightweight, both physically and metaphorically. It’s one of the most fascinating pieces of research we’ve ever encountered.
Vehicle registrations go back a lot further than you might think: as far as 1662, in fact, when hackney coaches in London were required to display numberplates. We even know the name of the person who owned number 1: a George Morris of ‘Pickadilley’.
Horseless carriages weren’t registered in the UK until well into the 20th Century. ‘A1’ was not, in fact, the first number issued, but it was certainly among them, secured by Earl Russell for his 12hp Napier on 7 December 1903. His story exemplifies what makes this book such an engrossing read: it’s not about the numbers or the cars, but the people who first owned them. So we learn that Earl Russell was something of a ‘scorcher’, who in 1904 forced a cyclist off the road while overtaking another car. During the subsequent court case, his wife, a passenger in the Napier, described the cyclist as a ‘nervous wobbler’ and added with suitably aristocratic hauteur: ‘It occurred to me as I saw him get off his machine that the sooner he gave up cycling the better.’
Then there’s the first owner of AX1, Reginald Price, a magistrate’s son and Army officer whose love life was complicated by a string of mistresses and illegitimate children. His behaviour was described by a judge as ‘a disgusting piece of blackguardism’, before adding: ‘You ought to be punished with a horsewhip.’ And we haven’t even got beyond the ‘A’s yet.
Such is the depth of biographical detail, the author has focused only on the registrations issued by 1 January 1904. An added twist is the inclusion of current vehicles that numbers are allocated to, where known: so, for example, A1 is now on a 2007 Mini (it was bought by a Brunei prince). It’s curious how many valuable plates have ended up on very humble vehicles, presumably to keep them ‘active’.
While there’s a section at the back on interesting registrations beyond that 1904 cut-off date – including the various diplomatic vehicles that can be spotted in London, such as 1 PAK on the Pakistani Ambassador’s car (replacing the less politically correct PAK 1 that it wore previously) – that’s really just a bit of garnish on a fabulously valuable historical document, packed with evocative period photos. Best of all is the price: just £39 plus p&p. It’s not generally available from booksellers but you can buy it from eBay for £45 all-in or email the author at ny@ nicholasyoung.com. For anyone interested in early motoring – or in people, generally – it will be your bargain buy of the year.