Bicester Heritage’s Dan Geoghegan
A serial classic owner with a penchant for Alvis, for the past six years he has been the ever-busy chief executive of Bicester Heritage
1. My parents purchased a country garage in 1972, and I was born shortly afterwards. From just nine years old, attending the petrol pumps was a regular job for me at any available opportunity. I still have the Shell globes.
2. When the family business got its digital till in the 1980s, I was swift to secure its tactile predecessor, with its wonderful noises and ‘ring’, for my first business, aged ten. More recently it has had a new lease of life as a tea chest.
3. At University I brokered a three-way deal involving two Alvis Speed Twentys to secure the Riley MPH Prototype for Bob Meijer, who has been a fantastic mentor ever since. After the MPH’s restoration with ERA engine, Bob invited me on the Mille Miglia in 1996. I still wear the watch… and compete with the car.
4. When Macko Laqueur suggested we take his ex-French GP Lagonda on Le Jog in 1995, I leapt at the opportunity. With 32 O/S maps stuffed under my seat and no roof, it still ranks highly and gave me a love of maps – Macko was a brilliant tutor. It was my first HERO rally, and I have never bettered that bronze medal!
5. Randolph Trafford was a pioneering Herefordshire aviator and motorist, sprinting his Amilcar in events organised with the Wye Valley Auto Club (of which he was a founder member) on his driveway in the 1920s. We are restoring a cottage formerly on his estate and the aim is for this badge to return permanently, preferably on one of his old steeds.
6. A year after receiving the keys for RAF Bicester in 2013, the team gave me this large enamel sign as an anniversary present. Now that we are all using video conferencing much more, it’s become a great ice-breaker as a background.
7. I found this Index of Car Registrations in my dad’s office when I was very young; he was always quoting cars by their numbers. It sparked a fascination in their origins and histories and we are still using the numbers he collected in the 1970s.
8. When we were young, an Alvis Graber visited and, when I found a motor show picture of one of the four convertibles, it became an ambition to find a car. It’s a work of art and a marvel to drive.
9. At our first Sunday Scramble in 2014, the 2507 (Bicester) Squadron ATC presented us with the original RAF Bicester Scramble Bell. Dated 1939, the ATC had used it as a doorstop since the closure of RAF Bicester in 1976, but it now hangs in our 1771 Club Room.