‘IN ITS DAY, PROBABLY THE MOST ADVANCED CAR ON THE GRID – AND IT REMAINS ONE OF THE MOST REMARKABLE CARS IN F1 HISTORY’
There was a time, before World War Two, when American car manufacturers were simply leagues ahead of everybody else. The quality, reliability, style and performance of American cars were much better than what was on offer from their European counterparts. And at a time when American production numbers were already measured by the million, in Europe the biggest car manufacturers were still dreaming of numbers in the thousands. This is why, when we look at European car magazines of the period, we see so many American cars featured and offered for sale: most of the market, even in Europe, consisted of American cars.
‘There was no competition,’ says Nicola Bulgari, a leading Italian collector of American cars manufactured from 1930 to 1950 and the current custodian of this Cadillac V-16. ‘In America, cars were within the reach of the masses, while in Europe they were still reserved for a wealthy minority. In the USA people were using their cars to cross the country, and they needed something fast and reliable. In Europe the same distances were almost always covered by train at that time, relegating cars to a limited, more recreational use.’
As an example, in the 1930s one of the most successful cars in Europe was the Fiat 508 Balilla, with an 1100cc engine of about 30bhp, and manufactured at a rate of around 20,000 per year, compared with only around 500 of the more powerful and exclusive 100-120bhp Alfa Romeo 6C. A contemporary 70bhp Ford V8, however, was manufactured in numbers of around 300,000 per year, and the 80bhp Buick Series 40 around 100,000. And in this world, General Motors’ Cadillac Motor Car Division was the king brand.
Since being founded in 1902 from the remnants of the Henry Ford Company (after Ford himself had moved on and founded the Ford Motor Company), Cadillac manufactured cars that were considered among the best and most technologically advanced of the age. It became part of the GM galaxy in 1909, and its 1915 V8 started the Americans’ enduring love for this type of engine. In 1930, insulated from the most negative effects of The Great Depression by being part of GM, Cadillac still had the funds to create something very special indeed, and presented to the market a 16-cylinder car, equipped with an overhead-valve 135º V16 of 7.4 litres (452ci) and 165bhp.
The 16-cylinder Cadillac (marketed as the V-16, and also as the Sixteen) was available in 14 different body types, manufactured in-house or by external coachbuilders. Yet the 1929 crisis had an impact on sales, not only due to a general lack of money but because potential owners worried about being seen in such an ostentatious car during such hard times. The completely new Series 90 version was launched at the 1937 New York Auto Show, with a monobloc L-head design, and in a career that spanned 11 years in total, only 4076 cars were built. Yet it wasn’t only rarity that brought the Cadillac V-16 legendary status: its refined style, power and comfort made it the perfect choice for the wealthy.
‘It’s a huge car, fully 6.2m long, and it was expensive too, the priciest of the V-16 range’
COUNTESS ROSARIO JULIA de Schiffner de Larrechea de Arrivabene was born in Rosario de Santa Fe in Argentina in 1892, into one of the most prominent families of the country. She married the Italian Count Ignazio Arrivabene in 1914 and moved with him to Tehran, where he served as the Italian ambassador to Iran. There the young Countess Rosario began assembling the art collection that would make her famous in later years, but she moved back to Europe in 1918, following the death of her husband, and lived in France, Switzerland and Italy.
In 1922 she married Count Sergei Platomovitch Zoubov, who’d fled from Russia during the 1917 October Revolution, and continued travelling through Europe. In 1938 she was living at the Ritz in Paris, and on 3 June she walked along the Avenue des Champs-Élysées to enter number 144, Établissements Laiseau Paris – the French capital’s Cadillac agency. She was already a well-known customer, with a 1936 Cadillac Series 75 Limousine, a black car that had covered about 20,000km in her tenure by that point, and she wanted to buy something in which to travel in absolute comfort when crossing nations.
Of course, she already knew what she wanted because, the previous March, she had admired the dark blue formal limousine bodywork of the new Series 90 V-16 on Cadillac’s stand at the Geneva Salon. Cadillac’s
‘The V-16 with the sevenseat Town Car body by Fleetwood is very rare indeed, with only 18 built’
salespeople had provided her with a detailed portfolio, complete with the design of every possible body configuration. There were 12 bodystyles illustrated, with coupes, convertibles, sedans and limousines, spanning from two to seven seats. She favoured Style 9053, the town car (Sedanca
de Ville in French) crafted by Fleetwood.
Fleetwood Metal Body had been founded in 1909 in the Pennsylvania city it took its name from, and immediately established itself as one of the most appreciated American coachbuilders, working on Duesenberg, Packard, Bentley, Isotta-Fraschini, Rolls-Royce and Mercedes-Benz chassis, among others. Having being bought by Fisher Body in 1925, in 1931 Fleetwood was integrated into GM and moved its headquarters to Delray, Michigan. There it became one of the preferred coachbuilders for Cadillac. The V-16 with the seven-seat Town Car body by Fleetwood is very rare indeed, with only 18 built between 1938 and 1940 (11 in 1938, five in 1939 and just 2 in 1940). It’s a huge car, fully 6.2m long, and it was expensive too, the priciest of the V-16 range at $7620 in 1938.
The Countess specified her new car in deep Antoinette Blu , to be delivered through the Near East GM subsidiary in Alexandria, Egypt, then shipped directly from there to Naples, Italy, where it was due to arrive at the end of August, about 12 weeks after the order. ‘We have the letter,’ says Bulgari. ‘It’s dated 1 September 1938, from the Egyptian GM subsidiary, confirming to Countess Rosario that her car, chassis 3270310 and matching-number engine, would be at the customs offices in Naples harbour, and that a second set of keys would be sent to her in the following days. We have the copy of the shipment document too, dated 23 August 1938, indicating that the car – delivery number 3359, weighing 2504kg – had been loaded in Alexandria onto a steamer called Excalibur.’
Little is known of the car’s whereabouts during the war years, though it’s difficult to imagine the Cadillac spending time in ravaged Italy or France when the Countess had a house in neutral Switzerland. What
we do know is that, in autumn 1948, with about 30,000km on the clock, the V-16 was given to the Countess’s family friend Cardinal Francis Spellman, the former Archibishop of New York. He had been appointed Cardinal in 1946 by Pope Pius XII, so the car was registered on Vatican plates in ’49.
‘We have a video, dated 7 October 1949, in which the car is being used by Spellman on the roads of Rome,’ says Bulgari. The following year, the car was transferred to Cardinal Clemente Micara of the Roman College, and within months into the ownership of the Vatican State authority, on the SCV 13 numberplate that it kept up to 1966.
‘In 1963 I got to know the boss of the Autoparco Vaticano [the office managing the Vatican cars], during a visit organised by a family friend. I have a colour picture of myself from that trip, when I was very young, close to the V-16. About two years later, somebody told me that some of the Vatican fleet was being offered for sale, including the V-16. I got together with a couple of friends to buy it, along with a 1938 Buick. And in the following years I started to wonder where the other cars went.’
Most of them were sold in Rome, to companies who rented cars to the movie productions at the Cinecittà studios. Others went around Italy. ‘It took me a long time, and a lot of discussions, to convince owners to sell to me,’ says Bulgari – but so his collection began to grow. ‘The last one I brought home, one of the 1932 Cadillac V-8s the Vatican owned, was bought from my lifelong friend Giorgio Marzolla. He bought it in a Vatican sale, sometime before 1966. We then did a lot of research, looking through thousands of pictures for the cars. We found one showing Cardinal Spellman getting into the car, something we’d never seen before. The V-16’s history is unique, as it was received as a gift, while the others – two ’38 Buicks and two ’32 Cadillac V-8s – were bought by the Vatican.’
Its story is very important to him. ‘I owe a lot to this car,’ continues Bulgari. ‘Very few people have had the opportunity to hear a V16 engine; only Cadillac and Marmon had really built them for production cars. Bucciali did it too, pairing two in-line eight-cylinder engines, but only one or two were actually built as prototypes and none is known
to survive. When I bought the 1938 V-16, I was 23 or 24 years old and I’ll never forget driving it for the first time. It still makes me feel special: the sound, the power, the torque are amazing. From a pure engineering point of view, the 1930 V-16 was more sophisticated with its overheadcam engine, while my 1938-series has sidevalves, but the 1938 model drives much better thanks to the independent front suspension. My English friends won’t be happy, but even the contemporary Rolls-Royce Phantom, the Series III with its 12-cylinder engine, does not compare to the quality, smoothness, pleasure of driving and reliability offered by the 1938 Cadillac V-16.’
SUDDENLY, in the late 1970s, Nicola Bulgari sold his collection. ‘I really do not know what happened, but I was fed up and sold everything. It was a colossal mistake. When I realised, I hunted down all my cars to buy them back. The V-16, after several owners in France and in the USA, resurfaced at the RM Villa Erba sale in 2011. Somebody had resprayed her in black and the interior had been refurbished, too, while the car was in the USA. The work had been done professionally; it was near-perfect.’
In 2019 the V-16 was invited to take part in the Amelia Island Concours. ‘I took the opportunity to have her refreshed from bumper to bumper, and now she drives and handles as new. It is the only running 16-cylinder car in the collection, but there is a three-window limousine we bought some years ago that was too far gone to be saved yet had a running engine. We have two cars that are considered more prestigious – the 1933 Marmon Model 16 and the 1933 Stutz DV-32 – but the Cadillac is definitely easier to enjoy. It is more modern to drive, though I prefer to enjoy it as a passenger.’
So when I’m given the key, my first temptation is to sit in the back, and travel in the way this car was built for. But the opportunity to drive a 16-cylinder car doesn’t come around often, so I take my place in the surprisingly small space reserved for the driver and turn the engine on. If it wasn’t for a slight vibration just at the moment of ignition, I would have thought it hadn’t started, so smooth and silent is it while idling. As I pull away, I’m increasingly amazed at how sweet, light and responsive this vast 2.5-tonne car is. I play with the gearlever, just for fun: the torque is enough to pull you from standstill to full speed in third.
Steering response is languid, and I’m surprised by the distant roar and strength of acceleration as the road clears ahead and I can go full-throttle. Soon I feel right at home, relaxed, enjoying the perfect balance the car has to offer. I understand why Nicola Bulgari went back to this car.
THANKS TO Paolo Ciminiello and Kris Flickinger of the NB Collection.