CELEBRATING THE BRIGHT SPARKS

The scene: four classic car owners sat in deckchairs at an event:

Classic Car Owner (CCO) No.1: “Young people today, eh? When I was their age, I restored a Bugatti Royale I found in an abandoned shed in Southampton Eastern Docks.

CCO2: “Luxury. I had it tough. When I was a young man, I refurbished a Lotus Cortina once driven by Jim Clark, Graham Hill, George Formby and Tufty the Squirrel in the middle of the Cairngorms. In the dark”.

CCO3: “In the dark? Decadence! In my youth, I fully restored a Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost while blindfolded with parts funded by my paper round...

CCO4: “Right. I used to get up in the morning at 11pm, two hours before I went to bed, and combined revision 30 hours a day for GCE O-Level Home Economics with rescuing each and every Italian Job Mini from the bottom of a lake in the Alps.

CCO1: “Try to tell today’s young classic car enthusiasts that - they won’t believe you...”

Of course, very few classic car owners behave like The Four Yorkshiremen (which originated not in Monty Python but the earlier, At Last The 1948 Show). Yet, you can occasionally still hear grumblings and mutterings about how the next generation has no understanding of old cars.

This is why the 1926 Ford Model T restored by 2024’s Lancaster Insurance and Practical Classics’ Bright Young Sparks’ winner Rosie Hodgson-Jones is such an important vehicle. Not only is it a true automotive icon that attracted vast attention at the Restoration Show earlier this year, but Ms. Hodgson-Jones is also aged 16.

And there are so many other Bright Sparks: classic car owners and devotees aged under 25 whose drive and tenacity frequently shame older and grumpier enthusiasts, including this writer. Another star of the Practical Classics Classic Car & Restoration Show was the Triumph 2.5 PI Mk. I, whose owner is 21. This is a car not so much from his parents’ era as his grandparents.

There are countless other young enthusiasts across the country, restoring cars they remember from their youth (the early 2000s are starting to look very distant) or machinery that predates their birth by years and decades. The son of my next-door neighbour has a keen understanding of a 1960 Wolseley 6/99 engine and is planning to buy a 1996 Mazda MX5. He is aged 15.

“Young people today, eh? With their drive, their enthusiasm, their knowledge...” It gladdens the heart.