54 replies to this topic

[Perruqueporte]

I drove up to Shelsley in my Jaguar C-Type facsimile in June five years ago, to compete in the event which also celebrated 60 years of C-Types and 50 years of E-Types.  It was a great weekend.

 

When I arrived on the Friday evening I went to the petrol station near the old Hundred House Hotel in Great Witley, and while I was putting fuel into the car a very elderly gent parked behind me, came to have a look at the car and told me that he had raced a C-Type when the cars were new.  I asked him what his name was and he replied "Leslie Johnson".  If I hadn't been very tired following a late night working on the car, and somewhat wind-blasted at the end of a 150-mile drive in the car on a busy Friday afternoon, I would have remembered that Leslie Johnson had died over 50 years earlier.  As it was I was astonished, and asked the old gent if I might telephone him after the weekend to pick his brain about Clemente Biondetti, who I had been researching (Biondetti had shared a C-Type with Johnson at Le Mans in 1951).  He said yes of course, and gave me his mobile phone number.  Half way through supper that evening the penny dropped, and I was left wondering what all that was about.

 

I tried calling the number the following week, out of curiosity.  A woman answered and then then hung up when I asked if I could speak to Leslie Johnson.

 

I mentioned this strange episode to Doug Nye shortly thereafter, who said that over the years he had come across one or two such fantasists - harmless people who believed their own fantasies.

 

There are those whose fantasies are anything but harmless.  I'm not interested in hearing about them, but would be curious to know if any of you have experienced similar events?

 

Christopher W.

 

 

[john aston]

A couple - one, on seeing me extract myself from my Seven, blithely told me that his brother (in Whitley Bay or somewhere) owned the legendary KAR 120 C   Prisoner Seven; I really don't think he did . 

 

I used to know  a very strange man who had a history of marrying ever younger women - he told me blithely that he had a Lamborghini Jota he was just 'doing up'; he seemed strangely resistant to ,my request to see the legendary Lambo - of which there was one original (burned in a fire ) and three factory replicas, now joined by a stunning UK created car which can be seen at Silverstone Classic. But it wasn't my 'friend's' ....   

[Sharman]

In South West France Profonde I met a Scotsman who claimed to be Jimmy Clark 

[Glengavel]

Wasn't there someone years ago went round claiming he was a famous driver - Stirling Moss comes to mind. He would run up huge hotel and bar bills before disappearing in a puff of smoke. I think it caused the real driver no end of trouble.

[opplock]

Jonathan Palmer was the victim. The scam presumably worked because JP had a lower public profile than for example Stirling Moss.  

[ensign14]

 

Never miss a chance to refer to The Office.

[Charlieman]

Never miss a chance to refer to The Office.

Office worker: "How long will it take?" ...  Computer geek: "It will take as long as it takes."

 

It's one of life's unfortunate problems that the tech who fixes your computer, brakes or brain doesn't know how long it will take to repair. S/he might give you an estimate -- come back after a coffee or three years in therapy -- but it is a guess. 

 

A fantasist, addressing an unknown problem, will lie. A realist (probably somebody who has fixed something like it) will give an honest estimate. 

[David Birchall]

Charlieman:  I've got my wife sitting here,  can you explain that to her again?  

[Charlieman]

Charlieman:  I've got my wife sitting here,  can you explain that to her again?  

I dare not risk the consequences, David.

[LotusElise]

My late great-uncle shared a name with a very famous actor. He never openly impersonated said actor, but never refused the offers of upgrades, or tables in supposedly fully-booked restaurants, that the name brought. About ten years ago, there was a TV programme on Channel 4 about celebrity impostors, and there were mentions of a man who had been pretending to be this particular actor for years. I did wonder.

 

I've met and heard about a few fantasists in my time - one woman who had a different number of children, previous husbands and nationalities, depending on who she was talking to, another man at an old workplace who had a completely imaginary career as a Premiership reserve team footballer, a friend's ex-husband with an imaginary Oxford degree and a totally fabricated career and life history, whom I suspect was a bigamist as well. I've only come across one motorsport-related one, a work colleague of Dad's who claims to have raced motorcycles against the likes of Barry Sheene. Interestingly, his namesake is also deceased. This man also has a supposed unit full of sports cars, and can get anyone a free ticket to any Silverstone event. (He will never have actual physical tickets, he tells people to turn up and he'll "get them in", and then he mysteriously can't go.) My favourite of his fibs is his supposed affair with a certain well-known glamour model. Who is a lesbian.

 

The "Leslie Johnson" in the original post doesn't sound as if he was a similar case. I do wonder whether he might have had mild Alzheimers?

[2F-001]

Some folks don't seem to realise just how easily-disproven their fantasies are.  

 

I was at a trackday in Belgium and found myself chatting with a relaxed and mild-mannered Porsche-driving gentleman who claimed that his daughter was racing in Indycars. 

 

(That did turn out to be true though...)

[LotusElise]

Pippa Mann's dad?

[2F-001]

Yes.

[FLB]

Jonathan Palmer was the victim. The scam presumably worked because JP had a lower public profile than for example Stirling Moss.  

Featured on the American TV show Unsolved Mysteries:

 

http://unsolved.com/...s/jonathan-kern

[RogerFrench]

Many years ago my sister and I met a chap in Stafford who claimed to be racing driver. We were in a cafe having lunch, he was at the next table and overheard us. He bought tea, we talked and then he told us his name, Roy Salvadori.
I was very young, maybe 16 or so, and I'm sad to say I snickered. The poor chap blushed, got up and left. He was, it seems, well known in the cafe and totally harmless, living in a make-believe world.

[Doug Nye]

In the ex-military world such fantasists are derided - with deeply-felt venom - as 'Walts', derived from 'Walter Mitty', of course. The wide world of Walting is analysed quite handily on the British Army Rumour Service website AARSEPedia - which can be found here - 

 

http://www.arrse.co.uk/wiki/Walts

 

I recommend in particular 'The King of the Walts' section.     Rather sad in fact...but quite entertaining, nonetheless.

 

DCN  

Edited by Doug Nye, 04 April 2016 - 22:00.

[Jack-the-Lad]

In the U.S. we used to have something popularly referred to as "stolen valor" laws that punished those who "enhanced" or flat out lied about their military service in order to advance or enrich themselves.

Our omnipotent Supreme Court ruled that such enhancements and lies are protected by the First Amendment.

[Snakedriver]

I met a fellow on Facebook, an expert on the Cosworth F3 Screamer...Told me he worked for NART and was "Mr. Chinettis" right hand man. I figured I would solve this very politely when we needed some info on the MAE that we couldn't find because Cosworth was not at all helpful despite my multiple emails and phone calls from a member of this forum(I live in the US). So Tom says he'll take care of it...I'm thinking 'yeah, right'. 2 days later Tom forward the email from one of Coswoths F1 directors with the answer!

Tom was in fact 'That guy'.

There is a difference between illness, and pure BS.

[Sharman]

Swinging the Light was the Army term during the 50s.

[ensign14]

In the U.S. we used to have something popularly referred to as "stolen valor" laws that punished those who "enhanced" or flat out lied about their military service in order to advance or enrich themselves.

Our omnipotent Supreme Court ruled that such enhancements and lies are protected by the First Amendment.

 

You have a couple of Presidents who have relied on that - and others who have stolen other people's for the same purpose...

[Jack-the-Lad]

You have a couple of Presidents who have relied on that - and others who have stolen other people's for the same purpose...

Really? I'm not aware of any presidents who claimed to have served but did not.

[Snakedriver]

President hopefuls...

Leo

[ensign14]

Really? I'm not aware of any presidents who claimed to have served but did not.

 

It's the exaggeration bit.  Kennedy's PT-109 escapade was not the heroic one-man mission his dad pushed it as - it was a bit of incompetent piloting on a type of vessel that had an 80% survival rate.  Then there is his Pulitzer prize for a book written by someone else. 

[Jack-the-Lad]

Ok, I follow you. Yes, I imagine there was some embellishment. I wonder if any of his shipmates made a different account public, or corroborated his story?

I believe the "stolen valor" laws had more to do with impersonating being a veteran or an active duty service member, and falsifying documents associated with combat duty and personal awards for valor or extraordinary achievement. I should have made that more clear in my post.

[kayemod]

It's the exaggeration bit.  Kennedy's PT-109 escapade was not the heroic one-man mission his dad pushed it as - it was a bit of incompetent piloting on a type of vessel that had an 80% survival rate. 

 

I'm no expert on US presidential folklore, but I do know a fair amount of naval history, and your claim is a very long way from the truth. Kennedy commanded one of fifteen PT boats that were sent to intercept a Japanese convoy in the Blackett Straits off the Solomons. Half the flotilla, including PT 109 weren't equipped with radar, and it was a moonless night, pitch darkness and total radio silence. The venture was a disaster for the US Navy, but it was the result of bad tactics by the Navy, not failings on the part of those who took part. Half the boats involved never fired a shot, and 109 was sitting there with only one of its three engines ticking over and engaged, a Japanese destroyer emerged from the darkness and struck Kennedy's boat amidships, killing two crew members and cutting it in half. Without power, there was no chance that 109 could have tried to get out of the way in the few seconds they had, unlucky yes, but hardly incompetent, what else could they have done? Kennedy's crew never even saw any enemy ships before the one that sank them. The rest is pretty much as depicted in the film, which is a lot closer to the truth than some give it credit for. 109's survivors clung to floating wreckage for about nine hours, before Kennedy decided that they were going to have to swim to the nearest land, a tiny uninhabited island. They swam for five hours, Kennedy, who had been in a Harvard swimming team, towed a badly burned crewman, holding a rope to the injured man's lifejacket in his teeth. They survived on that island and a slightly larger one for about a week, sustaining themselves on coconuts and rainwater. As I said, the film PT 109 is generally accurate. The Navy may have embellished the story for publicity purposes, but in wartime, what would anyone expect? Jack Kennedy's father, Nazi sympathiser Joseph didn't exactly help, but the legend is essentially true, should Kennedy, a serving officer, have tried to tone down the official story, in effect calling his employers liars?

 

I don't know what passes for heroism in Brum, but that's good enough for me. As to whether JFK was a great president, that's more open to question, in many respects the oft reviled Richard Nixon seemed to achieve more. When Kennedy said  "I am a doughnut" in bad German in his Berlin speech, many would have agreed with him, but a real wartime hero without any doubt at all.

Edited by kayemod, 05 April 2016 - 16:58.

[gkennedy]

My namesake - but no relation. I'm not a doughnut.

 

Didn't we have our own motor sport fantasist/walt on here with the world's fastest Turner?  

[Glengavel]

I don't know what passes for heroism in Brum, but that's good enough for me. As to whether JFK was a great president, that's more open to question, in many respects the oft reviled Richard Nixon seemed to achieve more. When Kennedy said  "I am a doughnut" in bad German in his Berlin speech, many would have agreed with him, but a real wartime hero without any doubt at all.

 

Alas, the "I am a doughnut" thing is a myth.

 

http://www.snopes.co...te/berliner.asp

[Sharman]

My namesake - but no relation. I'm not a doughnut.

 

Didn't we have our own motor sport fantasist/walt on here with the world's fastest Turner?  

I remember him well.....because I wasn't a famous racing driver!

[Tim Murray]

He doesn't restrict his 'fantasies' just to motor sport, and as a result has been entertained at Her Majesty's pleasure on a number of occasions.

[ensign14]

Half the flotilla, including PT 109 weren't equipped with radar, and it was a moonless night, pitch darkness and total radio silence. The venture was a disaster for the US Navy, but it was the result of bad tactics by the Navy, not failings on the part of those who took part. Half the boats involved never fired a shot, and 109 was sitting there with only one of its three engines ticking over and engaged, a Japanese destroyer emerged from the darkness and struck Kennedy's boat amidships, killing two crew members and cutting it in half.

 

I don't know what passes for heroism in Brum, but that's good enough for me.

 

I read that PT-109 was out of formation, which is why it got hit.  And for heroism in Brum; surviving one of the biggest blitzes in World War 2, and the IRA's worst atrocity in England, perhaps.

[kayemod]

I read that PT-109 was out of formation, which is why it got hit.  And for heroism in Brum; surviving one of the biggest blitzes in World War 2, and the IRA's worst atrocity in England, perhaps.

 

On JFK's naval competence, I've nothing to add to my previous post.

 

And on bravery, don't you think there's a difference between active heroism and passive? I know that Birmingham has canals, but I wasn't aware that the inhabitants all swam for several hours after the Germans and IRA bombed them, so any comparison is a very slight one.

[ensign14]

It depends.  Is it heroic not to respond to provocation even though you could obliterate your provoker?  Is it heroic to rescue someone from a burning house when you started the fire?

 

(As an aside, I note President Cleveland was drafted to serve in the US Civil War, but he paid $150 to someone else to take his place...)

[gkennedy]

How wide are those canals?

[kayemod]

How wide are those canals?

 

Not very wide, it's possible to cross most of them by using the half-submerged shopping trollies as stepping stones.

 

On Ensign's last post, I'll allow him that, a much better example than JFK, but haven't there been other US Presidential draft-dodgers?

[Snakedriver]

Perhaps a new thread to discuss less than honorable US Presidents would be in order.

But as far as I'm aware of there has been no US Presidents that have "stolen valor" or are Walteristas.

And on that note, My Cooper and I are going to attend The Mitty at Road Atlanta later on this month.

Leo Basile
CW3 (Ret.)
US Army, Avn.

Edited by Snakedriver, 06 April 2016 - 13:58.

[ensign14]

The last one, perhaps...who then lied about the actual service of McCain and Kerry...

[Snakedriver]

McCain is the real deal. Kerry...is a pussy. (pardon the uncivilized verbiage)

Actually to answer the question, Kerry imbelished drastically. McCain is very modest about his service. I don't believe that I have ever noticed any embelishment of McCains service.

Edited by Snakedriver, 06 April 2016 - 14:04.

[LotusElise]

He doesn't restrict his 'fantasies' just to motor sport, and as a result has been entertained at Her Majesty's pleasure on a number of occasions.

 

It's not someone who also claims to be in the Military Police, and ex-SAS is it? He was on Digital Spy a few years ago.

The military is a common theme with more serious fantasists. They must know how easy it is to verify, surely?

 

I do wonder how many up-and-coming drivers have had careers affected by fantasists and serial exaggerators. All of those sponsorship deals that fall through. Could some of them have been down to simple liars, rather than out-and-out scammers?

[kayemod]

It's not someone who also claims to be in the Military Police, and ex-SAS is it? He was on Digital Spy a few years ago.

The military is a common theme with more serious fantasists. They must know how easy it is to verify, surely?

 

I do wonder how many up-and-coming drivers have had careers affected by fantasists and serial exaggerators. All of those sponsorship deals that fall through. Could some of them have been down to simple liars, rather than out-and-out scammers?

 

I think you're right. It's different of course where people have actually been put inside for their deception, but I've known a few serial liars in my time, and in most cases they didn't stand to profit in any way from their behaviour. I really don't think that many of these characters mean any harm, but they were just incapable of telling the truth. They start telling a story, and get carried away, and it gets ever more extreme. Clearly they mislead others, and can cause actual loss or harm, but I don't think they mean to in most cases, they just can't help themselves.

[RobertE]

Doug; I came across such a person in a local right-wing think-tank down here - The Plough - and some dismal fantasist interrupted a conversation to announce that he was suffering from PTSD as a result of his service in Afghanistan. I didn't believe him for a nanosecond (he was too old) so I dropped into this rather stilted conversation:

 

"Ah, good; well, hang around - I'm meeting some chums here in a minute from 40 Commando; this is their local. I'm sure you'll want to compare notes. And, by the way, was that before or after you assassinated Adolf Hitler? I turned away for some reason and when I turned back, he had fled...

 

As Eric Morecambe used to say; "The woods are full of them.."

[Glengavel]

I think you're right. It's different of course where people have actually been put inside for their deception, but I've known a few serial liars in my time, and in most cases they didn't stand to profit in any way from their behaviour. I really don't think that many of these characters mean any harm, but they were just incapable of telling the truth. They start telling a story, and get carried away, and it gets ever more extreme. Clearly they mislead others, and can cause actual loss or harm, but I don't think they mean to in most cases, they just can't help themselves.

 

It is astonishing how they get taken at face value. Must be the gift of the gab. Private Eye recently had a lengthy article about this chap:

 

https://en.wikipedia...ki/James_Shortt

 

He's apparently still selling himself as a security advisor to various corporate bodies who seem unable to get to grips with an internet search engine.

[Sharman]

Doug; I came across such a person in a local right-wing think-tank down here - The Plough - and some dismal fantasist interrupted a conversation to announce that he was suffering from PTSD as a result of his service in Afghanistan. I didn't believe him for a nanosecond (he was too old) so I dropped into this rather stilted conversation:

 

"Ah, good; well, hang around - I'm meeting some chums here in a minute from 40 Commando; this is their local. I'm sure you'll want to compare notes. And, by the way, was that before or after you assassinated Adolf Hitler? I turned away for some reason and when I turned back, he had fled...

 

As Eric Morecambe used to say; "The woods are full of them.."

That's not the Plough at Dysworth is it? When I frequented it back in the 50s/60s the local postman was a fantasist and had the nickname "  the Long Whatton leather gunner" bestowed on him by one of our number who ran a supercharged Popular on which he installed ever larger crank pulley wheels. He really got through some E93A engines! 

[Michael Ferner]

It is astonishing how they get taken at face value. Must be the gift of the gab.

Not really that surprising. is it? We all fell for Buford, didn't we...

[ensign14]

But falling for Qadbak or Direxiv of Prince Malik is beyond rational thought.  They were all a very brief search away from being obviously men of straw.  I could concoct a fake career fairly easily that would be difficult to double-check, but if I said I had had a couple of F3000 races that would easily be disproved.

[Charlieman]

But falling for Qadbak or Direxiv of Prince Malik is beyond rational thought.  They were all a very brief search away from being obviously men of straw.  I could concoct a fake career fairly easily that would be difficult to double-check, but if I said I had had a couple of F3000 races that would easily be disproved.

So you think that people like Bernie read and write their own email messages? If you do things for yourself and learn a bit, straw men are easy to spot; if you delegate, you rely on the diligence of others. Another thing you have to accept: your enemies will never tell you before you about to make a fool of yourself.

[Sharman]

Not really that surprising. is it? We all fell for Buford, didn't we...

I may have been off line during this discussion but how did we fall for Buford?

[Michael Ferner]

Well, I can only speak for myself, but I really did believe his stories, initially at the very least. I'm sure many others did, too, and I wouldn't be surprised if there are many who still do.

[Sharman]

Michael

What I meant was how were his fantasies, if that is the right description, "blown"?

John

[fbarrett]

Some years ago Brock Yates wrote a column in Car & Driver about a man living in the Midwest (Michigan?) who claimed to be Ken Miles.

 

Frank

[Vitesse2]

Well, I can only speak for myself, but I really did believe his stories, initially at the very least. I'm sure many others did, too, and I wouldn't be surprised if there are many who still do.

 

Michael

What I meant was how were his fantasies, if that is the right description, "blown"?

John

Please take this to PMs, gentlemen.