92 replies to this topic

[scheivlak]

Originally posted by Mal9444

I don't think there is much real debate, is there, that Moss was every bit as good as Ascari?

I don't think Moss was as good as Fangio -at least in a Formula 1 car!- in 1955.
There are quite a few knowledgeable people who rate Ascari at least as high as Fangio (see some other threads like http://forums.autosp...ighlight=Ascari).
Apart from that, I don't think that Moss was aready at his peak in 1952.

Draw your conclusion.....

[Mal9444]

Originally posted by scheivlak
I don't think Moss was as good as Fangio -at least in a Formula 1 car!- in 1955.
There are quite a few knowledgeable people who rate Ascari at least as high as Fangio (see some other threads like http://forums.autosp...ighlight=Ascari).
Apart from that, I don't think that Moss was aready at his peak in 1952.

Draw your conclusion.....

we could discuss this all night (some people already do!). Ascari versus Moss is largely irrelevant since it wasn't until 1954 that Moss had anything to match Ascari's machinery. And you are certainly correct in saying Moss was not at his peak in 1952. It wasn't until 1955 that Moss had anything like the machinery under him to advance. My real point was - and is - that the Bari incident, in holding back Moss's move into a competitive GP car and team for at least two seasons (can we agree on that?) was a very lucky break for Mike Hawthorn. Given Moss's performance two seasons later in a privately owned Maserati, and then the next season in a fully-backed works team, I would hope you would accept that if Moss had become a Ferrari works driver in 1952, instead of having to wait until 1955 for the sort of backing that Mike had from 1953 onwards, his career, and the history of the World Drivers Championship, would surely have been very different. I don't think anyone would disagree that as between Hawthorn and Moss, Moss was the more consistently quicker driver. So had it been Moss who got that works Ferrari seat in 1952 and not Hawthorn in 1953, who knows where he would have been by 1955, let alone 1958? I know that I am a fully-paid-up Moss Believer - but I really do not think it too fanciful to suggest that in a couple of seasons with Ferrari he could have learned enough to become world champion - even in the company of Fangio and Ascari.

Or shall we just agree to differ?

[oldtimer]

Here is a point to consider in the Ascari/Moss speculation. I have seen it in print that our man of the moment, JMH, considered Ascari to be faster than Fangio. That learnt from wheel to wheel racing with both...

[redfred64]

i think that mike hawthorn fully deserved his world championship, allthough collins should have been the first british champion. hawthorn was a great champion, but collins death (which persuaded him to retire) lost us one of britains greatest talents. i occasionally visit his grave

[redfred64]

on the sublect of le mans, i belive hawthorn was to blame, or any drivers racing instinct.

[oldtimer]

Blame is most definitely the wrong word, Redfred64. Hawthorn was a link in a chain of events, with his racer mode well and truly wound up.

[Flaminiasupersport]

Hawthorn is to blame????

If there's one thing to blame it's the difference between the cars and the narrow roads. If Macklin stayed "on his line" because he should have known that if Hawthorn passed him the Mercedes's were not far behind, the accident would have been totally different.

It's just an accident. And a race is and will always be a dangerous sport.

[ovfi]

Having seen many times the two movies on the accident, I agree with Flaminiasupersport that the road was too narrow to support the huge difference between the cars: but Macklin couldn't brake as Hawthorn's Jaguar, he couldn't stay on his line, and Levegh didn't had sufficient space to escape. See the images below.

[doc knutsen]

The pictures show pretty clearly how the Austin-Healey was behind the Jaguar, on the rh side of the dotted white line that marks the centre of the track. It appears that poor Levegh had virtually the whole left half of the track at his disposal, yet he, too, was well over to the right. Frere's explanation, that at the critical point Levegh would glance in his mirror and leave the left lane open for his team-mate Fangio who would be about to lap him, just like Macklin might have checked his mirrors for silver coloured cars when he was passed by the Jaguar. The track was very narrow, the speeds were very high, and there was no exit lane for the pits. It was very much a motor racing accident, with no driver to blame. Imo, of course.

[Dennis Hockenbury]

52 years on and the debate continues. This accident will always be the subject of debate and strong opinions.

[ovfi]

None of the drivers made nothing wrong, they made what they were supposed to . It's racing, you always have to go as fast as you can.
The situation was the cause of the accident, and the organizers accepted the blame for it; in the aftermath of the 1955 accident, the whole pit area was rebuilt. A pit lane was made, allowing cars to enter it at full trottle, braking only inside the pit lane, and the track width was enlarged from the pit lane entrance to Dunlop curve.
So Hawthorn, Macklin and Levegh were victims of an unimagined situation; it's the human nature... most of the time, we only learn from our errors, and sometimes we learn too late.

[redfred64]

on le mans, i said that any driver would do what hawthorn did, and i like and respect hawthorn

[Flaminiasupersport]

I like Hawthorn even if I never knew him personally!

About Le Mans 1955 so many stupid theories were written down, blaming this or another driver, but one does not have to be Einstein to understand that when several race cars approach a bottle neck at full speed, an accident is bound to happen! Add to that huge differences in power, speed, brake efficiency etc and an unexistant sense for safety (remember that picture of de Portago smoking a cigarette in his Ferrari at Reims while the fuel level is being checked just behind him...) and all the conditions for a big catastrophy are present! End of story!

I can imagine Macklin in his Austin Healey... suddenly a Jaguar passes him in a sound of thunder... wow... "where are the others?"... checks his vibrating rear view mirror... ha, there they are... what the f...? In front of him the Jaguar slows down (high tech disc brakes) because that's where the pits are... Macklin brakes... a wheel blocks... Oh no... car swerves... Levegh's view is concentrated on the "crowded" area before the pits... Suddenly he notices the Austin... Merde!!! Qu'est ce que cette Austin fiche là???? BAM... and the result we all know! Fangio slipped through as by miracle... Hawthorn looks in his rear view mirror and sees the chaos... damn... What happened after that is irrelevant.

About Hawthorn's ups and downs... Well, with only one kidney left and all the discomfort this handicap brings along, it sheds a new light on his career. Some pics show him in real discomfort and it must have been very hard to race under these conditions. Even so, he proved he could beat Ascari and Fangio! This doesn't proof he was "better" than the others, but it does proof that he was among the best racing drivers of his period, and the 1958 world championship is a true recognition of his talent!

After reading the book 'Golden Boy', I was in some way surprised to notice he was NOT so a funny and nice chap we all think he was. He could be very rude towards his employees, was often unaproachable, very rarely saw his "big friend" Peter Collins aside from the race tracks, the "atmosphere" at the TT garage he ran seemed very stressful at some points etc... The book puts Mike... hm, sorry, Mike was only for the very select "in crowd", Michael Hawthorn, back where he belongs, and not on a "piedestal" we like him to be...

Michael Hawthorn and Mike Hawthorn... Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.... maybe a bit far fetched I agree!

Edited by Flaminiasupersport, 23 February 2010 - 10:01.

[Terry Walker]

The Le Mans disaster had a lot in common with an aviation disaster - a chain of things, none disastrous in their own right, leading to final catastrophe. Not mentioned so far, but wasn't Levegh doing a solo run, driving the entire 24 hours, and therefore must have had very sluggish responses by then. I may be wrong.

I didn't know, few people did in those days, that Hawthorn's health was very dodgy, which may well have contributed to his occasionally erratic form. About all I knew of him was from a second hand copy of part 2 of his ghosted autobiography, Champion Year, which I read many years after he died. I was only a small child when he was racing.

[Tim Murray]

The accident occurred as the first routine pit stops were being made, some 2½ hours into the race, so Levegh would have been no more tired than anyone else. It was the 1952 race that he attempted to complete single-handed.

[Allan Lupton]

The accident occurred as the first routine pit stops were being made, some 2½ hours into the race, so Levegh would have been no more tired than anyone else. It was the 1952 race that he attempted to complete single-handed.

and, for the sake of completeness, John Fitch was to have been the other driver.

[Bauble]

Mike was a man of his times, just a few years older than myself, and to be anti German was pretty normal during the fities, especially for those of us who were nearly killed by them. It was not hatred, just antipathy and a dislike of seeing them succeed particularly in motor sport.

Many people over the years have tried to compare Mike with Stirling, but one might as well compare chalk with cheese, Mike was all heart and Stirling all brain, however, there is no doubt that ENGLAND had the two finest drivers of the day part from Fangio. I loved the guy and I'm not gay. He was, is and always will be a hero to me.

As I have pointed out in another thread, I witnessed the Le Mans accident and have never thought of it as anything more than a racing incident, unfortunately the consequences were such that nobody wanted to carry the burden of the tradegy on their shoulders. I have always felt that the apportioning of blame was a way to shift any possible fault on to others in order to be able to live with one's self.

To more fully understand Mike's character I suggest you read 'Touch Wood' by Duncan Hamilton, this is not only the best book on the sport I have ever read, but it gives a tremendous insight into the nature of motor racing in the '50's. Some of the stories about Mike and others will certainly give you a pretty good idea of the sort of chap he was, as well as putting a huge grin on your face.

In closing I have to say one of the more distressing aspects of this site is the amount of prurient speculation about long departed drivers etc. that some contributors seem to find interesting. Shame on them.

[dretceterini]

I have heard talk quite frequently of late about changing the inscription upon Hawthorn's gravestone.

As if the gratuitous painting of some of its carving in recent years hasn't been naff enough, now somebody airily presumes some kind of 'right' to deface and/or alter an inscription which was plainly chosen/approved by his sole surviving parent, her surviving family and closest friends at the time of her bereavement, just to cover present - and quite possibly transient - questions of language use.

Who the do these people think they are!???

'Gay' in period (1959) was a perfectly respectable word accepted by the vast majority of English-speakers worldwide as describing and celebrating hilarity, fun, enjoyment, good humour, partying in some style. All of which were intrinsic components of Hawthorn's character and personality.

Just because some homosexual militants apparently adopted the initials 'G', 'A' and 'Y' to claim a right to be 'Good As You' in some - I presume - northern Californian nooftah battalion during the '60s/'70s - and since the western world's Homintern has since powered the word's homosexual connotations to the forefront through the '80/'90s - should be no cause for anybody to tinker with a memorial which is nobody's but the dust lying beneath it, and the life celebrated upon it... I would repeat who the do these nitwits think they are????

T s...

DCN

Agree +1,000,000% BTW, I live in Portland, Oregon and the "gay" agenda is even more prevalent here that in California!

[Eric Dunsdon]

Mike was a man of his times, just a few years older than myself, and to be anti German was pretty normal during the fities, especially for those of us who were nearly killed by them. It was not hatred, just antipathy and a dislike of seeing them succeed particularly in motor sport.

Many people over the years have tried to compare Mike with Stirling, but one might as well compare chalk with cheese, Mike was all heart and Stirling all brain, however, there is no doubt that ENGLAND had the two finest drivers of the day part from Fangio. I loved the guy and I'm not gay. He was, is and always will be a hero to me.

As I have pointed out in another thread, I witnessed the Le Mans accident and have never thought of it as anything more than a racing incident, unfortunately the consequences were such that nobody wanted to carry the burden of the tradegy on their shoulders. I have always felt that the apportioning of blame was a way to shift any possible fault on to others in order to be able to live with one's self.

You cant argue with old Bauble, a great Hawthorn fan since 1951 and perhaps the only tnf member who witnessed the 1955 Le Mans accident (for thats what it was).. i saw Mike Hawthorn race many times between 1952 and 1958, spoke to him in Silverstone, Goodwood and Crystal Palace paddocks and got his autograph. I was a Moss fan but I always had time for 'old Mike' especially when he drove for BRM and Jaguar. For those of us who stood trackside in the 1950's Mike Hawthorn was truly a 'top man'.

[Terry Walker]

According to Eric Partridge's Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English, "gay" has a very long history as a slang word - 19th century and possibly earlier. "Gay bachelor" and Merry Widow" both implied heterosexual promiscuity. "Gay" was also used in the homosexual world at the same time as meaning promiscuous.

It stayed underground slang until fairly recent times when it was seized on in the mass media as a "headline' word: short, one syllable, easy to spell, fits a headline. Try squeezing "promiscuous homosexual" into a single column headline. It then rapidly evolved to mean homosexuals and lesbians in general.

So blame the press.

I actually read dictionaries, I must be crazy. I've actually read the 2 volume Shorter OED from front to back like a novel. Partridge, too. I've got several dictionaries of slang, including a reprint of a Regency dictionary of cant, as well as a US slang dictionary full of useful words like copacetic, and blivet. (A blivet is three pounds of **** in a two pound bag. Think about it.).

I was actually surprised to read Partridge's writeup on gay; it was news to me - particularly the Gay Bachelor/Merry Widow business.

I guess it's like "pig" for cop. We think of it as newish, hippie era, but it has been slang for cop for well over a hundred years.

Edited by Terry Walker, 24 February 2010 - 04:55.

[Allan Lupton]

Agree +1,000,000% BTW, I live in Portland, Oregon and the "gay" agenda is even more prevalent here that in California!

Continuing this digression, the hijacking of innocent words drives us to extraordinary lengths: it has long been customary to name new roads after local eminent people and here in Letchworth there was no problem naming "Parker Close" after Barry Parker or "Lawrence Avenue" after Annie Lawrence, but when it was decided to name a road after Horace Gay it couldn't be "Gay Gardens" and has to be "Horace Gay Gardens" - doesn't trip off the tongue as well, does it?

[kayemod]

... when it was decided to name a road after Horace Gay it couldn't be "Gay Gardens" and has to be "Horace Gay Gardens"

But I bet all the locals refer to it as Gay Gardens, I won't ask what goes on there...

On the pigs & police connection, I've rarely heard this is the UK, I wouldn't say it was common usage. Back in the 70s, a new police station was opened in St Ives, Cambridgeshire in, wait for it, Pig Lane. The plods didn't like this at all, and eventually the name was changed, but only for the section where the police station was situated. Pig Lane in St Ives is still there today, but one short stretch of the road is called Broad Leas.

[PRD]

Mike was a man of his times, just a few years older than myself, and to be anti German was pretty normal during the fities, especially for those of us who were nearly killed by them. It was not hatred, just antipathy and a dislike of seeing them succeed particularly in motor sport.

I just about remember my Dad buying a VW beetle in 1959 and the disapproval of our next door neighbours when he bought a foreign (especially German) car. If you read Motor Sport from the 50's then you can often see letters criticising WB for his support of foreign cars.
Times change and its a mistake to try and view the events of 50+ years ago through a 21st century moral prism

[angst]

But I bet all the locals refer to it as Gay Gardens, I won't ask what goes on there...

On the pigs & police connection, I've rarely heard this is the UK, I wouldn't say it was common usage. Back in the 70s, a new police station was opened in St Ives, Cambridgeshire in, wait for it, Pig Lane. The plods didn't like this at all, and eventually the name was changed, but only for the section where the police station was situated. Pig Lane in St Ives is still there today, but one short stretch of the road is called Broad Leas.

Btw, where I was dragged up, the term pigs is widely used to refer to the police, and has been for as long as I can remember - though it became increasingly acceptable around the time of the miners' strike.

[Terry Walker]

Amazingly (and we're way OT here, but WTH) - pigs was widely used in the Victorian underworld in London, where it seems to have originated. Origin unclear, from memory, unlike "slop", well known backslang from "police" - ecilop. (Pronounce it, see what you get). I can't lay my hands on my copy of Partridge at the moment - well buried - to check it out.

[Tony Matthews]

Btw, where I was dragged up, the term pigs is widely used to refer to the police, and has been for as long as I can remember - though it became increasingly acceptable around the time of the miners' strike.

In North Hertfordshire, 'pigs' is not unheard of, but gentler terms are normally used. However, I was in a local pub a few years ago when a small group of local 'characters' entered. On seeing a well known Police Officer of some rank having a quiet pint one of the group said "I see the filth's here!"

[Eric Dunsdon]

Mike was a man of his times, just a few years older than myself, and to be anti German was pretty normal during the fities, especially for those of us who were nearly killed by them. It was not hatred, just antipathy and a dislike of seeing them succeed particularly in motor sport.

While we were waiting for the newly signed Mercedes driver Stirling Moss to treat us to some demonstration laps in a 300SL saloon at the 1954 Boxing Day Brands Hatch meeting, someone at Bottom Bend suggested that we greeted him with a chorus of 'Oh Come All Ye Faithful'!.

[kayemod]

Amazingly (and we're way OT here, but WTH)...

That's one of the things I love about TNF, you're never far away from irrelevance and erudite rubbish. Who's going to resurrect that Blood Pressure thread?

[Tony Matthews]

That's one of the things I love about TNF, you're never far away from irrelevance and erudite rubbish. Who's going to resurrect that Blood Pressure thread?

If there's one thing that makes my blood boil it's people going off-thread...

[Bauble]

What extraordinary places a quite innocent thread can wander into, Letchworth, St.Ives, the origin of speakies! Blimey! As Eric would say

Puckles Me!

[Flaminiasupersport]

I have heard talk quite frequently of late about changing the inscription upon Hawthorn's gravestone.

As if the gratuitous painting of some of its carving in recent years hasn't been naff enough, now somebody airily presumes some kind of 'right' to deface and/or alter an inscription which was plainly chosen/approved by his sole surviving parent, her surviving family and closest friends at the time of her bereavement, just to cover present - and quite possibly transient - questions of language use.

Who the do these people think they are!???

'Gay' in period (1959) was a perfectly respectable word accepted by the vast majority of English-speakers worldwide as describing and celebrating hilarity, fun, enjoyment, good humour, partying in some style. All of which were intrinsic components of Hawthorn's character and personality.

Just because some homosexual militants apparently adopted the initials 'G', 'A' and 'Y' to claim a right to be 'Good As You' in some - I presume - northern Californian nooftah battalion during the '60s/'70s - and since the western world's Homintern has since powered the word's homosexual connotations to the forefront through the '80/'90s - should be no cause for anybody to tinker with a memorial which is nobody's but the dust lying beneath it, and the life celebrated upon it... I would repeat who the do these nitwits think they are????

T s...

DCN

This Gay crap gave me an idea whilst I was looking at "The Birds" on DVD (merely for Tippy and her Aston) and look what I did with Photoshop!
Tippy in front of the Bodega Gay School.... It's at the corner of Pansy Street and Backside Alley!

Edited by Flaminiasupersport, 24 February 2010 - 13:19.

[Doug Nye]

If this is too repetitious (another year has passed) I'm sure the moderator will erase it. However, just to record the fact that last Saturday - January 22, 2011 - marked the 52nd anniversary of Mike Hawthorn's fatal accident...and his loyal chums and admirers still haven't forgotten.



Tim Ely - who bought Mike's Riley and still owns and runs it today - with Nick Syrett (of BRSCC fame), a good drinking/racing/larkin' about chum of Mike's in period, having paid their respects at Farnham.



Each year on Jan 22 Mike's spirit gets updated with the news - this year including "You should see the state of the Hog's Back now!" - referring to the main A31 road between Farnham and Guildford which Mike used so often up until (and including) Jan 22 1959 - and "You'll never believe the price of petrol!".

DCN

[Barry Boor]

Well done, Doug. Thanks for reminding us about the date.

[Catalina Park]

Thanks Doug.

[D-Type]

thanks for the reminder. It's nice to see people remembering with flowers after 52 years.

[Lotus11Register]

This thread came up in a search about what Rob Walker may have said or written about Mike Hawthorn. Hopefully my question will get closer to the answer without "stirring up" an episode dealt with already.

Near the end of Rob Walker's years he was writing interesting retrospective articles for Road & Track, and in one he made reference to a remark that Hawthorn made to him in the immediate aftermath of the '55 LeMans crash. Walker said that he would someday reveal that story, but it would be the last article he would write. I for one continued my R&T subscription for several more years waiting for that revelation but in the next few articles he wrote Walker talked about other subjects, and it seems that the Hawthorn story never came out. Either he changed his mind or ran out of time. Perhaps I missed it.

Did anyone else catch this?

edited to correct spelling. Thanks Paul Parker !

Edited by Lotus11Register, 14 July 2011 - 21:31.

[ensign14]

According to "Mon Ami Mate", Mike's words to Walker (and Lois Rolt) were "it was all my fault..." Walker and Rolt told him not to be so silly and gave him a brandy. Lance Macklin backs up the story.

Although how much one reads into it is another matter - doubtless Hawthorn was in shock. And as for "all" his fault, well, had Macklin, Levegh or Fangio not been there, and had there been a proper pit lane or a wider pit straight, the accident wouldn't have happened. I think "racing incident" is the most appropriate verdict.

[Paul Parker]

This thread came up in a search about what Rob Walker may have said or written about Mike Hawthorne. Hopefully my question will get closer to the answer without "stirring up" an episode dealt with already.

Near the end of Rob Walker's years he was writing interesting retrospective articles for Road & Track, and in one he made reference to a remark that Hawthorne made to him in the immediate aftermath of the '55 LeMans crash. Walker said that he would someday reveal that story, but it would be the last article he would write. I for one continued my R&T subscription for several more years waiting for that revelation but in the next few articles he wrote Walker talked about other subjects, and it seems that the Hawthorne story never came out. Either he changed his mind or ran out of time. Perhaps I missed it.

Did anyone else catch this?

No offence intended but please do not join the ranks of those who have and in some cases still do refer to Mike HawthornE, it is Hawthorn without the extra vowel.

[Bauble]

What do you think of Mike Hawthorn?

The origin of this thread!

Mike stirred your soul, very few others ever did.

Fangio, Moss, Brooks, Collins, Ascari, Farina, all great drivers easy to admire, but for me Mike reached deep down inside and touched you where no other did.

He was, he is and always will be MY Hero, and I feel tears in my eyes as I write this.

God Bless you Mike!

Bauble.

[kayemod]

What do you think of Mike Hawthorn?

The origin of this thread!

Mike stirred your soul, very few others ever did.

Fangio, Moss, Brooks, Collins, Ascari, Farina, all great drivers easy to admire, but for me Mike reached deep down inside and touched you where no other did.

He was, he is and always will be MY Hero, and I feel tears in my eyes as I write this.

God Bless you Mike!

Bauble.

For me it will always be Sir Stirling of course, but yet another plug for Mike's books, Challenge me the Race and Champion Year. They were largely ghost-written, but both are really very good, they capture the flavour of life and racing back in the 1950s very well indeed, not too hard to find, even 50+ years after they first appeared, well worth searching for.

[CarlRabbidge]

What do you think of Mike Hawthorn?

The origin of this thread!

Mike stirred your soul, very few others ever did.

Fangio, Moss, Brooks, Collins, Ascari, Farina, all great drivers easy to admire, but for me Mike reached deep down inside and touched you where no other did.

He was, he is and always will be MY Hero, and I feel tears in my eyes as I write this.

God Bless you Mike!

Bauble.

As an eleven year old I received the book Champoion Year as a Xmas present, I read it so many times that I just about had it committed to memory. Mike was my very 1st international motor racing hero and for a period of time he became my role model for in that book he showed that with focus, determination, being true to ones self and a clear vision of what you wished to achieve then anything was possible. It sent very positive mesages to an 11 - 12 year old.

PS. We are in the process of finalising our plans for our long overdue big OE later this year. visiting Mikes grave is one of the things that I have on my bucket list

Edited by CarlRabbidge, 14 July 2011 - 20:48.

[RStock]

Except when it came to National Service.

From what I have read, Hawthorn more than likely would have been medically unsuitable for service, between the burns he had suffered at Syracuse and whatever ailment he was suffering from around the time he retired (I never saw what exactly it was). Seems he did try to avoid it, but I wonder if he was more concerned that whatever was found in a physical would also prevent him from racing, especially with what Jean Howarth said about black-out spells.

As to the thread topic, he seemed a genuinely good fellow well liked by all, except perhaps Luigi Musso.

[RStock]

According to "Mon Ami Mate", Mike's words to Walker (and Lois Rolt) were "it was all my fault..." Walker and Rolt told him not to be so silly and gave him a brandy. Lance Macklin backs up the story

It's said he was beside himself and more than a bit traumatized, and it took convincing by Duncan Hamilton as well as Lofty England for him to get back in the car to finish the race.