Claude Tipper

I'm asking this on behalf of a friend, does anyone have any information on a driver called Claude Tipper? Friend tells me that Claude was proud of the fact that he held a lap record that would never be broken, since the track had been dug up, and from what I've been told, he was a significant talent, possibly in the 50s & 60s. Nothing on Google, so does the name mean anything to anyone here?

Where are we talking?

Originally posted by David McKinney
Where are we talking?

On TNF.

Sorry. It's Friday afternoon.....

Originally posted by David McKinney
Where are we talking?

I know practically nothing about the man, only that he lived in Bournemouth at some time and probably only raced in the UK. I was told he raced 'sports cars' of some kind, but it sounded more like 500cc F3 to me.

http://forums.autosp...453#post2230453

Kayemod

I think your friend was referring to Claude's exploits at Weston-Super-Mare. Driving a Monaco-Norton F3 on 8 Oct 1949 he established the record for 500cc racing cars with a time of 26.42". This beat the time of the previous year which had also been set up by the Monaco, although there is some confusion over the 1948 results as to whether George Hartwell, the builder and original owner of this car, was behind the wheel or Claude.

Anyway it was definitely Claude in 1949 and he beat 19 other cars including the likes of Don Parker, Jack Moor, Clive Lones and and eight Coopers driven by Curly Dryden, Peter Collins etc.

What was unusual about the course was that the cars ran in pairs (unlike the year before), with one car on the road and the other on the wide promenade with the regular spaced lamp posts separating the two. As the course curved slightly to the right in favour of the promenaders the starting positions were slightly staggered!

To prove this result was no fluke the Monaco won its class again at the Gosport sprint (16/10/1949) beating Don Parker, Alan Brown and other F3 stars. But again who was driving the car is not certain, either G.Verner or W.H.Benham. Claude was second in class just to rub noses in dust or swirling sand.

This car was referred to once as a "perambulating clog" but it was very quick in a straight or slightly curved line. In won at Altcar in 1950 with Mr Tipper. Its wheelbase was five foot.

Sprinting at Weston-Super-Mare did not occur again until the late Fifties so possibly the seafront underwent redesign during the interval and the course was indeed dug up.

John

David Baldock has a Monaco 500 which he is rebuilding. He has just bought a 500cc Norton motorcycle as the only source of an engine.

Was the Monaco a one-off?

Thanks John, that's exactly the kind of thing I was looking for. I Googled "Claude Tipper" and found an uncredited newspaper article about him setting off with his second wife on a marathon honeymoon ride on a motor scooter to Yugoslavia and back in the mid 50s, about 5400 miles altogether I think. He was photographed setting off from Le Touquet in a posed shot in front of a Bristol Freighter aircraft. I've just phoned the friend who asked if I could find out anything about CT, and it appears that Friend's wife was propositioned by Claude Tipper in connection with an earlier scooter trip to Sicily, apparently a shared tent was involved, and being a woman of honour, naturally she turned him down. If you can follow this, a friend of Friend's wife did agree to go on this jaunt with him, but deserted CT's pillion as soon as they returned to the UK. Apparently Claude was charm personified but "A bit old for young girls like us." Friend's wife found a photo of her sitting in Claude's Messerschmitt bubble car a few years later, CT took the photo, and she knew the second Mrs Tipper as well, the first Mrs Tipper preceded the aforementioned tent-sharer, but apparently this second relationship lasted rather longer than the earlier scooter ride. They certainly knew how to have fun in those days, didn't they? It isn't all that much of a coincidence, he was quite a big wheel locally in the motor trade, but about 25 years ago I bought a car from the very same George Hartwell who shared the 1948 Monaco Norton car with Claude Tipper. It's a small world.

fuzzi,
There is only one Monaco (though with something of a trick, there was at least one other 500 called a Monaco much later) The Monaco was custom built for George Hartwell (later of Hartwell Imps and Cooper-Bristols) by the Monaco Motors concern. It is well-described here
Its very small footprint made it both highly manoeuvrable and (once the Norton was on cam) very rapid to accelerate. But it was way too twitchy for circuit racing. George did appear at the first public meeting at Goodwood (18/09/1948) - I suspect George's first run through Fordwater behind the more stable Cooper Mk IIs convinced him to stick to speed events...
George sold the car to CJ Tipper at the end of the season and moved to a Cooper Mk III, sticking to the 1,000cc Twin thereafter.

I am pretty sure that George drove the car at Weston in 1948. There is picture of Claude in the Monaco on the link above - I believe this is from Luton Hoo, August 1949. Claude mainly stuck to hillclimbs (I have several Prescott references) and sprints, though he also made a Goodwood appearance. The car was still competitive in 1950, winning at Gosport, Tewinwater, Queensferry and Markyate, plus third at Blandford and Brighton. Claude continued in 1951 with more sprint wins, and I believe he stopped competing at that point. TFer Michael Aikey sent me a reference to Calude and the Monaco with the annotation "Holds all 1/4 & 1/2 mile course records in the country (or county?) & British record for 500cc racing at 14.6 secs – terminated(?) 440 yards. 1951 season"

The Monaco continued in club events. I have vague recollections of it being advertised around 1953, though whether this was by Claude or a subsequent owner.

I think Claude gave up all racing, and focussed on his fascination for these European treks. Trek being the operative word here, as many were undertaken on scooters, though on at least one occasion he was tempted by the luxury of a Bond minicar.

I passed on all the Claude Tipper information, and an additional snippet came to light. The fact that CT often told this story when he had a drink or two inside him may mean that not too much credence should be given to it, but apparently he claimed to hold a pre WW2 Brooklands record of some kind, which may be where the sports car reference came from. Any suggestions?

Kayemod

According to my list of British and Irish racing drivers up to 1939 Claude Tipper did race a Riley and a Fiat before the war. At the last meeting held at Prescott organised by the VSCC on 26 August, 1939 Claude won his class with a little Fiat Ballila saloon. Whether this was in a record time I do not know.Quite where and when he raced the Riley I cannot re-discover.

Also I cannot make a Brooklands connection but maybe someone else can.

John

Does anyone have any information on Claude Tipper driving a 1959 Bond Mini Car around Europe ?

 

I have it on good authority the same car is soon to make a second trip around Europe in the company of several over Bond Minicars. 

For Claude Tipper at Ramsgate 1950 see:

 

https://forums.autos...e/#entry8825305

 

RGDS RLT

Does anyone have any information on Claude Tipper driving a 1959 Bond Mini Car around Europe ?

 

I have it on good authority the same car is soon to make a second trip around Europe in the company of several over Bond Minicars. 

 

"In 1952, purely as a holiday, Mr. Tipper bought a Bond Minicar and went 9,200 miles, from 200 miles north of Stockholm to Madrid, covering nine countries, seven capitals and seven grand prix. When he came back the Bond company gave him a car for nothing."

 

"It was back to Bonds in 1954 and down to Spain and Morocco to the edge of the Sahara. Coming back Mr. Tipper went over an 11,000-feet pass near Granada and clocked 6,200 miles on the whole trip. On each of these trips Mr. Tipper was accompanied by Miss Zoe Jarman, an ex-mannequin, now a motoring journalist, but on the fourth, this year, he went alone to Corsica on his Lambretta."

 

Worthing Gazette, Wednesday 07 December 1955

 

See also: https://books.google...minicar&f=false

 

RGDS RLT

Edited by Rupertlt1, 06 September 2019 - 14:27.

Gracias Rupertlt1 

So, what were the seven Grand Prix?

 

RGDS RLT

I've just spoken to the widow of my original informant. He seems to have known CT quite well, but his widow Inez, who is now a sharp and switched on 89, couldn't remember much more than she told me some years ago, it was all over 65 years ago of course. Friend told me that CT was "involved in the motor trade", but his widow is less certain, she can't remember what CT did for a living, but he doesn't seem to have been short of a bob or two, despite his choice of transport.  Inez went to CT's flat, which was in quite a "smart" part of Bournemouth, where he propositioned her with his tent-share offer. She turned him down, but said that her flatmate might be interested, as indeed she was, she's one of his companions mentioned in that magazine article, possibly the first one, though they parted as soon as they returned to the UK. Inez wasn't too pleased when her flat-sharing chum agreed to go, pointing out that she'd have to pay the full rent herself, but Claude smoothed things over by agreeing to pay his new tent-sharing companion's share all the time she was away with him, and he was as good as his word.

 

Inez doesn't seemed to have liked him all that much, not enough to tent share anyway, but Claude Tipper appears to have been an interesting character.

Edited by kayemod, 09 September 2019 - 12:47.

Whilst I don't have exact dates in 1963 Claude did live at 28 Penrith Road, Bournemouth as you can see from this phone book entry.

 

Whilst Penrith Road is within the Bournemouth boundary it is actually in Boscombe as the clifftop road it adjoins runs through from Boscombe to Southbourne. A visit to Google Street View reveals that Griffons, as it was called, is no longer there but has at some stage been replaced with a block of flats. With 28 Penrith Road being the very last dwelling in the road the flats enjoy good views out to sea so in its day Griffons will have had similar views and will have been a very desirable property.

Having recently researched Claude's history I too don't quite know what he did for a living. Claude was from Evesham in Worcs. and according to the 1911 census his father was a draper and milliner. On his father's death in 1948 he left c. £4000 net value. Presumably Claude used some of that money to buy the ex George Hartwell Norton Monaco in 1949. References are made on the internet to Claude being in the car trade in his later years but I have found no trace of any car related business he ran. If he did it was unlikely to have been called anything like Tipper Car Sales as the word tipper is too closely associated with tipping lorries. I've checked the excellent British Newspaper Archive and whilst there are many references to his hill climbing exploits as well as his trips around Europe there appears to be little else on what he did for a living.

When Claude made his well publicised treks around Europe he didn't need a great outlay. By doing them on a Piatti scooter or in a Bond Minicar little money would be involved. He didn’t even stay in hotels, he camped his way around Europe. Neither the Piatti nor the Bond Minicar used much petrol so he was able to travel cheaply. By persuading Bond to give him a car as they certainly did on one occasion, his costs were even further reduced. I think it's fair to say that he pretty much did it all on a shoestring budget.

Was Claude wealthy? I honestly don't know. I don't see him as being either rich or poor but he certainly had a knack of getting by. He was without doubt a character and a charmer where the ladies were concerned, although as we have learnt from Kayemod his advances weren't always welcome!

Graham

Edited by Crusoeman, 10 September 2019 - 20:27.

The 1955 article previously quoted has -

 

"Mr Tipper is a director of an artist group in London that specialises in painting racing cars.  The firm has done 320 paintings in the last three years.  A recent job has been to paint Ken Rudd's Healey."

Whilst I don't have exact dates in 1963 Claude did live at 28 Penrith Road, Bournemouth as you can see from this phone book entry.

 

https://i.postimg.cc...-Phone-Book.jpg

 

Graham

 

 

The flat that friend Inez, who I spoke to yesterday remembered, was in Parsonage Road, that's just up the hill from the central Royal Bath Hotel, going towards The Lansdowne, that's quite an expensive area, and from what little she remembered, the flat was an awful lot better than hers! Penrith Road might have been OK in the 50s or whenever that phone book entry dates from, assuming it's the same person of course, but that area is rather less select today. If he moved there, maybe Claude had become less affluent, Boscombe today, or "Bos-scum" as many around here call it has become very run down in some parts, though of course it might have been much better then.

 

From what Geoff E posted, possibly he moved to London, though if so, he came back to Bournemouth to die aged 77 (as a great many people do today, funerals are big business around here).

He married twice, once in Worcestershire (1931 to Frances Hainsworth, two sons), t'other in Bournemouth (1957 to Mary Mackay, one son).

He married twice, once in Worcestershire (1931 to Frances Hainsworth, two sons), t'other in Bournemouth (1957 to Mary Mackay, one son).

 

That might explain changes of address.

He married twice, once in Worcestershire (1931 to Frances Hainsworth, two sons), t'other in Bournemouth (1957 to Mary Mackay, one son).

 

His first wife remarried in Bournemouth in 1956 to become Mrs Smith. 

 

In the 1955 newspaper report Claude had said "Marriage?  I couldn't do these trips if I was married."

I’ve been back to the online phone books and have discovered that Claude was living at 7 Queensbury Mansions, Parsonage Road, Bournemouth from 1952 (that’s the earliest entry I can find) until 1961. From 1961 to 1965 he was at 28 Penrith Road. He then must have moved to Sarum, Avon Avenue, Hurn Road, Ringwood, Hants and lived there until he died in 1977. Avon Avenue, Ringwood is about 12 miles north of Bournemouth.

 

With regards Queensbury Mansions, at number 12 it had a very well known resident from c. 1937 until his death in 1993. It was Ken Baily. The name might not mean much to you until I mention the guy who regularly turned up at England football and rugby matches in his Union Jack suit. Ken was the man who covered up Erica Roe, popularly known as the Twickenham Streaker.  I am sure Claude will have known Ken.

 

Incidentally Kayemod mentioned Boscombe in an earlier post. It’s right to say that there are areas of Boscombe that have seen better days but moving away from the centre and towards the cliff top there are still some very respectable areas to live and Penrith Road is one of them.

 

Graham

Good news on this is that in the last couple of days we have managed to make contact with Claude's youngest son. As a result he is now in contact with the guy who now owns Claude's 1955 Bond Minicar.

 

For those of you who are interested a group of Bond enthusiasts set off this coming Sunday, 15th September, to drive to Bled in what is now Slovenia. It's a charity run that will retrace the trip made by Claude and his wife back in 1959. In those days Bled was in Yugoslavia. It's about a 4000 mile round trip

 

Further details here:

 

Edited by Crusoeman, 12 September 2019 - 12:25.

Southampton Concours d'Elegance, 7th June 1958

Organised by B.A.R.C. SW on behalf of Southampton Corporation

Class E: 

3rd-Mr. C.J. Tipper (Bournemouth) (1958

Goggomobil Coupe), 43/60 points

Source: B.A.R.C. Yearbook 1959, Page 90

 

Tipper ran the Goggomobil at Prescott in 1958.

 

Class winner up to 1200 cc in a Renault at Gosport Sprints, 2 September 1956.

 

Ran the Messerschmitt at Prescott 1959 - is this the car?

 

https://library.revs...ion=p17257coll1

 

Do we have the registration numbers for any/all the Bond minicars?

 

Found LLJ 894, NCK 373

 

See: http://500race.org/p.../claude-tipper/

 

RGDS RLT

Edited by Rupertlt1, 14 September 2019 - 13:00.

LLJ 894:

 

https://library.revs...ion=p17257coll1

 

https://library.revs...ion=p17257coll1

 

RGDS RLT 

GRN 136:

 

https://www.shutters...60ajpg-4818645a

 

RGDS RLT

SUNBAC Ragley Hall, Saturday 18 April 1959

Production Cars - Up to 1,000. c.c.:

1. C. J. Tipper, (Messerschmitt), 37.6sec

 

RGDS RLT  

As far as I can determine these were the Bond Microcars associated with Claude Tipper.

 

LLJ 894 from 1952 - Bournemouth registration that ran from June 1951 to July 1952. This was trip that started on 13th May 1952. Claude and his secretary Alice went all round Europe. They went as far south as Madrid and as far north as Stockholm. Incidentally does anyone know what Alice's surname was?

 

GRN 136 from 1954 - Preston registration. This registration ran from May 1954 to April 1955. It makes sense as I believe it was the first car that Bond gave to Claude in return for the publicity his trip would generate. According to Shutterstock he was off to South Africa with the car along with Miss Zoe Jarman. 

 

OCG 7 from 1955 - Hampshire registration that ran from July 1955 to February 1956. I'm not sure what run this car went on but I hope to find out soon.

 

NCK 373 from 1959 – Another Preston registration. This registration ran from June 1959 to March 1960. Once again it makes sense as I believe it was another Bond given to Claude by the company. This is the car that went to Bled in what was then in Yugoslavia. Bled is now in Slovenia. On this trip he went with his wife Mary.

 

 

With regards the hill climb at Prescott here is some video of the event. It took place on 3^rd May 1959

 

https://www.youtube....a9eG3O-I&t=198s

 

Sadly it includes no footage of Claude’s Messerschmidtt but you can see that it was a very wet event. That ties in with the photo already posted via the link https://library.revs...ion=p17257coll1 As you will see it was taken in the wet at Prescott. Here is a newspaper report on the event.

 

 

The reference to Miss Patsy Burt going off the road in a Cooper is something that you can see in the YouTube video.

 

The charity run by a group of Bond owners who set out tomorrow, 15th September, to Bled can be followed on Facebook. Look for a page called 'Bonds to Bled' where you can follow their run.

 

Graham

Edited by Crusoeman, 14 September 2019 - 19:42.

As far as I can determine these were the Bond Microcars associated with Claude Tipper.

 

LLJ 894 from 1952 - Bournemouth registration that ran from June 1951 to July 1952. This was trip that started on 13th May 1952. Claude and his secretary Alice went all round Europe. They went as far south as Madrid and as far north as Stockholm. Incidentally does anyone know what Alice's surname was?

 

 

I'm only now catching up on this thread, as I've been doing a bit of adventuring of my own, a mostly eastern European jaunt that has taken me out of circulation for the last two and a half weeks, travelling in a far more speedy and comfortable manner than Claude ever did, though probably also at rather greater expense. Depending on which country you're in, the "WI-FI", "WEE-FEE" or even "WI-FEE" is often problematic, so I've been taking an Internet break, and have been pretty much TNF free much of the time, but can now answer one of Crusoeman's questions about Claude's first journey at least.

 

The woman that accompanied Claude on his first trip wasn't called Alice, her name was Irene Payne, and her name was probably changed to protect her innocence, such as it was. She was a typist aged 24, a Welsh girl from the Valleys like my friend Inez, though I imagine at the end of the trip, she was much more worldly wise...  I expect that Claude introduced her as his "secretary" in much the same way that wealthy old men dining in expensive restaurants introduce their attractive and much younger companions as their "niece", this was the early 1950s remember, and if he'd admitted that Irene, who was not much more than half his age, was just the flatmate of someone he knew fairly vaguely, and that he'd only known her for about 10 days, eyebrows would have been raised all the time between departing Bournemouth,and their return home a couple of months or so later. They parted as soon as they returned to the UK, which apparently came as a shock to Claude, Irene never talked much about her experiences, never spoke to Claude again, married someone else not long afterwards, and sadly died from lung cancer at the age of just 42.

The 500cc Owners Association Facebook page has plenty of information and photos of Claude. He is also mentioned frequently in C.A.N Mays book 'Formula 3.

Edited by Eric Dunsdon, 08 October 2019 - 16:08.