8 replies to this topic

[Nanni Dietrich]

Possibly there is a mistake in every biography of A. C. Bertelli, available by books, websites, magazines etc.

 

The Anglo-Italian car designer, race car driver, mechanic and businessman, often associated with Aston Martin, is reported to have made his racing debut as riding mechanic to the great Felice Nazzaro, winner of the Coppa Florio held at Bologna on 06 September 1908, at the wheel of a Fiat. 

Bertelli in 1908 was 18 years old.

 

According to Italian contemporary press and Emanuele Alberto Carli's book "Settant'anni di gare automobilistiche in Italia" (actually the most reliable source about Italian racing in the early decades of 20th Century), Nazzaro's riding mechanic that day at Bologna was his friend Antonio Fagnano.

 

A Fiat employee, Fagnano was foreman in its Turin plants as well as member of the testing department, riding mechanic and racing driver. In 1908, he raced with Nazzaro many times, including in the Grand Prix de l'Automobile Club de France at Dieppe as well as in the first Grand Prize Race of the Automobile Club of America, held at Savannah, Georgia - in which Nazzaro, with Fagnano as riding mechanic, obtained a remarkable third place.

 

Other sources indicate Nazzaro-Bertelli as winners of the Targa Bologna instead of the Coppa Florio. The Targa Bologna was held the next day (07 September 1908) on the same racing circuit, a 52.5-kilometer public roads course around the city of Bologna  from Borgo Panigale-Castelfranco Emilia-Nonantola-S. Giovanni in Persiceto-Borgo Panigale, to be completed for 8 laps (the Coppa Florio was ten-lap). Winner of the Targa Bologna was Jean Porporato in a Berliet. Felice Nazzaro did not participate in the event.

Edited by Nanni Dietrich, 26 January 2025 - 15:45.

[robert dick]

On all photos showing Nazzaro at the wheel of the 1908 Circuito di Bologna winning No. 10 Fiat,

Antonio Fagnano is/was his riding mechanic.

For example:

https://www.passapor...037-rotated.jpg

 

And

L'Auto/6 September 1908 had the crew of No. 10 Fiat = Nazzaro/Fagnano.

https://gallica.bnf....pt6k46238897/f1

 

[Doug Nye]

In his seminal book 'Aston Martin - The Story of a Sports Car' first published by Motor Racing Publications Ltd, London, in 1957, compiler Dudley Coram of contemporary AMOC fame included the following:

 

"In the year 1908, at a time when Robert Bamford and Lionel Martin were obtaining their early practical experience as automobilists but had yet to form their professional partnership, the Coppa Florio was run off in Italy, preced the day before by a form of curtain-raiser named the 'Circuito di Bologna'. This latter event was won by the great Felice Nazzaro driving a Fiat. As riding mechanic he had a young Italian named August Cesare Bertelli, and it is with the works and exploits of Bertelli that we must now concern ourselves in order to place in proper perspective the rebirth of the Aston Martin car..."

 

'Bert' Bertelli lived until 1979 and would certainly have been involved with Aston researchers Inman Hunter, Fred Ellis and Coram himself, each of whom collaborated in production of that book more than 20 years earlier.  

 

This prompts the thought that 'Bert' had been not only creative with the truth, but perhaps had maintained a fiction for so long he possibly felt he deserved to have been riding mechanic to Nazzaro in that Bologna race, even if he wasn't.  

 

However, Nazzaro as a test and demo driver for Fiat would have surely been accompanied on many drives by young mechanics from the factory.  I'm inclined to believe that the young Bertelli had indeed been one of them, riding with the Grand Prix-winningr national hero - just NOT in a premier-league, or perhaps second-division, Italian motor race.

 

When one is trying to talk sporting-minded customers into investing in an expensive new sports car, the temptation never to spoil a good story with facts could certainly have proved irresistible.  Repeating it years later to eagerly attentive enthusiasts could have come as second nature...

 

DCN

[Vitesse2]

"When the legend becomes fact, print the legend."

[robert dick]

Bertelli's 1,5-litre 4-cylinder Aston Martin of the late 1920s came very close to a refreshed and updated 1908 racing voiturette as used in the 1908 Grand Prix des Voiturettes at Dieppe and the 1908 Coupe de l'Auto at Compiègne. Bertelli certainly designed his Aston Martin with a close eye on the Italian Isotta (62 x 100 mm) and the Swiss Martini (62 x 90 mm) which were powered by 4-cylinder OHC-engines. The early 4-cylinder Bugatti, which evolved into the famous Brescia immediately after WWI, was based on exactly the same 4-cylinder voiturettes, and gave birth to the legend that Ettore Bugatti had already designed the Isotta.

 

In the 1908 Bologna race, Vincenzo Trucco in a Lorraine-Dietrich finished second behind Nazzaro. Trucco's riding mechanic was Alfieri Maserati whose Maseratis not only became well-known by the end of the 1920s but filled the front pages in 1930. Maybe Bertelli, when creating and maintaining the fiction of having been riding mechanic for Nazzaro in the winning car, expressed a wish to be mentioned on the same level as Alfieri Maserati. But most probably it was pure promotion without any second thought. 

 

[Doug Nye]

 "But most probably it was pure promotion without any second thought..."

 

Indeed.  The old boy kept it up for many years...plainly...

 

Incidentally Nanni, while Augustus is of course the Anglicised form of the Italian 'Augusto', why do you use the English form 'Caesar' for what has many times been cited as A.C.Bertelli's second name normally rendered - not least, I believe, by himself - as the Italianate 'Cesare'?

 

Unrelated to this casual query, Bertelli became known familiarly within the British motoring world as 'Bert' Bertelli, while according to Coram amongst others his family always referred to him or addressed him as 'Gus'.

 

Do official Italian records list him as 'Bertelli, Augustus Caesar' - or as 'Bertelli, Augustus Cesare' - or as 'Bertelli, Augusto Cesare' ???

 

I won't venture into potential Welsh pronunciation of the surname.

 

DCN

 

Edited by Doug Nye, 31 January 2025 - 19:25.

[ReWind]

Not Augusto, Doug.

Agosto! (Do you remember some Italian bike rider named Agostini?)

Full name, AFAIK: Domenico Agosto Cesare Bertelli.

 

EDIT: Do not believe me! I'm just a tedesco.

Edited by ReWind, 01 February 2025 - 09:50.

[Nanni Dietrich]

The Italian name is definitely Augusto. Domenico Augusto Cesare Bertelli.

Agosto is only a month, in Italian language (August in English), never heard an Italian man named Agosto.

[ReWind]

I stand corrected, Nanni.