MIKE HAWTHORN d1959. British F1 driver with Ferrari / Vanwall & BRM between 1952 and 1958. 47 races with 3 wins. Le Mans 24hour winner in 1955. The First British F1 World Champion driving a Ferrari Dino 246 in 1958 (with one win in France and five second places). He retired from F1 at the end of his Championship season. In earlier life he had lost a kidney to infection and began suffering problems with his remaining kidney in 1955. This was so serious he was at the time only expected to live a short number of years. However just a matter of months into his retirement (on 22nd January 1959) he died aged just 29 in a road accident on the A3 by-pass near Guildford driving his highly tuned British Racing Green Jaguar 3.4. What happened that day is still unknown. Suggested causes being ; driver error mechanical failure or blackout. The crash has been attributed to a combination of high speed bad weather and competitiveness. Rob Walker was ahead of him and perhaps Mike Hawthorn pushed his car too hard in an effort to pass Walker's Mercedes 300SL. Hawthorn's Jaguar (nicknamed "the Merceater") was heavily modified for high power and speed. "No Kraut car could overtake or out-accelerate ....." Hawthorn's Jaguar (these are the words in his biography "Challenge Me The Race"). A close relation of Hawthorn's had been killed in the war hence his dislike of Germans ..............

A desirable original vintage 1955 autograph book page clearly signed in ink by Mike Hawthorn 

REVERSE of the page is clearly signed in pencil by both Ivor Bueb and Norman Dewis 

IVOR BUEB d1959. British F1 driver with Connaught / Maserati / Lotus and Cooper. 5 starts no points. He is perhaps best known for sharing the winning works Jaguar D-type with Mike Hawthorn in the 1955 24 Hours of Le Mans marred by an accident in which 82 spectators were killed. He repeated this success with Ron Flockhart in the ex-works Ecurie Ecosse car in 1957. He suffered serious injuries in 1959 when he crashed his BRP Cooper-Borgward Formula Two car at the Charade Circuit France. After being carried off the circuit by Gendarmes he died six days later in the hospital near the circuit 

NORMAN DEWIS OBE d2019. British test driver for Jaguar Cars from 1952 to 1985

From the autograph book of C Kettel of Sutton Coldfield. The motorsport signatures all collected at the Daily Express Meeting at Silverstone on May 7th 1955. Mike Hawthorn won the Touring Car race in his Jaguar Mark VII. Ivor Bueb won the 500cc race in his Cooper. AFTAL Dealer No13 and UACC RD Memorabilia UK COA

ID:132634 (BOX)