Inside a 1953 works rally car

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Look at that! It’s the inside of a 1953 Ford Zephyr, but not as we know it. This is the cockpit of Tommy Wisdom’s works rally car, probably as he drove it in the 1953 Rallye Monte Carlo.

The ribbed steel dash of the standard car (second picture) is pretty in all its simplicity, with a minimal number of gauges arranged in a neat binnacle right behind a thin steering wheel with a horn ring typical of the period. Wisdom’s car wasn’t quite as basic, with a massive additional instrument cluster placed right in the centre of that elegant dashboard, chock full of gauges, switches and lights.

We see a big speedometer reading in kilometres, a clock above it, and next to it what may well be a speed pilot. What are the other three gauges on the left for? The wire probably leads to a map light for navigator Simpson, while the big one on top must have been a warning for low oil pressure?

There are some further intriguing details. What is the big round thing on the steering column? What about the hanger hanging on the switch on the dash rail, and the device on the windscreen, right in front of the driver? Most fascinating, we think, is the bottle rack between the seats. It doesn’t look like water in there… Different days, for sure.

Words: Jeroen Booij; picture: archive/Bonhams
 

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