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May 21, 2003

Obituary: Alejandro De Tomaso

We have just received word from Italy Alejandro De Tomaso, founder and President of De Tomaso Modena S.p.A., passed away after a long period of illness. The funeral will be held in San Pietro Church, via San Pietro 7, Modena at 11 o'clock on Friday 23rd of May.


Alejandro De Tomaso was born in Buenos Aires on 10th July 1928. His father was a politician, who had been appointed Minister of Agriculture.

De Tomaso emigrated to Italy, where he drove OSCAs from 1956 to 1959, many times teaming with his wife, Isabelle Haskell of New Jersey.

Settling down in Modena, De Tomaso’s fertile mind flourished and soon he created a series of Formula Juniors, including the Isis and De Tomaso. By 1965, he had introduced the Vallelunga, a beautiful Ghia mid engined coupe, which used the Ford Cortina 1500cc engine.

The Vallelunga, however, gave way to even bigger plans. Working with the U.S. Ford Motor Company, De Tomaso started to work on the Ford V-8 powered Mangusta, designed by Giorgetto Giugiaro. If not a marketing success it most certainly caught the attention of the press as well as Ford’s upper level management, including Gene Bordinat. The result was the Pantera, which was designed by the American, Tom Tjaarda.


Remarkably, during that same period De Tomaso also constructed five Formula One cars, the DeTomaso 505, for Piers Courage. Having lured Gian-Paolo Dallara away from Lamborgini, De Tomaso’s F1 cars were extremely well-built. In a deal with Frank Williams, De Tomaso equipped the F1 cars with Cosworth engines. However, the death of Piers Courage at Zandvoort in 1970 stopped further involvement in Grand Prix racing.

Again using Ford V-8s, in 1970, De Tomaso built a four passenger luxury GT car, the Deauville, followed by the Longchamp in 1973.

In 1975, Alejandro succeeded in acquiring Maserati, then Innocenti, which built the new model of English Mini. Dealing with the Maserati production kept De Tomaso busy until Fiat acquired 49 percent of the firm in 1990. In the meantime there was a little deal with his friend Lee Iacocca, which resulted in the Chrysler-Maserati TC, built between 1987 and 1990.

In 1993, De Tomaso became seriously ill, with little chance of survival.

Today, the firm still produces two models of the Guarà: a coupè and a barchetta.

For more information about the funeral, contact:

Claudia Lodi
DeTomaso Modena S.p.A.
Via Virgilio n.9
41100 Modena
www.detomaso.it

Weekly Surprises
One of the nice things about being editor of VeloceToday is that every week is a surprise. As much as we'd like to establish a schedule of articles to be published for the next several months, we've always found that both difficult and, really, not much fun. Aside from Erik's F1 reports, which have thankfully been published every Wednesday after each event, we can't tell you what will be in next week's issue. Which makes is somewhat akin to a 50's era Italian pit stop, unrehearsed but exciting.

We can tell you what is coming up, at some future date, although we don't know exactly when. You'll just have to keep that subscription active to find out. So below, in no particular order, are just some of the stories we can guarantee you will receive via VeloceToday.

Michitake Isobe writes again
We mentioned earlier that we'd be hearing more from "Mitch" Isobe in the near future. And sure enough, Mitch will be onboard with a wonderful article about the Ferrari Evo. With great photos of this rare super 308.

The Forgotten Alfas
The much-maligned 6C2500 comes alive between the pages of Angleo Tito Anselmi's great book, The Alfa 6C2500. We'll do a comprehensive review and evaluation of this great Alfa of the 1940s. Don't miss it.

Phil Hill and Santa Barbara
West coaster William Edgar will provide a two part article about Phil Hill's run at the Santa Barbara Airport circuit in 1953, driving his own Vignale bodied Ferrari 250 Spyder. Complete with maps and historic detail, Edgar writes as if he was there--which he was.

Two Views of Essen
The Essen show is such a big event it took two of our best correspondents to fill us in. Italy's Alesandro Gerelli and Lancia expert James Steerman will provide us with two views of this fantastic show. Late, but better late than--

Lost but Not Forgotten
Once upon a time at Concorso, we stumbled upon an incredible Lancia B20 Spyder, completely original and with a very interesting history. Now if we can find the owner's email address, we will fulfill the promise of writing this very fulfilling story.

A sneak of Blue
In keeping with our promise to feature the occasional French car (no UN jokes please) Henk Brouwer visited the Schlumpf collection and brought back a fine collection of Gordini photos. So, we'll have a Gordini review on tap in less than a Paris second.

Fiat Part IV
Yes, it is really done, and it is long. But we've wrapped up the history of Fiat, covering the years 1966 to date. That's a lot of cars, but as you'll see, not so many for the enthusiast. Our final goodbye to Giovanni Agnelli, who despite our reservations, was, after all, a pretty great guy.

Volpini
Interest in Volpini came about as a request from one of our readers. We'll feature a Volpini Formula Junior and try to make some sense of the rest of the etceterinis from Volpini.

Cisitalia
How about a Castagna-bodied Cisi? We know where one is, if the owner will help us out with the story of this graceful barchetta.

Alfa Formula Boxer
Nearly forgot about this one. In the 1970s, Alfa produced a series of Formula cars with the Alfa Sud engine. Full details, photos, and history of this little known Alfa are coming up.

Surprises in between
Yep, in between all of the above will be even more articles, from Marcel Massini, Ed McDonough, and a host of others.






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