BRITFEST 96

Once again the British car show season in the Northeast United States got started with BRITFEST 96. The event, which is sponsored by The M.G. Car Club Central Jersey Centre and Moss Motors, Ltd., was held on Saturday, 27th April.

This year's show had a new record of 193 cars participating in the event, making it the biggest and best show in the event's 11 year run. M.G.s of almost every model and type were present as were other well known British marques such as: Triumph, Austin-Healey, Mini, and Jaguar.

British Car Clubs from Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and even the M.G. Car Club of England were in attendance at the event. Nick Cox, the North Amercian liaison for the M.G. Car Club worked a booth at the event to promote the mother club in North America. In addition, The North American MGB Register's vice chairman, Richard Miller, manned a table and was handing out sample copies of The MGB Driver along with membership applications.
Kurt Nagl and I travelled up from Baltimore in my 1974/5 MGB GT, along with Ken Olszewski in his 73 MGB Roadster to represent the M.G.s of Baltimore, Ltd Car Club. The trip north through the back roads of Pennsylvania and New Jersey proved to be uneventful, took approx. 4 hours and was 389 miles round trip.

The show couldn't have asked for better weather, with temperatures in the mid 70s and sunny. Well over 800 walk-in spectators attended the show and there were new and used parts vendors selling anything you could possibly need for your M.G. or other British car project.

The votes for the best three cars in each class were tallied up at 2.30 and awards were presented at 3.00. The folks at Moss Motors gave away door prizes to the show's participants in between the presentation of the awards and thanked the show's workers for all of the effort that went into making this event such a success. We left the show and headed back to Baltimore in anticipation of Britfest 97.

THE BRITISH ARE COMING, AGAIN!

That was the cry at the British Motorcar Show held on Saturday, 18th May in Lewes, Delaware at Blockhouse Pond Park. This event sponsored by the Lewes Chamber of Commerce and assisted by the British Motor Club of Delaware, attracted 68 cars on a cloudy day which started out with showers and fog.

British car owners from the Mid-Atlantic area made the journey to this small town located on the Delaware Bay. Lewes is the home of the Cape May - Lewes Ferry which runs between Cape May, New Jersey and Lewes, crossing the bay where it meets the Atlantic.

Lewes is rich with history. First founded by the Dutch in 1631 it later became British and was bombarded by the King's Navy during the war of 1812. The town features a historic district and shops that offered participants of the cars show special discounts.

The show field opened at 9.00 a.m. and the cars were arriving up until 11.00. The event was open to all British cars, however, the M.G. Marque was far the most numerous. I would estimate that more than 75% of the cars were M.G.s with the remainder consisting of Healeys, Triumphs and there were even two Rolls-Royces. (Have you ever wondered how many M.G. Midgets you could make out of a Rolls?) Cars were broken down into five classes: Prewar to 1950; 1950 to 1958; 1959 to 1968; 1969 to 1974 and 1975 to present.

Awards at this popular vote show were presented to the top three cars in each class at 3.00 p.m. This was followed by a police escorted parade of the winners through the business district. All in all, the day turned out to be quite enjoyable and I look forward to attending this event again next year.

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