Some of my most vivid memories of growing up were journey in the 1935 Austin A7 my Father bought shortly after de-mob from the army.
It took us from our old home in Newcastle upon Tyne to a two bedroomed property with an over-grown quarter acre garden near Nantwich in Cheshire when I was just turned four and my Sister only fourteen months old.
It was not a high performance vehicle, cold in Winter,sometimes too hot in Summer, no window wipers or even indicators when we first had it, and rather a boneshaker on long trips, but it still worked when sold some eight years later. A man who repaired this model of car would sell parts to people who owned them for twelve pence per item – probably fortunate since they might have stopped manufacturing them.
It was the way we went on most family holidays, under canvas, with relations in Northern England and cheap bed and breakfast. There were frequent day trips to local countryside places and occasionally Chester Zoo. It was a means of getting to school too and of course shopping.
We had a series of second- hand cars after that but this is probably the one I remember most vividly. Perhaps because it was the first we ever had, also because I sometimes was persuaded in a small way to help service it also memories of how it needed to be nursed into life in Winter, despite the paraffin lamp under the sump to stop the oil thickening and the radiator freezing with the frost, and frost being scraped off the windscreen during journies. It felt like a pioneering adventure even if close to home.