I know we’ve been talking about Jaguar an awful lot lately, so I suppose in that sense their inane re-branding campaign is working like gangbusters or bustergangs or gangbutter or whatever, but it’s also made me want to look into some really early Jaguar stuff, the sorts of Jaguars we don’t usually talk about, something other than E-Types and XKs or whatever. Maybe even before Jaguar was Jaguar, back when they were still Swallow Sidecars.
Yes, Jaguar used to be a company named for a different sort of animal, a bird, and the vehicles they made were still sleek and sporty, just free from the burden of “engines” and “transmissions” and other oily bullshit like that. Because they were sidecars, for motorcycles.
Stylish ones, too! Look at this:
That’s a hell of a sidecar! It has a whole roof and side curtains and everything!
Swallow Sidecar made sidecars, of course, but they also were something of a coachbuilder, and before they were making entire cars on their own, they started out by building bodies for the very popular Austin 7. These Austin 7 Swallow cars were sort of more stylish and luxurious versions of the Austin Seven, and the ads definitely played up their more stylish looks:
I mean, dude has a monocle. That’s also a wheel. And I think the ad copy is using “smart” in the British sense of “notably stylish” and not in the American sense of “always knew NFTs were bullshit.”
These re-bodied Austin Sevens looked great, the ad wasn’t lying. Look:
Just for reference, the normal-bodied Sevens were kind of dowdy, upright, spindly things:
…so, compare that to a roadster like this one
…and I think you can see the appeal of what Swallow was doing.
Now, the Seven was a genuinely tiny car, like roughly maybe Fiat 500-sized, and everything on them felt a bit sub-scale. They were entry-level everypersons’ car, but it did help if those everypeople weren’t too large.
In that sense, they remind me of one of the earliest takes on the same formula that gave the world the legendary Aston Martin Cygnet:
That formula being take a small, cheap economy car and stick enough new swanky stuff on it until it becomes fancy. It’s a formula that doesn’t show up all that often, but the British seem to be among the best – or at least most persistent – at it. Think these Swallow Sevens, the Radford Minis, and, of course, the Cygnet.
I’m going to leave you now with a video of one of these tiny and charming Swallow Sevens, one with a name so unashamedly British I think it can summon beans upon any piece of dry toast if said aloud three times: Wupperty.
When does management allow Jaguar articles?
My BSA sort of A10. sort of because I really cannot remember what bits came from which BSA has an SS attached to it, they have been together for many decades, the motorcycle is called Mr. Chuffley, the sidecar is Mrs. Chuffley. Sad when thought through, a charming and swift swallow forever shackled to a noisy and often irritating smelly lump. although through the years the smelly lump has literally bent to her will so the twain can never be parted.
Cool cool;
Not going to switch to a monacle, but will attempt to work ‘withal’ into three conversations today.
Also the associated expression ‘wherewithal’ meaning funds, as in “I’d love to swim in a pool full of marmite but I don’t have the wherewithal”
“Now, the Seven was a genuinely tiny car, like roughly maybe Fiat 500-sized, and everything on them felt a bit sub-scale. They were entry-level everypersons’ car, but it did help if those everypeople weren’t too large.”
Yeah, hence the popular nickname, “Chummy”, as one had to be pretty… chummy with the other occupants in such a car.
“I mean, dude has a monacle.”
At the risk of being obnoxiously and officiously nitpicking I’d venture that it’d be a good idea to double-check a word’s spelling before putting it in italics, as any error is that much more glaring when so typographically emphasized.
Next time check your dickshunarry first.
Eh, no need to be rude or snide here; if you want to do that sort of thing there’s always Twitter or 4chan. We gotta maintain a modicum of decorum here; otherwise, if one can’t do that, then begone, varlet.
It’s been fixed now. Good of you to keep an eye on that.
The Austin Swallow sounds like something you’d find on Urban Dictionary..
Right next to hawk tuah.
better than the College Station Gag?
The Swallow was the more popular follow up to their earlier effort, the Spitz.
Eventually swallowed by a jaguar… or, put another way using a different bird, by the cat that ate the canary.
My dad remembers Austins. They brought some to America and called the Bantams. Cool tiny cars that had the style of a full sized car in about 1/3 size packaging.
I remember them because of an 8th grade assignment. I was told to make an original poem. Which I could not do. So, I asked my dad for help and he gave me this one.
There was a man from Boston
Who bought himself an Austin
There was room for a Seat
And room for his Feet
But his balls hung out so he lost Em.
For some reason, I got F on the assignment. I’m guessing the teacher realized my dad had stolen the poem from somewhere else.
Yeah, plagiarized poetry… that’s the ticket. Not, perhaps, that your teacher was a bit teste about the last line!
An F?!? Thats just nuts!
My brother’s first car was a 1970 Austin America that somehow found itself in northern New Jersey. It was probably my first close look at a car that approached packaging with a more complex philosophy than “make it bigger.” We we’re all astonished at the room inside relative to the footprint.
My Dad restored a 1940 Bantam. When the engine was in his shop I thought the block was a battery. It is that small.
The door opening is so small you have to enter butt first and rotate. Of course that is a bit of a problem if the other seat is already occupied.
“Wupperty, Wupperty, Wupperty!”
(Beans fired at my toast from off screen cannon cover me from head to toe)
“TORCHINSKYYYYYYY!!!”
Oddly enough that is exactly how they sound at idle: wuppertywuppertywuppertywupperty…
That’s what Torch sounds like at idle? Is that a side effect of the aortic dissection repair?