“Paradiddles, Pistons, Propellers and Portraits”
By
Stuart Spencer
A limited edition of 400, each copy signed and numbered by Stuart
I offer copies here at £49
Post & Packing – UK – included. Europe – £25. Rest of World – £35.
Please use the proforma below to order your book and I will then invoice you individually at your own p&p rate, usually within 24 hours.
This unique limited-edition book has been written by someone who has been a talented artist, drummer and motor industry manager. I have known Stuart Spencer for many years and was delighted to see the launch of his book, which contributes importantly to our knowledge of the Midlands car industry – especially Jaguar during its peak production years – while also being an entertaining read. Stuart has a particular brand of humour which more than evident in his writing!
Stuart started his career in the motor industry in 1966 with Humber and the Rootes Group in Coventry. He was a technical illustrator in the body design drawing office. There he worked on advanced engineering projects including the Spartan, Hillman Minx, Humber Sceptre and Sunbeam Rapier. After the Chrysler take-over, he worked on Avenger, Sunbeam and Chrysler 180. Stuart was also involved with the very successful Chrysler/Talbot works rally and race teams.
In 1983 Stuart started work at Jaguar Cars, joining the design studio under first Doug Thorpe then Geoff Lawson. This book takes the reader into the heart of Jaguar (which has always been very much a design-led company) because he became manager of the design studios. There he met, and often worked closely with, Jaguar personalities such as engineering director Jim Randle, Ford’s Bill Hayden, Jaguar CEOs Sir John Egan and Sir Nick Scheele, American super-engineer Jim Padilla and many others. Nor are the highly skilled modellers and others in the design studios forgotten (including the cleaners!), people whose work is often not given due credit. Stuart was therefore much involved with many key new Jaguars, especially the epic launch of the critical new XJ6 (XJ40) in 1986. Before that came “Jersey Junior” and the book includes perhaps the first published pictures of this highly-secret new Jaguar saloon being developed by Jaguar with GM – only to be axed when Ford stepped in to buy the company in 1989.
Other themes run through his life: ‘Paradiddles’ in the title refers to basic patterns of drumming, because music (specifically drumming) has been a major interest for Stuart. Another strand in Stuart’s life is art, and although he takes pains to point out that he was not a car designer, he was often asked to produce concept illustrations of new Jaguars, and was also commissioned to paint portraits of leading Jaguar figures. For his own interest he made superbly executed cutaway drawings of cars, not to mention meticulously researched paintings of aircraft – an interest of his since as a child he watched American and British bombers flying over the family home in Birmingham. Finally, as an ex-Army man, I especially appreciated the way Stuart donated two of his paintings to Army charities.
