Cousins and Contributions

Houston, we have a prodigy . .

Bill Emerson discovers the car Donald Healey drove across America into auto history, writes KEVIN NORBURY
March 23, 2005

Our photographer was trying to get Bill Emerson's old sports car in position for his camera and I joked: "Houston, we have a problem." Emerson, a former NASA space engineer, quickly shot back - "There is no problem here."
Emerson was at one stage project leader for NASA's Explorer 23, which in 1964 was the first satellite to detect "micro-meteoroids in space", but these days he is more involved in detecting micro nuts and bolts for his 1948 Healey Westland Roadster.
When it comes to this rather rare set of wheels, he is the proverbial perfectionist. "Probably," he agrees, with a gentle bearded smile. "I'm a perfectionist for authenticity." He wants the Westland restored " As close as possible to the original, as it was built in 1948". Even the hose brackets he had 're-done' and the domed slot screws on the firewall, while stainless steel, are 1948 screws.
There is more than one reason he wants the Westland rebuilt to the way it once was. It is a significant car. The Westland-bodied Healey was the first car former British racing driver Donald Healey - of Austin-Healey fame - built, the "Healey Healey", as Emerson calls it, badged only with the word "Healey". Not only that, he was to discover this Westland was once Healey's own car. How it came to be in Australia - Emerson is an American living in Florida - is another story. But let us go back to 1977.

Emerson had just returned to the US to live in sunny California after two years helping the Japanese start their space program. All he wanted was a convertible and he bought a 1953 Austin-Healey 100. He had always liked this model, having first seen it as a college student at the Miami world fair. Next came a Nash-Healey, and then one of the original 50 racing Healeys, a 100S which he raced in Mexico and California. Emerson says he eventually met Donald Healey at a car show in the US in 1980 and discovered he dabbled in radios and electronics. Being a space engineer, Emerson understood such things and the two became friends. Possibly because of this friendship, at one stage Emerson says he owned 11 Healeys. One of them he bought after seeing an advertisement in the Los Angeles Times for a "1948 Austin-Healey". He knew that could not be right and when he went to see it, found this old sports car on blocks. It was, in fact, a Healey Westland. "I bought it on the spot."
He also noticed this car had some unusual features. For a start, it was right-hand-drive and Donald Healey had told him that in his racing days he wrapped the steering wheel with twine for a better grip. "And this car had that." The body was tan but he could see it had been a metallic green - Healey had talked about his early use of metallic paint. The seat adjustment was "definitely for a very short man" and Healey was only 155 cm.

Healey had also told Emerson of a trip he made from New York to Hollywood with his son in a Westland to set up dealerships, and had written about it in a British magazine. The plot, as they say, thickened. Emerson pushed on with his research, which in 2001 resulted in The Healey Book. For that he found "more than 90 Healey-type cars" - one of every production model ever made - and numerous specials, including a Healey Elliott (a Healey with a British-built Elliott body), the only one ever raced at Le Mans.
At the Automotive Research Library in Eindhoven, Holland, Emerson stumbled on Healey's article in the British magazine Autocar and matched the chassis numbers to prove his Westland was, indeed, the car Healey had driven across the US. Emerson could not quite believe it and eventually started having the car restored. The chassis, engine and running gear had been done, "but they (the US restorers) were incapable of doing justice to the (all-aluminium) body", he says.
Then he saw the work of David Pike, a young Australian panel-beater from Bacchus Marsh, who had worked in the US. "I was very impressed " and late last year, Emerson's Healey Westland, and 11 boxes of parts, were on a ship bound for Bacchus Marsh. The car is now basically back to the way it was in 1948. The body is a light metallic green, which Emerson matched from paint samples on the wheels and in the boot. "I spent over a month getting the right colour," he says.
The carpet and the maroon hides for the upholstery he got from England. Still to go on the firewall are the brass identification plates but Emerson cannot find the right screws. He must have the right screws and the ones that came off it are back in Florida. "Somewhere in doing my inventory I left off eight screws," he laughs. "They are the eight screws that fit the identification plates."
They may have to wait until he gets home, where he has big plans for the car. He wants to retrace Donald Healey's 6382 kilometre trek across the US in October this year. "Donald did it with his son and I want to do it with my son to relive the whole experience."

Autobiography -
Donald Healey was a British racing driver who won the Monte Carlo Rally but is more famous for the Austin-Healey sports car, built from 1952 until 1967. The Healey Westland (a British Westland-built body on a Healey chassis with a Riley engine) was the first car he produced under the Healey name and was built from 1946 until 1952.
There was also a Nash-Healey (1950-54) with a Nash engine, a Jensen-Healey (Healey body and Lotus engine) and a Healey with an Alvis engine. All were built in England. Only 42 Healey Westlands were built and they sold for $US7500 when the American Cadillac was about $US2000. Between 1956 and 1960, Donald Healey also made Healey boats. He died in 1988.