By: Ed Niles

Most of them, I confess, by writers more witty than I, in language more flowery than I can summon up.

It was in 1986 or 1987 (I forget; the memory is the second thing to go. I forget what the first is). I received a phone call from someone named Bill Jacobs who wanted to take me to lunch. We ended up in Beverly Hills, where Jacobs, a very nice man from Illinois, explained that he was a car dealer outside of Chicago and that, among other things, had just acquired the Ferrari 500 Mondial that I had owned and restored a year or two earlier. We had a nice chat, and a nice lunch, after which Jacobs told me that he also owned another 500 Mondial, not quite so nice, that he had entered in the upcoming Mille Miglia. Would I like to join him as his co-pilot?

Well, I was dumbfounded. I was being asked to spend three days and nights in a cramped car and cramped hotel rooms with someone that I had only known an hour! My brain went on full stutter and stammer! It took me what seemed like hours to come up with any response at all. My mind simply would not accept this surprise question as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Finally, I made some excuse about being too old, or too busy, or too something.

I regretted it as soon as we parted company. My regret continued when I read, after the event, that he had finished successfully. My regret was not even dampened by reading that it was one of the wettest Mille Miglias in recent memory.

So it was that in early 1989, when my pal Mark Dees cooked up a scheme to get into the event, I was a little more receptive to the notion. Mark had been reading an obscure book on the history of the Mille Miglia, and he had learned that the famed driver and journalist, Paul Frere, had won his class in 1953 driving a Chrysler Sedan. It seems that the great Belgian driver had hoped to run the event in a Jaguar Sedan, but when the Jaguar turned out to be unavailable, he acquired a Chrysler, with its early version of the famed "Hemi" engine, and showed the rest of the crowd the way to go.

No, Mark did not own a Chrysler. Mark has owned a great number of interesting cars, but a Chrysler Hemi was not among them at the time. But Mark got ahold of an entry form and sent it in anyway. On the parts that called for the serial number of the car and a photo of the car, Mark simply responded "the car is in the paint shop". The organizers of this extraordinarily popular event are usually pretty careful about screening the entry forms. But they have stated a preference for cars that will give the event a broad range of historic automobiles, and their desire for variety must have overcome their normal caution. The entry was accepted.

Ed and Mark beside the Hemi-powered 1952 Chrysler Saratoga, pretending to be the car Paul Frere drove in 1953..

Mark then started scouring the country for an appropriate Chrysler. He found one on the east coast. An original car, unrestored, in overall average condition. It was a 1952 Chrysler Saratoga, powered by a 5.4 liter, 180 horsepower Hemi V-8. Mark concluded that it was possible - just possible - to get the car back to California, do a fast rebuilt and paint job, and put it on the ship for Italy.

But Mark is not a man who can leave well enough alone. Well, while the engine is out, let's hop it up a little bit. And those brakes really ought to go; maybe I can fit some Buick alloy drums in their place.

It is a universal truth that car restorations always take at least twice as long as anticipated. So the deadline for getting the Chrysler on the ship came and went with the car still apart. Okay, we can still make it. We'll just have to fly it over.

I was left with the details of arranging for the flight. Alitalia knew all about flying sports cars over for the famed 1000 Miles of Italy, so I contacted them. "No problem. Just give me the make and model of the car, its weight and its dimensions". My response brought a stunned silence!

Somehow, we got the car ready for the last flight to Milano, and, somehow, the Alitalia personnel got it on the airplane. I could not bear to watch.

The bill of lading described the merchandise as, "vehicle, self-propelled". We hoped! Mark had barely had an opportunity to drive the car around the block before it had to sprout wings and fly to Milano.

The car did make it to Milano, and thence to that sweet little town on The Lago Di Garda which would be the temporary digs for the ladies, while Mark and I went racing for three days. The next morning, we drove to the Piazza Della Vittoria, adjoined by the Piazza Della Loggia and the Piazza Della Duomo, all of which were already filled with cars of all descriptions. There was no doubt we took the prize for the largest car! Surrounding us were what Gerald Roush calls the etceterini: Pegaso, Stanguellini, Abarths, Moretti, Siata, Tojeiro, Bristol, Invicta, Kieft, Halscylec, Gioco, Monaci, Ermini, Denzel, Giaur, Stanga, Veritas, Volpini and Wanderer!

Appropriately, Mark had arranged for the California license plate "BALENA" (whale in Italian). He had wanted "Leviathan" but it would not fit on the California license plate.

Balena at the start of the 1989 Mille Miglia!

During the week of the Mille Miglia the Italian newspapers carry almost nothing but news of the event and the cars and personalities entered. Apparently, there must have been a story about the "Balena" as once we got underway we could hear shouts of "Balena! Balena!" wherever we went.

After a sumptious dinner at "The Monastery" we left Brescia. Loneto, Desenzano, Peschiera, Bussolengo, finally to Verona. We discovered a problem. The more we drove the car, the dodgier the brakes became. They had a strong tendency to make the car turn sharply to the right when applied with any strength. Mark soon learned to use them gingerly, shifting down at the same time.

After an hour and ten minutes sleep at Ferrara, we took off down the adriatic coast. With the peculiar brakes never far from our minds, we were still able to see 110 mph on the old Chrysler's speedo! God help the etceterini. As we slowed for a stop at one of the many check points, we discovered a new problem. There were clouds of black smoke behind the car, and the engine did not want to run below 25 mph. It turned out that one of Mark's many modifications, the Edelbrock carburetor, had a leaky float. We pulled to the side of the road to disassemble the carburetor. The parts were neatly laid out on a cloth on top of Balena's left front fender, when a sudden breeze blew everything off into the bushes. We found all the parts except the pin for the carburetor float. We made do with a piece of baling wire. Mark's glue (who would take a trip like this without glue and baling wire?) was not gasoline-proof, but it at least allowed us to get the car running once again.

Ed and Balena broken down somewhere along the route of the Mille Miglia. The worst day racing beats the best day working.

At the next check point, we had the same problem, and borrowed some epoxy from an accommodating fellow-competitor. As Mark once again worked on the car on the side of the road, the safety vehicle came by and the driver, in his pigeon English, asked: "Will you be returning?" I thought he meant next year, so I responded, "if they will accept our entry". Once I understood his question, I explained that we were almost ready to get the Chrysler back on the road. After spending a half hour sucking gasoline from the leaky float, Mark said he could still taste it three days later.

Saturday afternoon and evening saw some of the worst weather imaginable. Race cars with thin Italian skins were dented by the hail. At one point, coming into Rome, the fog was so thick that each car was escorted by a local policeman on a motorcycle. Visibility was no more than 5 to 10 feet. Policemen were everywhere, escorting us into each check point. In one town, nobody had bothered to tell the police officer the location of the checkpoint, so he took a dozen or so of us on a half hour wild goose chase. We were able to argue our way out of that one with the judges. It was not our fault!

Saturday night, we actually got three or four hours good sleep on the outskirts of Rome. But Sunday, despite Mark's best efforts, the brakes seemed dodgier than ever. Sharp application would cause the car to jump sideways at least a car width. At one point, Mark was trying to follow the Italian style of making a third lane down the center of a two lane road, when he found himself going into a blind left hander. He was passing a civilian in a Fiat, but thought better of it, and (suffering from momentary brain fade) slammed the brakes on. The Chrysler dodged to the right, with the Fiat driver looking over in terror at the behemoth coming his way.

Heading north from Rome Sunday morning, the weather cleared, and we were able to beat a fast path to Florence. As we drove along the Lungarno Acciaioli, next to the Arno River, I was able to give a salute to our favorite hote