John Macartney and his son Edward enjoying the first stop in Montgomery, Alabama to begin his 12,000 mile quest to raise moneys for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. John will be traveling in a 1973 Triumph Stag on this great adventure.
Beginning the quest in the deep South with NO air conditioning rings true the old song “Mad Dogs and Englishmen go out in the Mid day sun.”
We had an absolutely splendid visit as John shared information regarding his plan to raise money for and awareness of PTSD. After a break, he regaled us with stories from his days in the English motor industry. His tale of blowing a Rolls Royce engine was hilarious. He was “sacked” and the very day applied for a position with another car firm, which stated – “What! We blow engines daily on our test stands. You may start next week.” John omitted he worked for Rolls Rouce Aero Division and this was a turbine engine valued at 250,000 lbs! How about being sent to deliver a Jaguar and finding it is an XKE Lightweight full blown racecar with competition clutch and no insulation for noise or heat. Driving through Belgium – and 130 in 3rd!
Members enjoyed the fellowship so much that eight brave souls joined John in his travel to Georgia the next day. He was safely placed like a baby into the caring arms of the Georgia Triumph Association for the next leg. So now we are official members of the Mad Dogs and Englishmen going out in the midday sun – road crew division.
If you are on the route – make plans to join in. The cause is very worthwhile and the visit with John is a blast. We wish he could pass through again.
David Price
President, 2009
Montgomery British Motoring Club
www.montgomerybrits.org
To vist the official TTAC website – click here: http://www.triumphtransamerica.org.uk/
[Editor’s note: This link is dead now, but you can Google “Triumph Trans-America Charity Drive” for several great articles and photos from third party sites.]
Triumph Trans-America Charity Drive 2009
John Macartney will be passing through Montgomery on July 2nd. We have made plans to spend some time with John and his wife. Plans are to meet them in route and caravan into Montgomery. A room has been reserved for John to share stories of this undertaking, the charities and of course his days working for Standard Triumph. Join us for all or parts of this day as we will also enjoy a dinner with the McCartneys. Contact David Price at dprice@bituminousinsurance.com for more information
Forty years ago and at the age of twenty-three, I was transferred from the Export Department of Standard-Triumph in Coventry, to the company’s only showroom in the heart of London’s Mayfair district. The showroom at 15–17 Berkeley Square, London W1, was a prestigious location and in the fall of 1967, I became one of the team. Those of us who worked there used all our guile and persuasive talents to secure personal export orders for the company’s product range, and perhaps inevitably, two of the prime markets for the sports car range were Canada and the United States. As order followed order – and successive customers told me where they lived, how and where they planned to use their cars, I developed an ever-increasing interest to see this huge continent. As my career later developed over the ensuing years, I visited many continents – including North America, but only on business. I can’t say those trips allowed me “to see America” because they didn’t. One airport is much like any other, all hotel rooms are seemingly ‘L’ shaped and if I never see Chicago O’Hare airport again, I won’t lose sleep fretting about it. But seeing so many Triumphs going Stateside, I resolved that one day I’d visit North America myself. I’d go where and when I wanted – and at a time to suit only me. Most of all, I’d do the trip in a Triumph and at the end, I’d arrange things so I could have some quality time admiring The Fall on the east coast.
The downside to that distant pipedream is that no Triumphs have been made for more than twenty years – but the trip plan is still in place. What’s more, it’s all coming together right now, though by somewhat curious means. I don’t need to go into the key reason at this point, because there is much to say on a variety of important things. At this stage and with 2007 having seen many emails going back and forth, I can now break cover and declare the intentions!
In 2009, and as a now retired UK Standard-Triumph employee, I plan to drive the U.S. and Canada in a Triumph, raising money for charity – in no more than three months. I can’t make it longer than three months because of US visitor visa conditions. I doubt any of my former colleagues or forebears have ever done this, so it could be another ‘Triumph First.’
But, while I travel, I want to meet as many Standard-Triumph enthusiasts in those two countries as I can. Most important of all, I really want them to help me achieve the overall objective of completing what is likely to be at least a 10,000 mile journey in a little over three months in a car that’s likely to be thirty or more years old. Are you up for that, guys?
Triumph Trans-America Charity Drive 2009
A well-known British classic car enthusiast, automotive historian and author, John
Macartney from Evesham in Worcestershire, will be undertaking a marathon 10,000 mile Charity Drive across the United States and Canada later this year. This epic journey will be undertaken in a fully-restored 1973 Triumph Stag which is currently undergoing a full rebuild to ‘as new’ condition in Chicago, Illinois.
The Charity Drive objective is to raise funds for three charities – Anxiety Disorders
Association of Canada based in Montréal, Québec, Assist Trauma Care of Rugby, England and The Sidran Institute of Baltimore, Maryland, USA. All three organisations specialise in the many facets of awareness, education and treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
This insidious mental illness can affect members of the armed services, those in the civilian emergency services, hospital staff and anyone who has had a mind-shattering, life-threatening experience. Tragically, and for a variety of reasons, too many PTSD sufferers are unable to find the specialist help they need to recover from the illness, with the result that a turn to crime – or even suicide, is by no means uncommon.
Current estimates and research in Canada, the UK and USA, indicates between 5{d7bb5f80100d9cc8ed36d8b44483fdbf859ff4aee0deeb25afed5de8e54bd8dc} to
10{d7bb5f80100d9cc8ed36d8b44483fdbf859ff4aee0deeb25afed5de8e54bd8dc} of the populations suffer from PTSD. Statistics in the United States further underscore the fact that between 60{d7bb5f80100d9cc8ed36d8b44483fdbf859ff4aee0deeb25afed5de8e54bd8dc} – 80{d7bb5f80100d9cc8ed36d8b44483fdbf859ff4aee0deeb25afed5de8e54bd8dc} of the people who experienced rape, child abuse or violent assault will suffer from PTSD.
John, whose early career started with Jaguar and Standard-Triumph in Coventry – and
later with British Leyland in London, saw him spending many years both living and working overseas. He also became a PTSD sufferer in 1980 from time spent working as a civilian for an American company in Iraq at the outbreak of the Iran/Iraq war. In his own words, “it was Assist Trauma Care in Rugby who helped me rediscover a life I’d forgotten after twenty seven very tedious years of PTSD suffering. Believe me, that’s far too long for anyone to wait, because the treatment I did eventually receive wasn’t available within the NHS!”
The Triumph Trans-AmeriCa Charity Drive will start from Daytona, Florida on 27th
June 2009 and is planned to finish in San Luis Obispo, California on 29th September
2009. During the course of the drive, John Macartney will be visiting a large number of
enthusiast clubs catering for British cars. Additionally, a number of North American
motoring journalists have said a trip of this length – with a sole fundraising objective for registered charities – has never previously been undertaken. So, in completing the route, John will not only achieve a ‘FIRST’ in American and Canadian motoring history – but as an Englishman driving a 35 year old British car restored by a team of committed enthusiasts in Chicago, Illinois.