William Bird was the chaffeur until 1936 when the car became a funeral car for Asington Co-op Northumberland. In 1943 continued as taxi and funeral, wedding, home guard and hire car at Beverley near Hull until 1952. Various owners to 1963 when engine J3R replaced by X2E. Owner's wife could not drive the car so it was traded in for a VW Beatle! My dad paid £250 for her in 1964. I recovered the original engine and other parts from the donor hearse. We attended the rally at Goodwood in 1964. After replacing one main and one big end bearing and the idler gear bearing I re-installed the engine in Feb 1965. Ater the Queen's silver jubilee in 1977 my brother-in-law drove the car back to Bingham near Nottingham flat out at 60mph, chucked out the oil from the rear bearing and melted all the little and big ends! With my dad's help I fixed the engine and he drove us in the car to Derby for the 75th R-R anniversary. She was used for family weddings.
After my dad died in 1991 I have used the car much more. I went to Normandy with a tent in June 1994. In April 1995 I drove from Calais to Copenhagen, Rostock, Gdansk and back towing my 1967 Safari 15 foot caravan. In Sep 1995 I took an old friend back to his POW village in Poland via Normandy, Denmark and Sweden, returning via Dresden and Colditz Castle. With the caravan of course! In Sep 1997 I drove with the caravan to St Moritz (Euro rally). Solo, I drove over all the local passes - Stelvio, Gavia etc. Then with the caravan through the Dolomites (Sella, Pordoi, Falzarego etc) to Austria. Solo up the old closed Loibl, then to Hungary Slovakia and back via Prague. In 2002 I drove the car again for the Queen's golden jubilee. In Aug 2002 I took the caravan for the third time to Poland, to do wedding duties for the real Magdalena after whom the car was named in 1995. 1100 miles back in 2 and a half days, mainly on ordinary roads.
