Re: IML: About Tom McCahill??

["Bill Watson" <wwatson5@xxxxxxxxx>]

Tom McCahill was married a number of times but never had children of his
own.   His assistant during the last decade of his life was his wife's son.
Unce Ton's grandfather was a well-to-do New York lawyer (if memory serves)
and left his money to his son (Tom's father) when he died.   Unfortunately
for Uncle Tom, the depression and his father's alcoholism wiped out the
family fortune.

During the depression, after having to leave college, he either owned,
managed or worked for,. Murray's Garage in New York City.   During the war
he began writing articles on a variety of subjects for magazines such as
Mechanix Illustrated.  After the war he did two road tests, one on the 1946
Ford and the second on the 1946 Buick.  These were published by Mechanix
Illustrated and the rest, as they say, was history.

Uncle Tom sent sales of Mechanix Illustrated soaring upward over the years
with the public becoming infatuated with his stories and road tests.  He
wrote many articles on car safety, maintenance, etc. and his own letters to
Uncle Tom column got more mail than the magazine's letters to the editor.

One of my favourite road tests was the one he did on the 1952 Singer 1500
roadster, a small MG competitor that became a part of the Rootes Group in
1955.  The Singer prior to the war was noted for shaky body construction,
average engine performance and a big question mark on brakes.  And those
qualities continued after the war with the Singer 1500 roadster.

Uncle Tom had this Singer roadster out at a race track in New England (he
lived in Connecticut in the 1940's and early to mid-1950's) and was
accompanied by his photographer, his wife at that time.   He asked her to
stand in the middle of the racetrack and take a couple of photos of him
coming around the curve.  As he travelled around the curve, there she was,
right in the middle of the roadway.   He could tell she was not going to
move so he slammed on the binders.  And verified the question mark on Singer
brakes.

The Singer was slowing down, not as fast as Uncle Tom wanted, while his wife
was true to her word.  She was standing in the middle of the race track
taking photos as came around the bend.   As luck would have it, the Singer
stopped with inches to spare.  And his wife never wavered.  Which was a
great relief to Uncle Tom.  As he stated, it was very fortunate as good
cameras are hard to come by!  Every once in a while a photo of his wife
would appear in a road test or article.  The photo of his wife that appeared
in publication a year or so later did not look like the woman in the Singer
article.

He was friends with  people from all walks of life, people such as band
leader Paul Whiteman and NASCAR head Bill France.   In the late 1950's he
moved to Florida and began testing cars at Daytona.   He was an avid hunter,
noted for packing his car(s) with equipment and his black labrador dogs, and
heading off for a bit of duck hunting,   That placed him in good graces with
another avid duck hunter, George Mason, president of Nash-Kelvinator.   That
probably had a great deal to do with Uncle Tom being the first auto writer
to see and test the Nash Rambler when it was first introduced in 1950.

Cross-country travelling was another of Uncle Tom's trademarks during the
1950's.  He regularly travelled to California loading up his car and heading
off for a couple of weeks.  His road test of the 1956 Plymouth Sport
Suburban was conducted during one of his jaunts from Connecticut to Florida.

When it came to cars, he was a great Chrysler fan.  From 1956 through to the
fuselage era he had nothing but praise for the Imperial and bought one
vitually every year during that period.   Although he mocked Imperial's
free-standing tailights when they first appeared in 1955 (calling them
"sparrow strainers") he mourned their loss when the 1963 models were
introduced.

He believed Chrysler's Torsion-Aire suspension gave Chrysler products
handling characteristics that all North American auto makers should copy.
When it came to automatice transmissions, Torqueflite was the unbeatable
champ and Chrysler's brakes were second to known.   He claimed he knew
Walter Chrysler and owned Chryslers and Dodge Brothers cars in his younger
days.

During the last few years of his life he slowed down quite a bit.  He was a
heavy smoker and was not noted for his slim physique even in the 1940's.
His wit seemed to die off as he slowed down.  He died in 1974 (if memory
serves me) and his step-son, Brooks Bender, continued on for awhile writing
Tom McCahill road tests,  Always felt it ironic that his favourite car, the
Imperial, would die shortly after he did.

Collectible Automobile did a nice piece on him a few years back.  Cannot
locate my copy of the article (although I did come across the article on
Ionia/Mitchell-Bentley).  Mechanix Illustrated also did a 25th anniversary
story on him in 1971 (can't find that either).


Bill
Vancouver, BC







----- Original Message ----- 
From: "mika jaakkola" <mika.jaakkola@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <mailing-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, February 22, 2005 9:56 PM
Subject: IML: About Tom McCahill??


> Hi guys,
>
> As we all know, Tom McCahill made many road tests about Chrysler
> Corporation cars.
> But does anyone know anything about the man himself? When did he live?
> How was he educated?
> What cars did he use in personal life? etc etc.. anything?? There's
> big story about Virgil Exner on IOC, but
> would it be possible to interview McCahills son/grandson ?!?!
>
> Thanks,
> Mika Jaakkola
> --1964 Imp
> --1957 Imp
>
>
>



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