As many of you will know, Paul Doube, club member and ex President of the Sprite Club ,and stalwart of the ClubbiesSA movement is having a running battle with his health at the moment. A few weeks ago, to help me piece together some of my father’s recollections of his trips to Mallala, I asked Paul if he’d mind writing down some memories from his youth, a time when you could find him happily sweeping the floors at Garrie Cooper’s workshop, just soaking in the early days of Elfin Cars. Within the hour the following came bouncing back. Enjoy!
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The Workshop Rat, by Paul Doube
… I did indeed ‘haunt’ the Elfin factory on Conmurra Avenue, Edwardstown when I was a kid. I had developed a bit of an interest in racing and race cars, as my older brother used to bring home magazines about cars and racing, though these were usually English magazines, such as Auto Sport. In one of the Australian magazines, was an advertisement for Elfin Sports Cars, and I realised that the workshop/factory was not far away from my home at Clarence Gardens.
After school one afternoon, I hopped on my trusty treadley, and cycled down to Conmurra Avenue, where I found an unlikely looking Besserblock workshop set back a little from the street, and which was next to a firm called Cooper Motor Bodies, run by Cliff Cooper (Garrie’s father), and where Garry and Elfin Sports Cars started out. I won’t detail the history of Elfin as that is easily available elsewhere.
In any case, I saw the sliding door at the front of the workshop was slightly open, and so I peered in, trying all the while to remain out of sight of the occupants of the workshop in case I was seen to be doing something wrong. It was an amazing sight to see a couple of racing cars under construction as well as one or two being either repaired, serviced or prepared for racing, and though it was a fantastic sight, I was desperate to find a way to get inside and have a really good look.
I can’t recall for sure but this must have happened a few times over the ensuing weeks, and on a few occasions I was sure I had been sprung, but there was a big bush growing in the carpark next to the office door and workshop entrance, and I figured if anybody saw me, I could hide in the bush. I only had to do that once when a car pulled in to the carpark area (not really a carpark, just an entrance way to the premises), and as the car parked, I hid in the bush to avoid having to fess up. I have often wondered what that person must have thought, as they clearly saw me peering around the workshop door, but that I had disappeared by the time they got out of their ute.
Not long after that incident, it was school holidays, and of course, I had again cycled down to Conmurra Avenue, probably secretly hoping I would be invited in for a tour. All of sudden the garage door slid back, and this older bloke grabbed me by the front of my jumper, making me think I was going to be in trouble and have the police called (a real fear as my father was a policeman). It turned out it was Cliff Cooper, and he had a broom in his hand, again making me think I was about to get a hiding.
His words still ring clear to me when he said “instead of looking in, you might as well make yourself useful, and come in and sweep up“!
That was my ‘in’ to Elfin Sports Cars, and from that day on, I used to go down as often as I could, and simply walk in and grab a broom, and pretend to sweep up, in reality never doing much sweeping at all, and as much as possible, hanging around close to those working on the cars or talking about what they were doing. It was probably just as well, as many of the basic layouts of chassis were simply drawn in chalk on the workshop floor, and if I had swept those chalk lines up, I’m sure I would have been given a hiding.
It was a case of almost being in a live ‘Boys Own’ comic, as while many school mates were interested in racing cars, I was actually getting inside the factory, and talking to the people who designed and built them. Garry was a quieter bloke but very interesting to listen to, while Cliff was louder and I thought at the time, a bit of an ogre, but nothing could be further from the truth. Others were John Webb, the genius alloy body builder, Dale Koennecke who looked after the engines and built engines, and a smaller Italian guy named Ernest Littera, who seemed to me to be able to do absolutely anything, as well as Cliff and Garry, A younger guy was there at the time doing his apprenticeship as a fabricator, named Gregg Mobbs, and it was Greg who owned and raced an Elfin Clubman, and later designed and built the first seven of the seventeen Kestrel Clubmans, plus others who came in to do things, such a Bruce Wendt, a PMG Technician by day, but who also wired every Elfin to leave the factory.
As an aside, there are a few later connections from that period, Bruce also wired my Kestrel Clubman and of course Greg welded up the basic chassis for my Kestrel (No 7) before I took over the build with great assistance from Tim Rees, and I later used Dale Koennecke as an expert witness in a case I was appearing as counsel in. When I had Dale in chambers to proof him as a witness, he kept saying he thought I was familiar, to which I detailed my time going to the Elfin factory as a child. On hearing that, Dale roared laughing and said “of course, the workshop rat”! Apparently that was how I was explained to people who came to the Elfin factory on a legitimate basis.
I continued to do this for a couple of years, but schooling at St. Ignatius at Norwood got in the way, as I was never home early enough to get down to Conmurra Avenue, though I did drop in on a few occasions when I was on school holidays. From memory this would probably have been in about 1963, as I recall being about ten years of age at the time, and that would fit in with getting a bike for Christmas just before my tenth birthday. I recall that I probably did this for two years or perhaps slightly longer, as that would also fit with my going to St. Ignatius, so probably between 1963 and 1966. This would also fit with the cars I recall seeing, which were the Catalina/Formula Junior, Elfin Mono open wheelers, the first of the Elfin Formula vee cars, and Elfin Mallala sports car.
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… I’m sure many of us would give anything to experience first hand the sights, sounds and smell of 1960s motorsport, even just for five minutes. Paul, after being caught hiding in the bushes, got to spend his holidays and weekends in his formative years being small part of Australian motorsport history. We are all glad he didn’t sweep the floors too well!