THERE were thousands of old pre-war cars still on the road in the late 1950s, many of them truly unroadworthy.

There was no MoT test, and they were cheap to buy and run, with petrol costing just a few shillings a gallon.

Our first car was a 1935, Model Y, Ford 8 saloon and cost £45, a month’s wages for me in 1958.

This was the only fully-fitted car to be sold new for £100 and it showed in its specification.

It had cable-operated brakes, vacuum-operated wipers, and a low-powered engine with three-speed gearbox.

We considered it a triumph if we gained the brow of any hill still in top gear.

But we didn’t care. We loved motoring in our 23-year-old car although, for my part, I needed to adopt a somewhat stoical attitude towards its deficiencies.

Unless fully charged, the six-volt battery wasn’t man enough to turn the starter motor, so I usually used the handle to crank the engine by hand to start the car.

I remember stalling the engine one night at traffic lights in George Street, Oxford.

I tried the starter – no joy. So I strolled to the front of the car, cranked it with the handle until it started, got back in and drove off, all the while ignoring the utter chaos I had created all about me.

Driving a car of this age meant keeping your wits about you, ready to cope with any sudden emergency. One day, we were driving in High Street, Oxford, towards The Plain – always a tense situation, with wobbly steering and soggy brakes.

We had just gone past The Queen’s College when I noticed a smell of burning rubber.

Desperately seeking an excuse to placate my quite agitated wife, I said: “Oh, I expect someone’s lit a bonfire in the Botanic Garden over there.”

The starter cable had come loose, flashing across the engine and burning the rubber insulation.

From then on, my wife was always suspicious of any unexpected smells. Some years later, we arrived in our beat-up old Maxi for a funeral at Oxford Crematorium when my wife said: “Bob, I can smell burning.”

After a moment’s silence, I pointed to the smoke coming out of the Crematorium chimney!