Picture Car Confidential #1: Action!
It is with great pleasure that we welcome veteran car columnist Jamie Kitman to Hagerty Media. A man of many pursuits (rock band manager, automotive journalist, concours judge, purveyor of picture cars for film and TV), Jamie lives and breathes vintage machines. His curious taste for interesting, oddball, and under-appreciated classics—which traffic through his Nyack, New York warehouse—promises us an unending stream of delightful cars to discuss.—Ed.
Some people own stocks and bonds. Others purchase art, annuities, and antiquities, while others favor precious metals. And many reasonable persons take pride in owning their homes. But not me. I own cars—41 at the current count—and little else, a fact I’m not proud of.
It’s not like I need or sometimes wish for fewer cars. It’s just that, as an exceptionally—how to say—well-seasoned automotive journalist, I could and should be realizing the tremendous savings that many of my scribbling compatriots do by exclusively testing brand-new vehicles 12 months out of the year. Fifty-two or more cars per annum which you merely need to fill up or charge, pay tolls/parking tickets for, and endeavor to keep right-side-up while not curbing wheels. Then, report your findings. Which I do, happily, after all these years.
But something went wrong in my youthful brain long ago, when, at age 14, I stopped buying 1/43rd scale Dinky and Corgi cars. From then on, pretty much all the money I could earn, save, or otherwise lay hands on was dedicated to the purchase, care, and feeding of old cars, antediluvian machines for which it is hard to find qualified people to service and often even harder to supply with parts. All of these lumps of mechanical creativity, of course, need a dry, secure home. Fifty years later, not much has changed.
The problem for me (and some very patient loved ones) is that each of these machines fascinates me. In a world where new cars seem to grow increasingly dull – notwithstanding their undeniable safety, environmental, and accelerative advantages – I generally prefer old cars. Despite their shortcomings in these important areas, many egregious, every old timer I own offers – to me, at least – so much more than a modern machine, with their anonymous looks and increasingly outsourced innards and engineering.
Older cars showcase their makers’ unique takes on how to get the job done. Different engine configurations, alternate visions of transmissions, suspensions, seating, gauges—each offer a distinctive assemblage of clever responses to the many tasks a carmaker faces, with the essential humanity of the machine’s creators rising to the fore. Automotive national character, once so obvious in the products of individual countries, has all but disappeared, a great loss. When we ask for bold styling today, we get the Cybertruck.
In 2011, when I had fewer than half as many cars, I was invited to supply foreign models from the 1960s to a TV show, Pan Am. Great idea in theory, not so great a show, and it was canceled in short order. But it occurred to me that the picture car business was one that might not only help defray the cost of maintaining all the cars piling up around me but keep me experiencing the joys of hundreds more cars. Other people’s cars.
Now, you may disagree, and, if so, good on you, but I’ve always felt, to turn an old truism on its head, that quantity is a component of quality. When I want a steak, I don’t want three ounces of architecturally plated beef cut from a cow that consented of its own free will to die young and gay; I want a big-ass steak that tastes good. Now, it is a fact that you can’t eat all the food, drink all the wine, or date all the women that appeal (or men, as taste dictates). But you can buy all the cars you can afford and, unlike children or husbands or wives, the state won’t take them away from you if you neglect them. (Homeowner associations excepted.)
I share these many machinations of the mind by way of introducing you to a new column I’ve been asked to write for Hagerty. With so many cars in my picture car business’ warehouses, and so much experience with them and the others among the thousands on my company, Octane Film Cars’, ever-expanding website, not to mention all the new cars that pass through my motor house, it often transpires that I am driving 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 or more old cars in a single day. So why not let the loyal Hagerty community in on the fun and adventure? And the misery and frustration.
The week isn’t over yet and I’ve already been behind the wheel of a 1936 Riley Kestrel 12/4 Sprite with a pre-selector gearbox, 2013 Mini ClubVan, 1962 Ford Galaxie, 1965 Peugeot 404 wagon, 1966 MG 1100, 1991 Mazda Miata special edition, 2018 Caterham 160 with Suzuki turbo 600cc kei triple, three different Series III Jaguar XJ6s, 2024 Aston Martin Vantage, 2025 Chevrolet Blazer EV, 1979 Alfasud 1.3 four-door, 1995 Alfa Romeo 164 Super Twin-Spark, 1967 Renault 16, 1983 Euro-spec Peugeot 505, 1968 International Travelall, 2007 Porsche Cayman S, 1962 Jeep CJ5, 1963 Morgan 4/4 four-seater, 2020 Mercedes-Benz C300, 1993 Alfa Romeo Spider, 2021 Ford Expedition, 1977 Checker cab, and a 1982 Citroen GSA Break Club. Oh, and a 1966 Econoline van which we sold. Plus a few others I can’t remember offhand.
People often say to me, “You’re living the dream, surrounded by cars.” I agree sometimes, other times not. I explain that I suffer from a grievous case of arrested development, my personality having frozen when I was 12, hence several decades of employment as a rock band manager and car magazine writer. The truth is, I remind them, there’s a reason YOU don’t own so many cars, and I bet it’s probably a good one. Which is why, starting now, I’ll be regularly chronicling in these pages the ups and downs of a life consumed by cars. So you don’t have to.
For now, I’ll leave you with these words. I don’t recommend emulating my lifestyle and what might be mistaken for my perennial financial planning advice—old cars and expensive dinners for two aren’t always the wisest investments. Friends, you will, in the months ahead, see why. From the all-night repair of a broken Kaiser-Darrin clutch fork to the search for a Rover 2600S’ fuel tank sender, or on an on-set repair of the shift linkage on a ‘60s Econoline van, there’s never a dull moment. I hope you will agree.
