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Yeaaaaa Baby!
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An
Austin gets its powers back...
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By Brian Lohnes Photos by/courtesy of Jim Oddy, John Cassiol and Brian Wood |
John Cassiol is a gasser guy. More specifically, John is a gasser guy from the northern reaches of New York State, and he’s a guy who appreciates history. You see, fine reader, back in the days of dinosaurs, cave men,
and the 24-inch crank centerline rule, there was a man who came
from Northern New York and took on some of the biggest names in
the gasser biz. That man was Jim Oddy and the car he once drove
to greatness now rests in the loving hands of John Cassiol.
It all started for John back when he was a little kid, “The guy who lived next to us when I was growing up had a gasser-style Willys and I was really fascinated by it when I was a kid. I saw an Austin when I was about 8 years old and I knew I wanted to own something like that when I got older.” That childhood fascination had turned John into a gas-o-holic by
the time he was old enough to explore his mechanical roots. Two words here, people - fateful decision. “One of my friends wanted to drive the car and I said ok. Unfortunately, we got into a real freak accident. It was not my friend’s fault but the car was a complete loss; it was all bent and broken.”
This accident is what spurred John’s quest for the Oddy Austin. “It was back in 1998 that I had heard the car was still around. I managed to locate it in Montreal, the only problem is that I can’t speak French and the guy who had it couldn’t speak much English. I did finally manage to find out that the car was sold to someone in Burlington. I figured it was Burlington, New York, so I started putting ads in the paper and looking for the car. “It turned out that a guy in Burlington, Vermont had the
car, but had sold it to another guy in Long Island, NY, who I also
eventually tracked down. I found out that the car, which had been
made into a street rod back in 1973, had spent time in Rochester,
Toronto, Montreal, Vermont and Long Island.
“When I called the guy in Long Island, he said that the car
was not for sale,” mused Cassiol. You have to love the way
John thinks, though. “I sent the guy pictures of my smashed
up Austin to try and get some sympathy. It worked, and he agreed
to sell me the car. The next problem was getting it home. My little
Ranger pickup truck was not going to make the ride, so my buddy
Jeff agreed to tow the car home for me.”
Being the astute journalist type that I am, I immediately asked, ‘how did you know’? Elementary, my dear Watson, as John described, “There were a couple of things. This car has a special cut-out in the trunk where the parachute was recessed into. Because of that hole, there would not be a trunk handle. Also, this car is not chopped like any other Austin I had ever seen. The way the chop is and the proportion of it is just right. Everything about the car is just right, and that’s how I knew it was the right car when I saw it.” So Jeff and John dragged the mistreated legend back home. John
checked in with his wife who was assuming that he would be getting
some sleep after the long ride. John thought about it and then headed
for the garage, “I couldn’t stand those motorcycle fenders,
I had to get them off right then or I would not have been able to
sleep.” Remember people, there is a fine line between hobby
and mental illness.
One of the first phone calls John made was to Jim Oddy to have him get a look at the car to verify its authenticity. Oddy recognized the car from 50 feet, even with all of the changes that had befallen it over the nearly 30 years since he had last seen it. It was during that meeting that John asked Jim if it would be ok that he restored the car to its exact form as Jim had raced it in the 1960’s. John said, “I know that sometimes people may be wary to put
their names on something if it is not true to the original. I told
Jim that I was going to do a real good job on the car and he would
be happy with the final product.” His goal is to get the car
back to its pure roots. “Someone cut out the cage and stripped
out the entire original interior. I have been getting those pieces
back. The car had Fiat seats in it originally and I just located
some in Ohio. I was going to have to get them from Germany and I
don’t want to think how much that would cost.”
One of the highlights in John’s resurrection of the Austin
was uncovering the parachute hole, or as they called it, “Al
Capone’s vault”. Acting on a hunch, John went at the
trunk lid with the grinder where the hole should have been. Sure
enough, he ground through a thin patch and hit pay dirt, the original
trunk lid was still on the car. Another original part of the car
was the glass. John was pretty amazed that the original glass was
in the car and in awesome shape.
Motorvation is currently provided by a Ray Barton wedge engine, obviously not the blown Hemi that should be in there. But John has that covered. He has gathered up a 392 Hemi, a vintage torque-flite transmission and even the original minin radiator that Jim Oddy ran in the car. By the way, John IS taking the motor to Oddy’s to be built. Fitting.
The car is not fully restored yet, but John is working on that,
“I’m just a regular Joe and this is a pretty expensive
process. I am taking my time and doing everything slowly. We got
so much good feedback from when we showed the car at the Hot Rod
Reunion in Bowling Green, Kentucky. It is lettered now, but the
car is in primer. People absolutely love it though. A lot of people
have many memories of this car and they all look it over really
close. There are some people I have to especially thank for that
Kentucky trip. I need to give special thanks to “The brothers”;
they know who they are and we would not have made it if it were
not for them. They are great people and that meant a lot to me.”
John notes that the car is not really intended to be raced. There
may be a few wild moments every once in a while when the car burns
rubber, but this piece of history is designed to be a show piece.
“I have so much invested in the car, and I don’t mean
just money. So many people love this car that I could never let
anything happen to it.”
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