Always Check the Barn!

A New York man retired. He wanted to use his retirement money wisely, so it would last, and decided to buy a home and a few acres in Portugal. The modest farmhouse had been vacant for 15 years. The owner and wife both had died, and there were no heirs.

The house was sold to pay taxes. There had been several lookers, but the large barn had steel doors, and they had been welded shut. Nobody wanted to go to the extra expense to see what was in the barn, and it wasn’t complimentary to the property anyway……so, nobody made an offer on the place.

The New York guy bought it at just over half of the property’s worth, moved in, and set about to tear in to the barn…….curiosity was killing him.

So, he and his wife bought a generator, and some tools. The doors were welded shut, but an angle grinder took care of that.

What was in the barn?

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Fiat Cabriolet (1200 or 1500), Ford Cortina MKII, Mercedes Benz 180/190.

Aston Martin?

Opel GT, Lotus Elan FHC, Lotus Super Seven Series IV, Lotus Elan DHC.

Porsche 356, Austin Healey Sprite MkII, Volvo PV 544, Ford Y?

Giulietta Sprint, Giulia Sprint Speciale (SS), Nash Metropolitan.

Alfa Giulietta, Lotus Europa, another Lotus Elan FHC, Matra Djet?

Lancia Flaminia Coupé.

Abarth 1300 Scorpione.

American (inspired) design.

Interior of Alfa Romeo.

Lancia Flaminia Coupé, Peugeot 504 cabriolet & 404 cabriolet.

Mini, Alfa 1900 Super Sprint, Balilla.

Fiat Topolino II, Triumph TR4, Peugeot 202.

BMW V8, Formula racers, Chryslers, Mercedes, Austin A30.

BMW V8, Formula racers, Chryslers, Mercedes, Austin A30.

Bloody WICKED
ALL UP VALUED AT $35 MILLION NZ DOLLARS.
THIS IS A TRUE STORY THE MAN AND HIS WIFE HAD FULL CLAIM TO THE LOT. THEY HAD A GREAT RETIREMENT.


Joe from Brick, NJ

I know it sounds cool, but this one is definitely fiction. This is what UrbanLegendsOnline.com found…

Portuguese Barn Houses 180 Cars, All Covered with Decades of Dust

Huge collections like the one in Portugal don’t just happen. Cars are accumulated by someone with a purpose.
Story on SportsCarMarket.com
By Tom Cotter

One day this January, I received at least ten forwarded email attachments to a web site that featured photos of an eclectic collection of old cars in a decaying building. For the next week it seemed the web was literally blanketed with these images, each giving a similar story:

“Imagine moving into an old farmhouse in the Portuguese countryside, and, while walking around “the lower 40” of your new investment, you come across an old building. Curious as to what may be inside, you pry open the rusted door and for the first time in decades, one of the largest hordes of old cars ever discovered is exposed to sunlight.”

I didn’t believe that story for a moment.

Huge collections of cars don’t just happen. Cars are accumulated—sometimes lovingly, sometimes not—by someone with a purpose. I was sure this collection was not assembled by accident; nobody would simply sell an old farm and fail to mention to the new owners the stash of old cars in the barn.

I decided to investigate. I searched the web and ultimately came to an English language dead end at the Mazda Miata Club Norway web site. But I kept going, sending emails in English and hoping that some kind recipient would take a few moments to answer some questions. All indications were that the cars were hidden somewhere in Portugal, so that’s where I focused my investigation.

Through a Cobra buddy, Don Silawski of Washington, DC, I contracted with a Portuguese translator, Clara Dixon. Clara would be my tour guide and try to unearth some of the naked truth regarding this huge stash. Clara also checked the Internet for news stories that may have been written in Portuguese newspapers about the cars. I was beginning to feel like a CIA sleuth…

I must admit that for me, a lifelong barn-finder, a collection this large would be the discovery of a lifetime. My 15-year-old son, Brian, even tried to convince me to hop a flight to Portugal to see if I could actually find the collection myself.

I was eventually able to contact the photographer who was contracted by the cars’ owner to shoot the photographs that would ultimately appear on millions of car-guy computer monitors beginning on January 20.

THE STORY BEHIND THE STORY

Manuel Menezes Morais shot the photos, but he was sworn to secrecy about the cars’ location and the owner’s name. However, he was able to obtain permission from the elusive owner to give me the following information:

The owner of the cars was a car dealer in the 1970s and 1980s, and decided to save the more interesting cars that came through his doors. When the barn was full, he padlocked and “soldered” the doors shut. (Perhaps welding was too permanent.)

Web sites varied on the number of cars: 58, 100, and 180 were speculated. According to Morais, there are 180 cars in the barn.

And, aw shucks, none of the cars are for sale.

Clara was able to determine that the cars are located somewhere in the area of Sintra, near Lisbon. I asked Morais if he could ask the owner if he had a favorite car. “He has lots of good cars in very good condition,” he says, “but he loves the Lancia Aurelia B24. He has two.”

I would ask that a European-based SCM subscriber pick this story up and help fill in the blanks. And let me know what you find (tomgcotter@roadrunner.com). I’d like to include the true story in a future In the Barn book, as well as in SCM.

TOM COTTER is a contributing editor to Road & Track. The sequel to Cotter’s book Cobra in the Barn, to be called The Hemi in the Barn, will be published by Motorbooks this fall.