It seems some people put their names on the list, but when their turn comes along they pass on the privilege of actually buying the car to some appointed other, for a small consideration, of course - say, either side of $2,000. Now, Peter Morgan could raise his prices, dwindle the long line, frustrate the speculators and boost his own profits considerably in the bargain, but he just doesn't feel like it. Like his father before him, he provides value for money while continuing to build what is, according to Thoroughbred and Classic Cars magazine, "arguably the finest sports car ever manufactured."
The Morgan Motor Company first distinguished itself as a builder of fast, cheap three-wheelers. These were hybrid motorcycle-cars that were popular in the early days of Britain's automotive age. Founder H.F.S. Morgan built the first for his own amusement in 1909. The company officially began in 1912, the same year H.F.S. drove one of his own designs to a world speed record for a 1,100-cubic-centimeter cyclecar - almost sixty miles per hour. In 1925, a Morgan set another record, almost 105 miles per hour, and the company was churning out something like fifty hand-built cars a week. Despite this success, Morgan made the move to more laborious four-wheelers in 1936, although, characteristically, cyclecars weren't fully dropped from production until 1950.
In the intervening years since that first four-wheeler, probably the most dramatic change at Morgan has not been in the cars themselves, or the way they are meticulously hand made, but in the list of enthusiasts panting to get them.
These cars are not quaint museum pieces; they can go. A Morgan Plus 8, the top of the two-model, three-style line, uses an all-alloy, fuel-injected, 196-brake-horsepower V-8 engine built by Rover. It can do zero to sixty in 5.6 seconds, which will make even a Ferrari Testarossa look pretty stupid at a stoplight. Above eighty, though, put your money on the Italian; the Morgan's dandyish, anachronistic lines give it a drag factor like a beer truck's.
This engine, though, and the Ford product used in the smaller 4/4 model do not meet emission standards in the United States. Since 1968, Isis Imports of San Francisco, the single authorized American dealer, has used a loophole to get in its yearly allocation of two dozen cars; it switches the fuel system from gasoline to liquefied petroleum gas. The inconvenience is balanced, says Bill Fink, Isis's owner, by the 110 octane available in propane and the muscular oomph it gives. With this and other mandated safety modifications, he charges $25,000 for the 4/4 and $32,500 for the two-seat-only Plus 8. In Britain, the plain-vanilla versions cost $18,700 and $27,200. That's a hefty premium. Yet an imported Porsche 944 Turbo, with much the same zero-to-sixty time and nowhere near the quirky charm, costs twice as much.
While it takes a hard heart not to delight in how Morgans look and the way they handle, it also requires a hard butt to drive them. Their independent front suspension, which is the same sliding-bar scheme used in the cyclecars since before the First World War, makes for a decidedly uncushioned ride. One mildly hyperbolic Washington Post writer compared it to "being dragged naked in a coal scuttle backwards over gravel by a cantankerous mule."
| Above, a nearly complete Morgan body in the paint shop (note wooden frame). Right, two new Morgans, destined for long-waiting customers, pause outside the "erecting shop." |  |
