1955 Ferrari 375 Thousand Miles: model n. 12 belongs to the Italian director Roberto Rossellini by Mario Savona
In 1955 Roberto Rossellini bought a model from the Modenese Ferrari car manufacturer, exactly the twelfth of the fifteen 375 Thousand Miles spiders assembled; at first, it was supposed to be shipped to Luigi Chinetti for competing in the USA. After a short time, Rossellini delegated the car’s restyling to Scaglietti body shop that completely transformed it from spider into a wonderful and elegant coupé. In 1964 I was in Rome and heard about a selling of Rossellini’s property, among which a Ferrari; I was curious, so I went to have a look.
When I saw that marvellous exemplar I couldn’t resist and though I was only a young man with limited available cash, I managed to get a loan for the incredible amount of 265.000 Italian liras, so I bought the above-mentioned Ferrari. Needless to say, I drove to Palermo though I haven’t got my driving license yet.
Obviously my father was unaware of this umpteenth madness of mine; one day he wanted to please me promising a FIAT 500 as soon as I’ll graduate. Now then! I already had a 5.000cc Ferrari parked in the street far from my parents’ look!
It wasn’t really a perfect car, as it lacked the typical little masks of the front and lateral air intakes; anyway it was wonderful to my eyes. I was passionately fond of it, so I bought some aluminium sheets and built homemade the missing parts achieving a considerable aesthetic outcome. One year later my jewel was stolen, and despite many searches I came to nothing. Eleven months later, I found out that in a garage in Naples there was a wonderful green Ferrari, very similar to mine. Obviously I rushed into the Neapolitan city; deep in my heart I didn’t’ think it was my beloved Ferrari, also because the colour didn’t correspond to the original silver grey of my car, and I’d never have thought that somebody would change its colour, least of all in military green. I can’t describe my feeling when I got to that garage and I saw my “baby”; the owner of the company said that somebody left the car to check the engine, as some water filtered into the oil, but never picked it back, so it was parked in a corner as it was left.
Once I took back my jewel to Palermo, I looked for a cheap and skilled mechanic who could repair the damage, but in practice it was impossible. After a few months I came to the big decision: I would have repaired it by myself, or at least I would have tried to. In a short time I was surrounded by a crowd of people coming to see this irresponsible and a little mad boy that got into his head the idea of dismantling, overhauling and reassemble a twelve-cylinder, six twin body carburettors and two magnets, having the overconfidence of making it leaving again.
After six months that boy succeeded in reassembling that splendid twelve-cylinder; I can’t describe my emotion in the moment when I tried to make it start again; evidently the car didn’t want, but finally my stubbornness triumphed and with the complicity of a friend, drawing the car with another one, after one thousand meters my ears heard again the noise of the racing car. Maybe only six of the twelve cylinders were working, but I was successful. Afterwards, with a meticulous setting-up of the two magnets, the roaring cylinders became twelve. It was a huge success for me.
In 1970, after the repeated requests of a close friend, I decided to sell my 375. I thought that commendatore Enzo Ferrari could be interested in it for his little private museum, so I wrote him a letter including some photos. I had the pleasure of receiving his personal answer, in which he said that he was not interested in the purchase of the car (Ferrari Spa stored up the cars that raced for its racing stable only); anyway, he suggested me a French collector as a probable purchaser, a certain Mr. Bardinon, which I contacted immediately.
After a long exchange of letters, on a beautiful day I received a phone call that announced the arrival in Palermo of certain Mr. Damagnes; in a few words I sold him my jewel for an amount that at that time I considered quite high. From this entire story I learned that it is wise to listen to other people’s advices but at the end you have to do off your own bat.
Today I keep the original wheel because I changed it with a smaller one.
