It all started with Wacky Arnolt's unheard-of offer
Mark J. McCourt
10/19/2022
Photocourtesy of RM Sotheby's Auctions
The decision of Chicago, Illinois-based car dealer/accessories vendor Stanley H. “Wacky” Arnolt to market his own series of imported sports cars in the early 1950s had far-reaching consequences that would affect important players in the automotive industry. While little-remembered outside of marque-enthusiast circles today, his first such offerings—the Arnolt-MG coupe and convertible—were critically important to the Italian firm that built them.
The Arnolt-MG story began in late April 1952 at the Fattori e Montani stand at the Turin Motor Show; this Rome-based firm imported and sold the products of the newly formed British Motor Corporation, including MG. The TD-based coupe and convertible on display were built on spec by Carrozzeria Bertone, whose own nearby stand exhibited the wild, Franco Scaglione-penned Abarth Fiat 1500 that would inspire the 1953-’55 Alfa Romeo Berlina Aerodinamica Technica (B.A.T.) 5, 7, and 9, and was 180-degrees from the conservatively elegant Bertone MGs. S. H. Arnolt, in attendance at the show, shocked coachbuilder principal Nuccio Bertone by offering to purchase the two MGs, plus a further 100 of each body style. In this early postwar period when Italian coachbuilders’ traditional one-offs and low-series-production builds were proving insufficient to sustain business, that order was a revelation.
Photo by RM Sotheby's Auctions
On the Arnolt-MG Register's history page, registrar Tom Lange shares Nuccio Bertone’s own words in which he described building those two custom MGs in hopes of enticing the British automaker into a limited-series collaboration. Starting in late ’52, Arnolt and Bertone were able to secure the purchase of rolling TD frames directly from Abingdon for delivery to Turin and, subsequently, as finished cars to Chicago. Tom reports that MG delivered its last TD chassis to Bertone in May 1953, and a total of 103 examples of the pricey, slow-selling coupes (67 units) and convertibles (36) were built.
Photo by RM Sotheby's Auctions
There’s debate over the origin of the Bertone-badged Arnolt-MG’s body lines, but Tom attributes them to prolific stylist Giovanni Michelotti. Although the Italianate Arnolt-MGs shared precious few design elements with the roadster upon which they were based—a take on MG’s traditional radiator grille, TD disc wheels, and instrument panel/gauges were the most notable visual giveaways—they were veddy British under the skin. The TD’s standard 54.4-hp, twin-SU-carbureted, 1,250-cc OHV four-cylinder engine and four-speed manual remained in the MG box-section ladder frame, which also mounted the A-arm/coil spring front and leaf-sprung live-axle rear suspensions and four-wheel drum brakes. To that chassis, Bertone craftsmen welded hand-formed steel bodies with alloy doors, hoods, and trunklids, and installed leather-upholstered interiors (and, in the case of the convertible, a folding cloth roof).
The Judson-supercharged 1953 Arnolt-MG convertible (#237) and 1954 coupe (#293) on these pages are in the Texas-based Gene Ponder Collection. By the time you read this, they will have been sold, with no reserve, by RM Sotheby’s on September 22–24. Classic.com lists four public Arnolt-MG sales between 2014 and 2022, with three coupes averaging $74,000 and the sole convertible bringing $110,000. As of this writing, value guides suggest coupes bring between $40,000 and $100,000, while convertibles can command between $50,000 and $150,000; we’ll see if the Ponder pair set new benchmarks.
Photo by RM Sotheby's Auctions
SPECIFICATIONS
Engine: OHV I-4 with twin SU carburetors, 1,250-cc (76.3-cu.in)
Horsepower: 54.4 @ 5,200 rpm
Torque: 64 lb-ft @ 2,600 rpm
Transmission: Four-speed manual
Suspension: A-arms with coil springs/solid rear axle with coil springs
Brakes: Four-wheel drums
Curb weight est. 2,200 pounds
0-60: est. 20 seconds
Top speed: est. 85 mph
Photo by RM Sotheby's Auctions
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