The main reason for my trip to Los Angeles started during a casual conversation with my friend Tom McIntyre during the Amelia Island weekend. We were talking about the Peter Mullin Collection of prewar french cars and how it was a shame how after his death about a year ago, his heirs had closed the museum in Oxnard, and were planning an auction to sell everything. McIntyre told me he had a special invitation through the Peterson Museum for one last tour of the Mullin Museum in a month or so. I felt this could be the last chance to see a collection of cars of this caliber in one place again, so at the risk of being too forward, I asked if there was a chance for me to join him on this tour.

Being a long time member of the Checkered Flag 200 group through the Peterson Museum in LA, Tom added me to his +2 which included his good friend Lynn Park. Mr. Park is known as “Mr Cobra” and has been friends with McIntyre for decades. Not only did I get a ticket to an exclusive viewing of the Mullin Collection, but I also got to tour it with these two interesting gentlemen!

The Museum was built with the inspiration of the Paris Auto Show back in 1937 and when I first saw this thoughtful design, I was immediately overwhelmed with a sense of sadness when I looked at the collection of cars, memorabilia, models, furniture, and curation that represented a lifetime of passion and work. All this was going to be dispersed by the end of the month through an auction and may never be seen in one place at the same time again. It became clear the Mullin Family was either not interested, or not capable of sustaining this collection into the future.

The cars were spectacular, but the the models of the same cars would have been an impressive collection!

The appreciation of pre-war cars was not the only thing Peter Mullin must have admired, as large collections of art deco furniture was also on display.

There was so much to see everywhere I looked, and things to learn about that I never had easy access too. Just like the Ferraris that I am passionate about, many pre-war French cars had racing history before they were known for their elegant street cars.

A few of the notable 1:1 scale cars had already been moved or acquired by other collections. I heard the Atlantic went to the midwest, and four cars were already obtained by the Peterson Museum.

I would have been very happy with some of these models! This one is especially captivating!

One car that I was glad to see was this Bugatti Brescia that was recovered from a Swiss lake over 20 years ago. Failing to pay the import duty at the Swiss Border after winning the car at a poker game, the playboy owner abandoned it and never came back to retrieve the car. Under law to destroy unclaimed property, the Swiss Duty officers sunk the car in a local fresh water lake hoping to someday recover the car. The plan was literally sunk when the chains broke, but the car recovered decades later. A charity auction eventually brought the car here to the Mullin Collection. Where this car ends up next is anyone’s guess, but I’m glad I had a chance to see such a notorious car!

There was so much to see and so little time that I recorded my visit. It’s just raw video of me wandering around the museum, but I wanted to document all this one last time.