Blanco Adventurer By John Hallowell How often do you see a Ferrari in a small Texas town? I’d have to say hardly ever, but J. Katherine McClure claims that when she lived in the tiny north Texas town of Justin (population around 700), the dozen or so Ferraris in her shop made it the town with the most Ferraris per capita in the U.S. Old-timers would chide her gently, saying “You can’t haul much hay in one of those.” McClure lives in Blanco now, when she’s not traveling the world, and the dilapidated barns around her (rented) old ranch house have occasionally housed classic cars worth over a million dollars each. This is her remarkable story. Born a fifth-generation Texan in the small town of Decatur, McClure might well have turned out to be quite parochial in her approach to life. But she had a grandmother who ran the local cattle auction and who never did anything exactly “by the book.” Katherine must have inherited her grandmother’s free spirit, because she was “always restless, always wanting to do something different.” She attended college in Denton, working as a wrangler in a local stable, and learned rock-climbing during the summer at Yosemite National Park. She met a young man (named Bob) in 1974, whose family was “into stock-car racing;” with his encouragement, she bought a beautiful a 1967 MGB convertible with a blown engine. Bob got her a shop manual and loaned her his tools, telling her “It doesn’t take a rocket scientist” to re-build an engine. She did it. “I was thrilled when it started,” she recalls; Bob then taught her how to properly drive a sports car. A little while later, the pair discovered a silver, 1950s-era, Ferrari convertible stored in a barn. They bought it, fixed it up, and painted it red. “When I drove it that first time,” McClure remembers, “it was all over. I was hooked; there was nothing like it.” She and Bob joined the Ferrari Club of America together, and took the car to a national meet. It turned out that the car was more rare than they had realized, and they were soon offered an amount for it that they couldn’t afford to turn down. With their profits, they were able to buy two Ferraris and had a little cash left over. One of their new acquisitions was a 1964 specially-ordered Ferrari coupe which had belonged at one time to actor Steve McQueen. The hobby soon turned into a part-time business, and they rented a shop near the railroad in Justin. McClure spent much of her time tracking down and purchasing old Ferraris. “I’ve had so many crazy adventures driving old Ferraris across the country,” she laughs. “I was in my twenties, but I looked about twelve, and when I showed up with a paper sack full of cash, some people just didn’t know how to react.” If one of their discoveries wasn’t roadworthy, McClure would drive a 1956 Chevy truck with a flatbed trailer. “I always had Uncle Freddie’s .410 shotgun with me, just in case,” she says. “But I never had a lick of trouble.” Over the course of about ten years, McClure estimates that the pair bought and restored about thirty Ferraris; they also did quite a bit of business in Ferrari parts. One of McClure’s jobs was corresponding with the Ferrari factory in Italy to make sure that they had the right parts for the right car. At one time, McClure received a letter from Enzo Ferrari himself, written in his trademark purple ink.
McClure’s work had an unexpected consequence. Over the course of dismantling thirty Ferraris, she became one of the world’s leading experts on what was authentic and what was valuable. So even after she and Bob parted ways in 1984, her skills were in great demand among serious collectors of classic cars. That year had been a bad one all different ways, McClure recalls. Her business dissolved and her house burned down, “I thought I was done with cars forever.” She had been climbing mountains and exploring caves for years; that year, she decided to go to live on the beach in Mexico. “It was warm, and far away.” She explains. “I lived in a grass hut on a cove (on the Pacific coast) and speared fish for a year. It was the best therapy possible.” Her next stop was New York City, where she, recalling the days when her grandmother would take her along on trips to Dallas to purchase uncut diamonds as an investment, decided to study under the Hasidic Jews at the Gemological Institute of America. New York was a “big shock,” she says. “I was still having trouble wearing shoes.” She worked as a “cater waiter” and a hack driver to pay her way through the school, then returned to Texas to be a gem dealer. (Interestingly enough, she met Jacques Vaucher twenty years ago in New York; he has since moved to the Hill Country, too, and was featured in the Winter 2008 issue of Texas Hill Country magazine.) Things didn’t go as well as she had hoped, and when old acquaintances from the car business began calling, she started a brokerage (“just me”) for “ old cronies with very special cars.” “In the late ‘80s, the market for classic cars had gone through the roof; like the art market,” she explains. “It was an investment.” When her collector friends started realizing how much their cars were worth, they started calling McClure to discreetly find buyers. Her expertise and reputation grew as she tracked manufacturers lists to account for every car built in the early years of Ferrari, Maserati, Aston-Martin and other prestigious car makers. “I realized I could make more in the car business,” she says. “ People wanted ‘important’ racing cars, and I knew where to find them.” McClure had never really settled down anywhere before 1993 (the only property she owns is a city block in a deserted Mexican mining town), but that year, she recalls, “I was snooping around for a place that felt like home.” She found it in Blanco County, and she has lived there (when she’s home) for more than fifteen years. And while she occasionally drives exotic cars on the county roads around her home, her everyday transportation is a 1992 Ford pick-up truck. In 1996, English car enthusiasts decided to re-enact the London to Brighton rally which Prince Edward had used to shine a light on the potential of automobiles a century earlier. McClure went along for the ride, which included Prince Michael of Kent, race car driver Stirling Moss (“We passed him,” McClure reports proudly) and others, all driving “veteran cars” and wearing period clothing. The next year, enthusiasts re-enacted the legendary Peking to Paris race of 1907. McClure couldn’t find a ride that year, and when the trip was repeated in 2007, her driver took ill and needed surgery at the time the race was run. Next year, she plans to accompany an old friend in a 1929 Chrysler Imperial in what she describes as the ultimate automotive experience. “The first 5,000 mile is wilderness,” she says, showing the route on a world map. “ If I make it from Peking to Paris, my career will be complete.” That doesn’t mean her career will be over. This year, she participated in the Flying Scotsman rally, from London to Edinburgh, an event arranged by the same folks plotting the Peking-to-Paris run. It was cold and rainy in the open cars, but they stayed in castles every night and had a wonderful time. “I would never be able to do anything like this any other way,” McClure says. “I’m fortunate to have access” to these people, these cars and these events. And now, even though she has a seat in the world’s ultimate road rally, she’ s looking for sponsors to help pay her way there and back. (She needs to get to Beijing a week ahead of time, then spend another week in Paris when the race is over before flying home.) If you would like to help, you can call her at 830-833-2351. Maybe you can be a part of Katherine McClure’s remarkable life story. _http://www.hillcountrymagazine.com/issues/20092/162.php_ (http://www.hillcountrymagazine.com/issues/20092/162.php)
