A Porsche period piece

 Roger Putnam who has provided some choice photos for the blog from his archives over the years sent me the above photo of Porsche works driver Jaroslav ("Jerry") Juhan with Ferry Porsche in Austria. Roger's connection with Jerry is that he did the Mille Miglia with him in a famous competition Jaguar XK120 in 2005 -see photo below.
Jerry Juhan was one of the first works Porsche drivers. He started out his racing career in Central and South America.He died in 2011 at the age of 89.
The photo is rather charming with its period formality and the ladies in national dress.

As I am not into the detail of Porsche 356s I asked the local resident 356/550 expert,David Nicholls,to take a look at the photo to see if he could accurately date it from the cars. His response is forensic and straight out of PSI (Porsche Scene Investigation).

"The only clue from the 356 in front, is that it has a "Bent Windscreen", so that car is pre September 1955 when the "Curved Windscreen" was introduced.

The 356 behind Ferrys' right shoulder, has

'A' style bumper with low aluminium overriders. Late 1952 onwards.

Turn signals directly below the headlights. Introduced in1953.

Horn grills added beginning April 1954.

So the photo was taken some time between April 1954 and September 1955.

The weather looks quite mild, the people are lightly dressed and the distant trees are in full leaf. I think that you could take the Winter period, October'54 to March '55, out of that time frame.

In conclusion Your Honour, I would say that the photo was taken either, between April and October 1954, or, between March and September 1955.

I would imagine that both 356s would be from one of those periods.

These Porsche 356s, are known as "Pre A's" ".


Every picture tells a story.