La Dawri Conquest, American hot rod sports car, like Devin Glasspar SCCA race

1960 Other Makes Description

This is a fantastic time machine example of an early American special sports car. During the 1950s, a number of small automobile companies sprang up, supplying the demand for sports cars and bodies that could be built and customized to the builders skills and desires. Glasspar, Victress, Byers, Devin, and La Dawri were among the top names. Many were raced successfully against the best that Europe had to offer. Aston Martin, Ferrari, Porsche, Jaguar, Maserati, Austin Healey, and many others were head to head raced with these cars. Some specials were built as boulevard cruisers and enjoyed on the street. This La Dawri was built in 1960 and is an prime example of a period hot rod sports car. A bonus of this car is that we have all the paperwork on the car since new including the mso for the body from La Dawri Coachcraft, engineer drawings and blueprints of the car, detailed mechanical specs, period paperwork, receipts, period photos, and more.

This car does not run and drive as it has been sitting for a number of years. It has been well preserved and kept dry and out of the weather. The body is in good condition, painted once in a green metallic, and shows no damage. The body was placed on a modified Kaiser Henry J chassis. The chassis is still in good condition and only shows a bit of surface rust and no rot or damage. La Dawri provided a detailed handbook on how to modify this chassis to fit the body and also how to adapt for mechanical upgrades. A Oldsmobile Rocket engine was modified at the time with Fenton headers, Gotha rocker arms, Jahns pistons, and a dual point distributor. The engine is currently soaking and does not turn. The engine is connected to a LaSalle 3 speed manual transmission with a shortened Oldsmobile driveshaft connected to a Ford rear end.
This interior was nicely finished with dark brown bucket seats and Stewart Warner gauges (including the highly desirable early 160 mph speedometer) A sports car type wooden flat faced steering wheel completed the look.
What is incredible about this car is that almost nothing has been changed or modified in the 60 years since it was built. The vast majority of these cars are left outside to deteriorate or have been modified beyond recognition over the years to keep up with current trends. This car is a time machine to what would have been the state of the art hot rod sports car at the time. Please look closely at the following picture link. I have taken pictures of every angle of the car including underneath and also pictures of all the paperwork.

https://beautifulsurf.smugmug.com/La-Dawri/La-Dawri/
Please do not hesitate to reach out with any questions. We work on and have restored and sold a number of these type of cars over the years. We are based in both the Atlanta area and St Augustine and this car is located near Atlanta.