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"I doubt if Mike got more than £20,000 per year from Ferrari, and when he was with Jaguar we paid him a £1,000 retainer and he kept all he won in prize and bonus money"
Watching and reading about modern formula racing and the massive sums paid to drivers made me reflect on what took place in the 1950s when Mike Hawthorn became the first British World Champion racing driver.
Take the cars, for example. In those days, and even with Mercedes and Auto Union pre-war, the teams had only one spare car, whereas today it seems that at least one car per driver is required to allow for practice shunts or blow ups.
While some may think that modern drivers justify the many million dollars they are paid for risking their lives, racing is nothing like so dangerous as it was 40 years ago. Today's cars are almost indestructible - the centre section is immensely strong and when wheels, suspension and even engine have been thrown off in a shunt, the driver is still sitting tightly strapped in the 'tub'.
Added to this, circuits are surrounded by Armco and run-off areas, whereas in the old days none of these safety factors was there - but drivers knew that if they went off the road and hit a tree they would get hurt.
Thus in my opinion it is fair to say that the drivers of those days were more skilful than those we now see and I wonder how some of the modern 'ace' drivers would perform on circuits with no modern safety devices.
Apart from the safety factor, drivers were then paid very little, many of them racing for the sheer joy of doing so with money being a secondary consideration.
I doubt if Mike got more than £20,000 per year from Ferrari, and when he was with Jaguar we paid him a £1,000 retainer and he kept all he won in prize and bonus money. However, the most he received in this way was Le Mans 1955, when it amounted to £6,600 shared with Ivor Bueb.
In 1956 at Le Mans these two drivers showed their true worth when their car had been seriously delayed and had little chance of finishing well placed. In spite of the rain they said: "We'll have a go!" and, having lost some 20 laps, finished sixth and winning the handsome sum of £30. They were, however, happy that they had given their best even without payment.
Mike Hawthorn with Lofty England
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Mike Hawthorn in a typical pose with Stirling Moss
With Jaguar Mike was happy to do all asked of him whether testing, speaking to the Apprentices Motor Club or attending a works function, all of which he did without ever asking for reimbursement. In fact he shunned publicity for the good deeds that he did, and an article in a recent Jaguar World ('Jaguar Scrapbook, Vol 6 No 1) on the cars owned by P.M. Burnett reminds me of on such example.
At the 1958 Motor show Burnett had asked Mike whether he would go to Stafford Jail (where Burnett was the governor) to talk to the inmates one Sunday afternoon in January. These talks were provided on a monthly basis to maintain interest among the inmates in the world outside, and the speaker had to be someone who was right for the job.
Mike, a very suitable candidate, agreed but was killed before the time arrived.
Mr Burnett, whom I had known as a customer for some time, rang me and asked if I could help out by taking on the job Mike was to do. So I agreed and went along to find that I had to do my performance twice, since they could not have over 800 prisoners all together at one time - there were not enough warders!
Standing up in front of some 400 prisoners is quite an experience but I quickly found that cracking a joke got them on your side and there were always some Jaguar customers or chaps who had stolen Jaguar cars among the audience!!
That having gone off well, Burnett later became governor at Pentonville where I made a similar appearance for some 1,200 inmates. I also visited Maidstone Jail where the inmates had a motor club but without cars - they did rallies on paper!
In Mike we had a wonderful character - greatly loved by our mechanics and probably the best Formula One driver we have seen post-war, and one who on his day was virtually unbeatable - most people know that
he had a serious kidney problem and, when this was troublesome, not unnaturally he was not at his best.
What a pity he is not here today.
'Lofty' England
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