journalist or artist?
The story of Frederick Gordon-Crosby.
It’s the weekend. The race is won. The work for the press has begun. Frederick Gordon-Crosby, known to his colleagues as Gorby, works for the world’s first car magazine, The Autocar. He’s a true petrolhead, although that term probably hadn’t been coined yet in the 1930s. Even when he couldn’t attend a race, his colleague Sammy Davis would explain how the race unfolded, and Gorby would sketch the accompanying scene. Sammy would narrate, Freddy would translate—with charcoal, pen, pastel chalk, or oil paint.
But today, he’s present. Among the still steaming machines. The smell. The dust. The drivers. The racing goggles come off. Freddy reads their eyes. Fatigue. Pride. And, truth be told, relief. In his mind, he envisions the speed, the danger, and the thrill they must have faced. Speed—that’s what he wants to capture. No rush. He needs to submit the illustrations by next Friday. A little further on, Bryan de Grineau is sketching for The Motormagazine. He has to submit by Tuesday. Poor Bryan. For him, the race is just beginning. Freddy packs up his sketches and calmly races back to his studio.
Freddy knows many cars inside and out. Lately, he’s been creating a lot of technical cutaway drawings of cars. When he attends car shows, he unflinchingly captures every technical detail for The Autocar. This sometimes makes manufacturers nervous, and they try to stop him. At the Paris Auto Show, it went so far that the police were called. The gendarmerie let Freddy continue, as he wasn’t doing anything illegal. Besides, the work was stunning!
But now it’s all about the race. The speed. First in charcoal. Lines. Then in oil paint. Streaks, smears, colors—life on the canvas. Just like in a race, he keeps up the pace. A speeding blue racer tears through the hilly landscape, from a viewpoint no one has ever stood. Yes. That’s how he’ll do it. Frederick Gordon-Crosby creates journalistic art. And he passes his talent on to his son, Peter. Freddy remains employed by The Autocar for the rest of his life. That sounds longer than you might think. Gordon-Crosby had been ill for some time, and when his son Peter died in a warplane crash in 1942, he ended his own life.
The Autocar lives on. Years later, another talent appears on the payroll. James May, now famous from Top Gear and The Grand Tour, writes for Autocar. But not for long. Out of boredom and frustration, he creates a hidden message that you can only read if you string together the first letters of his articles. The editorial team feels insulted, and James May is let go. But oh well, that’s another story.
