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The Shipment, Part 1

After acknowledging receipt of payment in full on April 3, 1962 - exactly four weeks after Nerheim contracted to buy the car - the Donald Healey Motor Company made arrangements to ship the car to Seattle, Washington, the nearest large port to Nerheim's home in Tacoma, Washington.  Part of that process was obtaining insurance for the shipment, and the Certificate of Insurance includes several interesting items.

 

First, the car was to be shipped via the S.S. Pacific Unity, presumably via a crossing of the Pacific Ocean, which only makes sense given that the destination was Seattle on the USA's west coast.  Not many Healeys made it to the USA via a Pacific crossing!

 

Second, the car was shipped from the port of Manchester.  This is interesting because the Donald Healey Motor Company factory (the "works") was in Warwick, and Warwick is roughly halfway between London, where the car was purchased, and Manchester, where the car would ship from, and there were 15 days between acknowledgement of the receipt of payment in full and the departure of the ship bound for Seattle.  This indicates that a stop was planned at the factory in Warwick. 

 

Third, the certificate specifies that the insurance originates from "Insured's factory in United Kingdom" - that would be Warwick, again signalling that the car passed through Warwick, and since the sale included the Le Mans Kit, it only makes sense that the kit was installed at the Donald Healey Motor Company before onward transport to the port of Manchester.    

Certificate of Insurance 1962 04 18.jpeg
Shipping Tag.jpg

An ultra-rare - last one surviving? - shipping label of the Donald Healey Motor Co., Ltd. showing the port of Manchester, the ship name "Pacific Unity" and the destination of Seattle.  In fact, there are two such shipping labels among the car's documents.

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