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After three months of no takers, to keep them from going into a scrap pile, I purchased both of them. I discovered that the largest one was a 30 horse Stanley just like the engine that broke the land speed record in 1906 at 127 miles an hour. At that time, being a newcomer to steam, I didn't realize the value of the 30 horse engine until I tried to sell them. No one seemed interested in the smaller 20 horse, just the 30 horse engine. People told me that, it was the largest engine that Stanley ever put into their cars and that there were only a handful of these left in the world. The 30 would have been sold, but the buyers insisted, that as an engine, it was only of scrap value and that they would only buy it for the salvage of the "few good parts that it had". Having been in sales for years, I seen right through these deceptive lines and decided not to sell it at any price. My wife was in full agreement , as for someday we might find something that we could put it into.
Years past by while we drove our little 1914 10 H.P. Stanley roadster all over creation. We realized that someday we would like a powerful touring to haul our grandkids, as we never had room in the little roadster for them. Mentioning to several people of our desire to acquire a larger pre '16 Stanley touring, we looked years for one. Finally, giving up all hopes of buying a pre '16, we bought Gordon Sullivan's beautiful and original 1922 Stanley model 735 B Touring.
In November, 1997, the Mediterranean Shipping Company's "Carla", a 27 year old 57,211 ton container ship was bound to the United States from the container port of Felixstone, England. Off the coast of Portugal, loosing it's steering in gale force winds, it turned sideways and broke in half with the front end sinking into the Atlantic ocean into the black depths of 2,000 feet deep water. The front half carried most of it's containers. In one of these containers was Brent Campbell's beautiful 1904 CX Stanley, his recently acquired rear axle for a Model K Stanley and sharing the container was Norm Shanklin's 1911, 30 H.P. Stanley engine and his 30 H.P. engined rear axle. Norm Shanklin was building up a 1911 Stanley model 85, 7 passenger touring and to complete his Stanley, these parts were returning from John Goold's Stearn Restorations shop in Avon of the United Kingdom.
After searching for two months to replace the engine, Norm Shanklin contacted me about the availability of my engine. He said, "since there isn't another 30 horse engine around that is available, either you sell me your engine, or you buy my 30 horse Stanley touring." Knowing that the sale of our engine was "no", I elected to buy his touring. After two weeks of negotiating, we had arrived at a price and the touring is now going back together.
Our 1911 Stanley, model 85, 7 passenger touring, which lost it's engine to the Atlantic Ocean, is now having it's engine replaced by one that has survived the Pacific Ocean. This 1911 touring has earned the title of "From Sea to Shinning Sea."