Randy, in the photo from 1978 the registration number appears to be an English one for the year 1971. Whats the story?
Those plates were put on by the late Ray Caivano, proprietor of Austin-Healey West in San Francisco. There were some English cars in the shop too, so they may have been reappropriated for
display purposes on the Healey. While they were on the car when I took delivery, I knew he wanted them back and were not considered part of the sale.**
I will say though, the ticket I received when the Healey was left double-parked down in SF's Financial District never did find its way to my address (Diplomatic Immunity, lol!).
** Later that year when Ray & Jo-Anne made a trip to Paris and London, he had an authentic set of UK plates made for me "
BN6 042" to compensate for not getting the
AWK set. The front one was damaged in that little scrape I had with the side of a mountain down in Woodside, California, but I still have the one that was fitted to the rear up front in the clean garage.
So
the story isn't really much of one