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Vintage dealership pics?

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TR3driver said:
AlWallace said:
triumphdealer.jpg
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Thanks for the photos, Al! Any idea where this one was located ?
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Los Gatos, CA "found on Flickr after web search"


Ken Keegan's dealership is long gone, but the building is currently the site of Silicon Valley Auto Group, an exotic car dealership (Bugatti, Bentley, Lamborghini, etc.). See a recent picture of it elsewhere on my photostream with a Bugatti in the showroom. Ken Keegan sold the more moderately priced Triumph, Volvo, Sunbeam, and BMW.
 
Thanks, guys.
 
Geo-

Nice! I did a quick internet check for Alamo Sportscars and the name anyway is still in use in the area. And I was all excited since they said they dealt with Triumphs. Except now they are motorcycles. Makes me wonder if there is a link - but I also suspect a lot of things were called Alamo around there!

Randy
 
Brosky said:
Randall, it was in Los Gatos:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/autohistorian/3685829888/

EDIT: OOPS, I snoozed for 15 seconds before hitting enter
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Well, what do you know! I thought I recognized the building! I work in Los Gatos and grew up here! Now there's a big awning covering the outdoors parking. I don't remember back when it was Ken Keegan motor cars but for many years it was Ferrari of Los Gatos. I should go snoop around and see if there are any Triumph signs lying around!

What year would this have been based on the latest model there? I'm guessing this was probably about the year I was born ('66).
 
John_Mc said:
What year would this have been based on the latest model there? I'm guessing this was probably about the year I was born ('66).
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Those look like TR4's and not TR4A's and there's still a TR3 on lot so I would guess 1962-1964.

Scott
 
I wish I had pictures from my first dealership job back in PA at a dealer called Pristow's Motor City. It later became Dewar's Car World and we dropped Triumph in 1969. We still serviced them, but no longer sold them.
 
Looking at the pics has changed my understanding - I thought there were a lot of Triumph only type dealerships - but were most broader foreign car dealers with multiple brands on the lot?
 
I started with Olds, Rambler, which soon became American Motors, Jeep, Triumph, Peugeot, Renault. Within five years Triumph was gone, but Nissan was in with it's own building and a few years later Mercury.

The dealership in RI that sold my wife our TR6 had Triumph, Jag, AH and MG and that was in 1974. They are still twin Jag and Rover in two different locations.
 
In Bakersfield, CA, 1981, the local dealership (where I attempted to buy parts for my 4A, they really were not interested for some reason) was Jaguar, Triumph and ... Subaru! When Triumph went out of business, for some reason the Subaru dealership moved to the Porsche/Audi dealer.
 
What are these amazing places called "dealerships" that Triumphs and other cars came from? :crazy:

I was ten when they more or less went away and have no memory of them. I've been dying to see a picture of Jack Pickard Imports in Greensboro, NC, from the 60s(?) and 70s. I should probably actually start looking for one...

My best recollections come from the used car lots of the mid- to late-80s, the independent foreign car parts stores (B&M in High Point), and junkyards (Anybody remember Ulah junkyard in central NC?).

Seriously, please keep sharing your experiences and more photos if you've got 'em!! Good stuff. :thumbsup:
 
Here is CJ Motors, which was on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley, CA. I worked there on Saturdays while I was going to JC. I'll never forget the time I took the tires off a Lotus Cortina, with a rubber hammer and tire iron, and bending the cr*p out of the wheels, as they were aluminum. John Bolander raced a Cortina, which was stored in the back of the shop the year after he raced it. And then there was the TR4 into the telephone pole....and I was NOT driving.
Scott in CA
 

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