JETTISONED JOWETTS

Several years ago, I found a battered book in a secondhand bookshop called “The Cars that got away”, by Michael Frostick, published in 1968. Amongst the unfamiliar exotic sportscars and luxury saloons, the vehicles that particularly caught my eye were three modest, slightly bulbous prototypes with typical early-50s styling, a pickup, a “station wagon” and a twodoor saloon.

These were captioned as “three versions of the 1950 two-cylinder Jowett Type CD.” According to the book, “Jowetts themselves, although still in existence, can say no more than that details and drawings of this prototype, together with its technical data, have become misplaced or destroyed.”

I assumed that the prototypes must also have long since been forgotten and scrapped. I put the book on the shelf, but remained intrigued by the vehicles.

The Jowett CD was to have been a development of the Bradford van. The utilitarian Bradford, introduced in early