In a small workshop in Australia St, in the inner Sydney suburb of Camperdown, lies the birthplace of the first V8 challenger for the Bathurst 500 title. Before Ford fired its first shots with the Falcon GT, Studebaker dealer Bert Needham Snr oversaw the preparation of a series of these V8-powered cars from the Indiana-based, but now defunct, American car maker.
Bert Needham Snr had been involved with Studebakers from the time he was 17, as a mechanic and engineer. Then immediately after WWII Bert Snr made some serious money by buying up war-surplus Studebaker ‘Blitz Wagons’ and reselling whole trucks and parts into an industry starved of tough, reliable trucks, to service post-war Australia.
Needham Snr became quite wealthy, and was appointed an official Studebaker dealer by NSW distributor, York Motors. That little workshop in Camperdown became the service centre and parts department, while a sales yard and showroom were established further west, at Wentworthville, becoming the biggest Studebaker dealer in NSW.
By the time the Bathurst 500 came along in 1963, Needham was the only Studebaker dealer left selling the American machines in Sydney, apart from Yorks. Bert Snr decided to enter a V8 Lark in the first Bathurst Armstrong 500 for Humpy Holden driver, Warren Weldon and his own son, Bert Junior.
Plenty has been written here in AMC about Weldon and his Studebaker exploits, but precious little about the enigmatic, flamboyant and devil-may-care Bert Needham junior.
The younger Needham had been schooled at the exclusive Newington College in Stanmore, but his main interest in life was his Dad’s Studebaker dealership – and in particular the workshops at 71 Australia St. The Camperdown premises was always packed with American iron from South Bend, Indiana, the HQ of the Studebaker Packard Corporation.
Bert Jnr was a tall and handsome sports star at Newington, and when he left school he went to work with his Dad at Needham’s Motors, doing an apprenticeship as a mechanic, working on the Studebakers in the
