HIS COMPANY might have produced some of the greatest cars ever made but Sir William Lyons was renowned for being tight with money. As former test driver, the late Norman Dewis, said during a 2013 interview, “Until you worked for Jaguar, you didn’t know what mean was.”
But in 1951 Lyons showed a rare moment of generosity when he gave his only son John a beautiful XK120 open two-seater for his 21st birthday. John loved the car and would keep it until his untimely passing four years later.
Despite later owners being spread around the globe, his XK120 survives, a lasting testament of the affection between a father and his son.
John Michael Lyons was born on 24 February 1930, three years after his older sister Pat and seven before his younger sister Mary arrived. He attended a local preparatory school in Warwickshire before going to Oundle, a well-known public school in Northamptonshire which had been chosen by his parents due to its historical links with engineering. This was then followed by a three-year apprenticeship at Leyland Motors.
When John turned 21 his father presented him with a Suede Green XK120, registered KRW 923 (chassis 660696), that he’d personally ordered for his son. The Jaguar replaced John’s first car, a two-seater Standard prototype, HWK 10, that was originally built in 1939. After being stored in the stables of the Lyons family home of Wappenbury Hall during the war, the car had been recommissioned in December 1948 by Jaguar’s service manager andapparently drove the by then elderly Standard across a still war-torn Europe to Rome and back.
