Shropshire Star

Ann's trip down memory lane in Martin's Morris

Happy memories of Methuselah the Mozza came back to politician Ann Widdecombe as she took the wheel of a car first registered in Shropshire in 1966.

Published
Ann in the driving seat

Martin Robins, the 10th owner of the Morris Minor originally supplied by Ercall Garage in Wellington, arranged to take his motor to Ann's home on Dartmoor so she could take a trip down memory lane.

"Ann purchased her Morris Minor in her university days from her godfather for £70," said Martin, who lives near Chippenham, Wiltshire.

"She named the car Methuselah – a gentlemen who lived to be 969!

"The car was kept for seven enjoyable, trouble-free years and then sold for £300. Happy days. When she sat in the Shropshire Minor all the memories came flooding back. It was simply wonderful."

Martin has owned his Shropshire-registered Minor, GNT 541D, since 2007.

Ann had bought her own car, which was already 13 years old at the time, as a postgraduate student at Oxford University and called it Methuselah after a Biblical figure.

Despite Martin's comment it appears not to have been entirely trouble-free, with Ann saying in one interview: "Often I would drive it from Oxford to my parents' home in Surrey very late at night. Sometimes it broke down and I would have to pull into a layby while I worked out where the nearest phone box was likely to be. There were no mobiles then."

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