Nov 26, 2013 - Sale 2333

Sale 2333 - Lot 292

Price Realized: $ 2,250
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 1,000 - $ 1,500
PROPOSING TO DESIGN, BUILD, AND MARKET HIS DREAM CAR STEINBECK, JOHN. Autograph Letter Signed, "John," to Howard Gossage ("Dear Howard"), reflecting on the mail received after the recent publication of his camping adventure book, Travels with Charlie, including a letter from a camper manufacturing company, remarking that such campers are designed for togetherness while his dream car would be designed for individual escape, and proposing that recipient and he design, build and market such a car. 2 pages, tall 4to, yellow ruled paper, written on separate sheets; horizontal folds. With the original envelope, addressed in his hand. Sag Harbor, 27 May [1963]
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"I have this morning a letter from the Rover Co. . . . --a Gertrude I. McWilliams . . . . She says and proves it with a picture that there is a Land Rover Camper. . . .
". . . Even the Land Rover says sleeps four, all the conveniences of a city apartment . . . . How different is my dream car. It sleeps nobody but its owner and perhaps a short term pick up. It is not made for togetherness but for escape. It is equipped to move about off the roads where nobody comes. It has a name not like camper but like Discoverer or Expectation Wagon. It will carry survival rations in sealed containers and enough emergency fuel for a long trip. . . . It is designed to get away. . . . People . . . are driven to the wall. They want to escape. My car will have a well-made inflatable boat carried on the roof and an electric trolling motor . . . . A boat signifies adventure and escape. My car would have the same message. It isn't made for dames. . . . Women have their hair dryer to run to. Men nothing.
"Mrs. McWilliams thinks I have some 'amusing' ideas. They are much more deadly than that.
"If Land Rover isn't interested in this whole new approach I may have to . . . design and build my own . . . . Togetherness has just about run its course. Aloneness is the present dream. What do you think?"