Carmel Life And Times

Carmel Car Tales

In the good old days, guys like Dio Roberts would stand in front of a crackling fire on Carmel Beach, smile down on his moonlit buddies, and tell some of the wildest Carmel Car Tales imaginable. It didn't take alcoholic beverages to make his listeners roll in the sand with laughter, and he didn't have to exaggerate anything or slander anyone to get a hearty laugh.

When this gem of a car sold at auction in Scottsdale, Arizona, in 1974, it was the most expensive car sold on planet earth, triggering off a series of inspired auction houses. The family depicted, the car's owners, were friends of Dio, and told him the full story of the Pierce Arrow's manufacture and its provenance.

A gold plated Pierce Arrow Opera Coup.
(Photo courtesy of Dio Roberts)

Dio has a hundred Car Tales involving former prize winners from the Concours d'Elegance, current exhibitors, and our area's most colorful car owners. Each year locals and visitors call him up to meet with him and figure out a time when they can be thoroughly entertained with his Car Tales. Those Who Want to RENT A CAR, or just hang out with him and his friends (such as Norman), know just how to find him, and are assured that he'll have new yarns to spin that none of them has heard before.

A Carmel native (whose parents, Kenny and Dorthea, are as "Old Carmel" as they come), the gregarious Dio and his high school chum Norman Lausten caught car fever when they were kids in the fifties. Around the beach bonfires they'd give lengthy descriptions of the gems that were hidden away in the garages of Carmel and Pebble Beach. To that they'd add a catalog of all the quirks of a how a particular car owner spoke, dressed, walked, and even their unique expression as they drove around town.

Dio and Norman were thus the first to know just when any owner might be persuaded to part with their car, nearly always at prices that were even ridiculously low back then. They'd memorize the provenance of each set of wheels, and amuse their pals with glimpses into the private lives of the colorful characters who had previously sat behind the wheel.

That's Dio with his hand on the grill of a 1959 Rolls Royce Silver Cloud I, the last year of that model. The setting is the old Crocker Mansion in Pebble Beach, former home of George Stole who wrote the music for The Wizard Of Oz and many other Hollywood classics. When Dio bought the car as a teenager, the $5700 price seemed like a lot of money for a car, but today its sentimental and actual value is enormously high.

(Photo courtesy of Dio Roberts)

In response to his ability to thoroughly entertain any Carmelite with such impromptu performances, his friends urged him to drive down to Hollywood and make a fortune in the entertainment industry. Pretty soon he learned just what was in the best garages of Tinsel town and Beverly Hills, and just what owners would part with their cars for a song.

This launched a lifetime career in dealing in classical cars, making his recollections a living repository of Car Tales: A project that could never be summed up literarily in just one volume of memoirs, let alone this short article. Instead of writing this down by candlelight in his picturesque home on the Little Sur River, or in his place here in town, he personally spins his yarns to clients who rent these classic cars from his office across Dolores Street from the Post Office.

Dio drove this onto his Carmel driveway in 1967 for only $3200. It's a 1958 Bentley Continental Blind Quarter Flying Spur, with a fascinating tale even longer than its name. One of the gems built by legendary coach designer H.J.Mulliner, Dio acquired it from a Beverly Hills decorator named "Rose Petal." After he redid the car, it won a third place in the 1969 Concours. Rose told Dio that it was originally built for the Shah of Iran, who special-ordered numerous features, but never took delivery because both the air conditioning he wanted and the power steering couldn't fit together under the hood.

(Photo courtesy of Dio Roberts)

Thus, the brand new car went to Robert S. Salient, owner of CBS, who refit it to the tastes of himself and his "companion." The two men then leaned back and drove down Sunset Boulevard with the luggage rack sparkling away and the sun roof wide open. Both men had their initials tastefully displayed on the door. In 1972, Dio leaned back and took it on his 36,000 mile European Grand Tour, displaying a personal letter of introduction from Governor Ronald Reagan to European leaders, including the chief of the Rumanian politburo who previously allowed few if any non-communists into his authoritarian state.

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