Australia Post Stamp, depicting replica of Capt. (later Col.) Arthur Waite's supercharged Austin 7 Super Sports. Many years ago I researched the possible location of the 1928 Australian Grand Prix-winning car, but the consensus was that it had been broken up. So I built a replica on the correct type of chassis etc, and had it painted. About this time Graeme Steinfort (from memory through Tony Johns) located from Sydney the motor and gearbox which we believe is from the original AGP car. I offered the car to Graeme who bought it and then with help from Barry Papps and myself got it going for the Historic Winton races that year, in a matter of 6 or 7 weeks. Graeme gave me the honour of competing with it first and I've had other drives of it in the intervening years. It is a painting of this replica that appears on the AGP 2002 stamp. Bill Sheehan

In January 1927, an event was held in Goulburn NSW that was billed at the time as the first Australian Grand Prix. But as it was held on a horse track, not a road circuit, and cars only ran off two at a time, historians do not treat it seriously as a Grand Prix. Particularly as, apart from enclosed circuits such as Speedways, races on the mainland were officially frowned on, in some States illegal, at that time.

The Victorian Light Car Club overcame the latter problem by organising a 100 mile race for cars, off the mainland. Using a road circuit on Phillip Island that had previously been used for motorcycle races, the Club proposed to run the event in two heats, each containing two classes by engine capacity, the maximum to be 2000cc. The winner was to be the fastest overall from the two heats. A week or two before the event, contemporary newspapers suggested that it had the stature of a Grand Prix. This was obviously taken up, as when in later years I interviewed the surviving drivers, they all believed that it was regarded as a Grand Prix at the time. Although the Program only says "100 mile Race", when the Club published it's results their headline ran "Grand Prix at Cowes a success". The race was run on 31st March, 1928.

Enter Arthur Waite. Born in Adelaide Australia, he went off to WW1, survived Gallipoli, served and was wounded in France, winning the Military Cross and being hospitalised. Whilst recuperating, he met a pretty volunteer nurse and later married her. Irene was a daughter of the motor-manufacturing giant Herbert Austin and shortly after Waite joined the firm.

Late 1927 he, with his wife, was sent to Melbourne to organise Austin Distributors. It was then that he heard of the upcoming 100 mile race and ordered a car to be sent out in order to compete. It was a supercharged Austin 7 - the only blown car in the race - was the fastest over-all, thus Arthur Waite became our first Australian Grand Prix winner. (The AGP is the world's second-oldest Grand Prix). Waite was later progressively promoted from Captain , so by the time of his death in his 97th year in 1991, his credentials read Colonel Arthur Waite, MC., OstJ., DL., JP., Freeman of the City of London.

He was the Foundation (and so far, only, ) Patron of our Austin 7 Club. Bill Sheehan