1962 Ferrari 400 Superamerica LWB Coupe Aerodinamico by Pininfarina

1962 Ferrari 400 Superamerica LWB Coupe Aerodinamico by Pininfarina
SOLD For Sold for $4,400,000 Including Commission
RM/ Sotheby's Auction, Amelia Island, FL. 2016
RM/Sotheby's Top Sale Of Amelia Island 2016
Chassis no. 3949 SA
Engine no. 56 SA
340 bhp, 3,967 cc SOHC V-12 engine with three Weber 40 DCZ 6 carburetors, four-speed manual transmission with overdrive, independent front suspension with unequal-length A-arms and coil springs, live rear axle with semi-elliptic leaf springs and parallel trailing arms, and four-wheel hydraulic disc brakes. Wheelbase: 102.3 in.
•The 1962 Turin Automobile Show car
•A factory covered-headlamp example with numerous special-order features
•Originally delivered to American sportsman Erwin Goldschmidt
•Well-known ownership history; only four family owners from new
ERWIN GOLDSCHMIDT AND HIS FERRARI
Goldschmidt was impressively wealthy, his father having been a German banker who fled to the United States in 1933. He was a talented racing driver, famously winning the Watkins Glen Grand Prix behind the wheel of an Allard in 1950 and going on to other successes in his Ferrari 375 MM and, later, a 375 Plus. He was a bookish perfectionist of mercurial personality, who insisted upon the best of everything in life and who pursued his goals relentlessly. Uneased by the Nazis’ requisition and subsequent sale of his family’s impressive art collection, he spent decades on the hunt and in and out of courtrooms, acquiring the pieces back—and then sold them at Sotheby’s for numbers that are still impressive.
He was, in short, exactly the sort of iconoclastic personality for which a 400 Superamerica was a perfect fit. And so, perhaps unsurprisingly, in December of 1962 he took delivery of chassis number 3949 SA, in Davos, Switzerland, with the car having been driven out to the vacationing Goldschmidt clan from Modena by a factory test driver, accompanied, it is said, by several logs of its new owner’s favorite Italian salami, a gift from Enzo Ferrari.
Chassis number 3949 SA was already a car familiar to the relatively young scene of tifosi, having been shown on the Pininfarina stand at the 1962 Turin Automobile Show. It had been ordered directly through Dr. Amerigo Manicardi, director of sales in Maranello, and in typical fashion, Goldschmidt had specified many details of its finish. The car was to be painted Rosso Cina with black upholstery and matching black-faced gauges; two pieces of fitted luggage were supplied for the rear parcel shelf, and a leather bolster was added between the front seats, as a saddle of sorts for the Goldschmidt children. Mrs. Goldschmidt requested an alloy grab handle on the passenger side, as well as red trim to the upholstery. Competition-style covered headlights were specified, as were Marchal driving lights and, most significantly, extractor vents in the lower rear fenders, which serve as this car’s instant unique identifying characteristic. From the rear, SNAP exhaust extractors produced a glorious noise, indeed.
Perhaps because of its one-off characteristics for a special client, chassis number 3949 SA was used not only as a showpiece but also for Pininfarina publicity photography, which appeared in the 1962–63 edition of Automobile Year and subsequently in Angelo Tito Anselmi’s La Ferrari di Pininfarina.
Then delivered to Davos, the 400 Superamerica accompanied Erwin Goldschmidt and his family for some 1,300 miles of European touring and then was serviced at the factory before accompanying them to the United States. Upon its arrival here, it would be enjoyed by its gentleman owner for the remaining 17 years of his much-too-short life, mostly as a weekend driver but also for events of the nascent Ferrari Club of America, including the 1967 meeting and concours at the Showboat Inn in Greenwich, Connecticut.
MODERN HISTORY
Following Mr. Goldschmidt’s passing in 1970, the 400 Superamerica was taken over by his son, Anthony, who had so often ridden on its center bolster as a child. Subsequently driven to his own home in California—a cross-country trip no doubt of thrills aplenty!—it was entrusted in 1977 to renowned Ferrari specialist Bill Rudd for a complete mechanical and cosmetic restoration, lasting over six months. Later, in the fall of 1979, it graced the cover of Cavallino magazine’s 7th issue and was the subject of a feature article within by Ferrari historian Allen Bishop, humbly titled “The Greatest Beast of Them All.”
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Robert Myrick Photography