You’ll have seen from several entries on this page that Jaguar’s legendary Chief Test Engineer, from 1952 to 1986, Norman Dewis, has at long last been honoured with an OBE. This recognition is a well deserved and long overdue - in fact I think he should have been knighted. To read about his full and fascinating life at Jaguar I’ll point you in the direction of his autobiography “Developing the Legend” co-written with well-known Jaguar historian, Paul Skilleter. I first met Norman in about 1987 which was a year or so after he’d retired from Jaguar. I was organising a Jaguar Day at Attingham Park in Shropshire and one of my work colleagues asked if I’d thought of asking Norman, who lived fairly close by, to present the trophies. Like most other people, I had never heard of Norman in 1987. Nonetheless I found his number in the ‘phone book gave him a call and have stayed in touch ever since. Shortly after presenting the trophies he came to one of our monthly meetings to give a talk. He arrived with quite a few pages of neatly written notes and began by reading from the notes in a fairly mechanical fashion ... about 10 minutes in it became apparent that the notes were a bit of hindrance and he started speaking from memory ... it was a superb evening. Since then I have attended any number of presentations given by Norman and they are always informative and entertaining. Our paths have crossed many times since 1987 and at his 90th birthday party, hosted by Jaguar at Castle Bromwich in 2010, I was asked to say a few words on behalf of the JDC. I told them it was a privilege to know Norman and to have been able to spend time with him but more than the fact that I could call him my friend was a much greater privilege. So congratulations Norman – we owe you more than we know. Well done. The album attached is collected from a few of the occasions when I’ve encountered Norman in the last 10 years.
Posted on: Fri, 02 Jan 2015 01:45:02 +0000
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