This ’50s Ferrari Formula 1 Car Is High-Speed History

The Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum is home to more than 1800 vintage vehicles. The majority of them-and also the main attraction-are motorcycles, but hidden in between and below are some of the greatest pieces of four-wheel racing history, too. One such example is the Ferrari 158, and just like everything else in the museum, it is ready to run.

George Barber is best known for the motorcycle collection he and his team have curated over the last 30 years, but his first love was cars. More specifically, racing cars. His own driving career happened at a time when many of the greats were rising, and that meant when Barber went looking for a crown jewel for the collection he knew exactly what he wanted: The John Surtees championship-winning Ferrari 158. Not only is it gorgeous, the history makes it the perfect fit for the museum.

John Surtees was a man of many talents, but at the age of 18, he forged a path into grand prix motorcycle racing. This was a natural path for the son of a motorcycle dealer in 1952. He quickly rose to a factory ride and won the 500cc World Championship in 1956 aboard an MV Agusta, though it came with a small asterisk due to the governing Fédération Internationale de Motocyclisme (FIM) banning Geoff Duke, the defending champ, for promoting a riders' strike over the money paid to racers. Surtees continued a dominant run, even as the manufacturers he rode for slowly bowed out of racing.

By 1960, Surtees had established he was not a fluke, and decided to try his hand at other motorsports. Where to start? Formula 1, as one does. He raced for several teams throughout the 1960s, but it was Scuderia Ferrari who came calling for 1963. It proved a fruitful collaboration, and a year later he drove the Ferrari 158 to a world championship.

It is a stunning car from a time when the cars were small and the risk big. The 1.5-liter V-8 sits just behind the driver, and while it would be tempting to pickle such a car for posterity, that's not how Barber thinks. Instead, the car is kept in running condition, as even with 1800 vehicles to take care of the museum is still well aware of how just sitting can rot machinery. The Ferrari gets out for occasional exercise on the Barber track, though at a much more pedestrian pace than Surtees would have driven it. Just seeing it running is a treat for most of us, though, and so we thank the Barber Museum for letting us hear that V-8 and for keeping it out in the public. Its next appearance, in fact, is this coming weekend at the Goodwood Revival as part of a tribute to the late John Surtees.