Edward Ramsden Hall (17 July 1900 – 12 May 1982) was an English racing driver. He was born in
Milnsbridge
Milnsbridge is a district of Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, England, situated west of the town centre, and in the Colne Valley. The name is said to have derived from the water-powered mill and the bridge that stood alongside it in the 13th cent ...
into a wealthy
Yorkshire
Yorkshire ( ; abbreviated Yorks), formally known as the County of York, is a historic county in northern England and by far the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its large area in comparison with other English counties, functions have ...
family in 1900, the heir to a successful textiles business which funded his motor racing and other sporting exploits. He is famous for being the only driver to successfully complete the full 24 hours of the
24 Hours of Le Mans
The 24 Hours of Le Mans (french: link=no, 24 Heures du Mans) is an endurance-focused sports car race held annually near the town of Le Mans, France. It is the world's oldest active endurance racing event. Unlike fixed-distance races whose ...
race solo, a feat he achieved in
1950
Events January
* January 1 – The International Police Association (IPA) – the largest police organization in the world – is formed.
* January 5 – Sverdlovsk plane crash: ''Aeroflot'' Lisunov Li-2 crashes in a snowstorm. All 19 ...
. He lived at
Kirkburton
Kirkburton is a village, civil parish and ward in Kirklees in West Yorkshire, England. It is south-east of Huddersfield. Historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire, the township comprises the villages of Kirkburton and Highburton and ...
, near
Huddersfield
Huddersfield is a market town in the Kirklees district in West Yorkshire, England. It is the administrative centre and largest settlement in the Kirklees district. The town is in the foothills of the Pennines. The River Holme's confluence into ...
until leaving the United Kingdom on his retirement in the early 1950s to live, initially in
South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...
, later in
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
and then
Monte Carlo
Monte Carlo (; ; french: Monte-Carlo , or colloquially ''Monte-Carl'' ; lij, Munte Carlu ; ) is officially an administrative area of the Principality of Monaco, specifically the ward of Monte Carlo/Spélugues, where the Monte Carlo Casino is ...
, where he had an apartment overlooking the harbour and part of the
Grand Prix circuit. He was married twice, first to Evelyn Muriel (divorced in 1931)
and secondly in 1933 to divorcée Joan Evelyn Quarmby (née Goddard) who survived him on his death in 1982.
Racing career
Hall started motor racing in 1922 and was a prolific amateur competitor at many venues including
Donington Park,
Shelsley Walsh
Shelsley Walsh is a small village and civil parish in Worcestershire, England, on the western side of the River Teme. For administrative purposes it is presently located in the Teme Valley ward of the county’s Malvern Hills district. In the 2011 ...
, the Isle of Man and the
Mille Miglia
The Mille Miglia (, ''Thousand Miles'') was an open-road, motorsport endurance race established in 1927 by the young Counts Francesco Mazzotti and Aymo Maggi, which took place in Italy twenty-four times from 1927 to 1957 (thirteen before World ...
until his retirement in 1951. He favoured races that demanded stamina and is mostly remembered today for his multiple drives in the 410-mile (478 from 1933)
RAC Tourist Trophy
The RAC Tourist Trophy (sometimes called the International Tourist Trophy) is a motor racing award presented by the Royal Automobile Club (RAC) to the overall victor of a motor race in the United Kingdom. Established in 1905, it is the world's ol ...
on the (
Ards Circuit
The Ards Circuit was a motorsport street circuit in Northern Ireland used for RAC Tourist Trophy sports car races from 1928 until 1936, when eight spectators died in an accident. Industrialist and pioneer of the modern agricultural tractor, Har ...
) in
Ulster
Ulster (; ga, Ulaidh or ''Cúige Uladh'' ; sco, label= Ulster Scots, Ulstèr or ''Ulster'') is one of the four traditional Irish provinces. It is made up of nine counties: six of these constitute Northern Ireland (a part of the United Kin ...
, where he competed every year it was held there (1928 to 1936). In 1960, he presented a perpetual trophy to the
B.A.R.C. for the annual winner of their
Formula Junior
Formula Junior is an open wheel formula racing class first adopted in October 1958 by the CSI (''International Sporting Commission'', the part of the FIA that then regulated motorsports). The class was intended to provide an entry level class ...
Championship winner (later
Formula 3).
Ards TT
The Ards TT was brought to Ireland by industrialist and pioneer of the modern agricultural tractor,
Harry Ferguson, and was the largest sporting event in the area at the time, regularly attracting more than quarter of a million spectators. It took place on the
Ards Circuit
The Ards Circuit was a motorsport street circuit in Northern Ireland used for RAC Tourist Trophy sports car races from 1928 until 1936, when eight spectators died in an accident. Industrialist and pioneer of the modern agricultural tractor, Har ...
a closed road circuit encompassing
Newtownards,
Comber
Comber ( , , locally ) is a town in County Down, Northern Ireland. It lies south of Newtownards, at the northern end of Strangford Lough. It is situated in the townland of Town Parks, the civil parish of Comber and the historic barony of Ca ...
and
Dundonald in
County Down,
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...
. Like many others at the time it was run on a handicap basis so that cars of very different sizes and performances were able to compete in the same race, which although difficult for spectators to follow during the race did provide some close finishes. In Hall's first TT race in 1928, he drove a 2-litre
Lagonda
Lagonda is a British luxury car brand established in 1906, which has been owned by Aston Martin since 1947. The trade-name has not had a continuous commercial existence, being dormant several times, most recently from 1995 to 2008 and 2010 to 2 ...
14/60 Speed model, which ran out of oil and seized causing his retirement from the race just a few laps from the end. In the 1929 race he fared no better, crashing his supercharged
Arrol-Aster
Arrol-Aster was a British car maker founded in 1927 when Arrol-Johnston and the English Aster company merged. The Wembley, London works of Aster was closed and production concentrated at the Heathhall, Dumfries factory of Arrol-Johnston.
At fir ...
17/50 into Ards town hall. 1930 saw him driving an unsupercharged
Bentley 4½ Litre
The Bentley 4½ Litre is a British car based on a rolling chassis built by Bentley Motors. Walter Owen Bentley replaced the Bentley 3 Litre with a more powerful car by increasing its engine displacement to . A racing variant was known as the Blo ...
and finishing the race for the first time, second in class and twelfth overall. In 1931 he drove a supercharged 746cc
MG Midget
Midget (from ''midge'', a tiny biting insect) is a term for a person of unusually short stature that is considered by some to be pejorative due to its etymology. While not a medical term like "dwarfism", a medical condition with a number of ca ...
, again retiring with engine failure, but in the 1932 race in the same model of car he finished first in class and third overall. His performance in 1933 in a supercharged MG
K3 Magnette was similar, achieving second in class and fourth overall in a race won by
Tazio Nuvolari
Tazio Giorgio Nuvolari (; 16 November 1892 – 11 August 1953) was an Italian racing driver. He first raced motorcycles and then concentrated on sports cars and single-seaters. A resident of Mantua, he was known as 'Il Mantovano Volante' ( ...
.
For 1934 Hall asked
Rolls-Royce
Rolls-Royce (always hyphenated) may refer to:
* Rolls-Royce Limited, a British manufacturer of cars and later aero engines, founded in 1906, now defunct
Automobiles
* Rolls-Royce Motor Cars, the current car manufacturing company incorporated in ...
to modify a
Bentley 3½-litre, which they initially refused to do because the company had long since quit racing. Reasoning that as this car was a private entry failure would not reflect badly on the factory, and Rolls-Royce assisted Hall by increasing the output of his engine from the standard 114 bhp to a more useful 131 bhp. His wife was his "verry efficient" pit manager (although a private entry, Rolls-Royce supplied a support team) and in 1934 the Halls were both worried about the car's quietness and lack of drama or final adjustments before the race (the model was known as the ''"silent sports car"''; the entry had been prepared in the factory, with a non-stop 12 hours endurance run for the "slightly hotted-up engine"). A previous entry of theirs "had required four different types of sparking plug to keep it firing on its six cylinders". Hall came second, and after the race the team celebrated in Belfast, and
Ernest Hives
Ernest Walter Hives, 1st Baron Hives (21 April 1886 – 24 April 1965), was the one-time head of the Rolls-Royce Aero Engine division and chairman of Rolls-Royce Ltd.
Hives was born in Reading, Berkshire to John and Mary Hives, living at 31 C ...
put in a simple expense account claim ''"To champagne – £45''".
The car was the first competition car built at Rolls-Royce since the car built for
Charles Rolls
Charles Stewart Rolls (27 August 1877 – 12 July 1910) was a British motoring and aviation pioneer. With Henry Royce, he co-founded the Rolls-Royce car manufacturing firm. He was the first Briton to be killed in an aeronautical accident wit ...
which he had driven to win the 1906 TT, and it was also their last. The heavy Bentley was not ideally suited to the tricky street circuit at Ards, but when the series came to an end in 1936
Hall had accumulated 3 second places in it (1934, 1935 and 1936), each time setting the fastest race pace (78.40 mph, 80.36 mph and 80.81 mph respectively), and each time defeated only by the handicap system. The final version of the car had a 4¼-litre engine producing over 160 bhp and a 40-gallon fuel tank behind the seats, enabling him to complete the distance without stopping. He was one of only two men to have competed in every running of the Ards TT, the other being
Earl Howe
Earl Howe is a title that has been created twice in British history, for members of the Howe and Curzon-Howe family respectively.
The first creation, in the Peerage of Great Britain, was in 1788 for Richard Howe, but became extinct on his ...
.
BRDC
Hall was elected to the
British Racing Drivers' Club
The British Racing Drivers' Club (BRDC) is an exclusive invitation-only members club for racecar drivers who are judged to have achieved success in the upper levels of motor sport for a number of seasons. Except under exceptional circumstances, me ...
(BRDC) in 1932 and was awarded their Gold Star in 1933 for his performance at
Brooklands
Brooklands was a motor racing circuit and aerodrome built near Weybridge in Surrey, England, United Kingdom. It opened in 1907 and was the world's first purpose-built 'banked' motor racing circuit as well as one of Britain's first airfie ...
when he raced the BRDC 500 Mile Race in a
Bentley 4½ Litre
The Bentley 4½ Litre is a British car based on a rolling chassis built by Bentley Motors. Walter Owen Bentley replaced the Bentley 3 Litre with a more powerful car by increasing its engine displacement to . A racing variant was known as the Blo ...
, partnered by
Dr D.J. Benjafield, and came second on handicap. Theirs was the fastest car in the race, at 112.12 mph.
In the BRDC 500 at Brooklands in 1933, Hall drove a works
MG K3 Magnette with streamlined bodywork and with his then girlfriend (later second wife), Joan, acting as team Manager and controlling the race from the pits. Together they worked out a novel method of pit control, combining steady driving (calculated to enable the car to outlast its competitors) with a single efficiently-managed pitstop, and these two factors together allowed him to take a famous victory.
Le Mans
Hall had entered the
4¼-litre Bentley into the
Le Mans 24-hour race in 1936, but the race was cancelled due to economic conditions and labour difficulties. There was a swansong performance for that car, however, when Hall drove it in the second post-war
Le Mans 24-hour race in 1950, becoming the first (and only) man to drive solo for the entire distance, despite having a co-driver in the pits ready to take over. He completed 236 laps, which equals to nearly 3,200 km (2,000 miles). When asked by
Denis Jenkinson
Denis Sargent Jenkinson (11 December 1920 – 29 November 1996), "Jenks" or "DSJ" as he was known in the pages of ''Motor Sport'', was a British journalist deeply involved in motorsports. As Continental Correspondent of the UK-based ''Motor Spo ...
what the toilet arrangements were if he never left the cockpit for 24 hours, Hall replied "Green overalls, old boy!"
His final international event was in the
1951 Le Mans race, driving a 4.1-litre
Ferrari 340 America
Ferrari America is a series of top-end Ferrari models built in the 1950s and 1960s. They were large grand touring cars with the largest V12 engines and often had custom bodywork. All America models used a live axle in the rear, were front-eng ...
Barchetta. He completed 125 laps before being forced to retire with electrical problems.
Photography
Hall was also a photographer and published a book on the subject of Modern Figure Skating in 1938. The photographic plates consist of action shots of skaters (taken during the
European Figure Skating Championships
The European Figure Skating Championships is an annual figure skating competition in which figure skaters compete for the title of European champion. Medals are awarded in the disciplines of men's singles, women's singles, pair skating, an ...
in
St Moritz
St. Moritz (also german: Sankt Moritz, rm, , it, San Maurizio, french: Saint-Moritz) is a high Alpine resort town in the Engadine in Switzerland, at an elevation of about above sea level. It is Upper Engadine's major town and a municipality in ...
), and a combination of formal and impromptu portraits.
T.D. Richardson, author of ''Modern Figure Skating and Ice Rink Skating'', wrote in the introduction to Hall's book "it was highly entertaining to see Mr Hall laden with cameras and gadgets, prowling round the rinks, stalking his prey in the hope of catching a new or unusual angle or lying flat on his tummy for hours, so that he might get a single shot. Young skaters are often possessed of 'temperaments', but Mr Hall's patience and good humour overcame all difficulties."
Bobsleigh
Hall was a member of the victorious Great Britain two-man and five-man
bobsleigh
Bobsleigh or bobsled is a team winter sport that involves making timed runs down narrow, twisting, banked, iced tracks in a gravity-powered sleigh. International bobsleigh competitions are governed by the International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Feder ...
crews at the 1927 European Bobsleigh Championship in
St. Moritz, and also contested the
1928 Winter Olympics
The 1928 Winter Olympics, officially known as the II Olympic Winter Games (french: IIes Jeux olympiques d'hiver; german: II. Olympische Winterspiele; it, II Giochi olimpici invernali; rm, II Gieus olimpics d'enviern) and commonly known as St. M ...
in the Number 2 Great Britain five-man bobsleigh, finishing ninth overall and ahead of the Number 1 Great Britain team.
References
Further reading
* E.R. Hall &
T.D. Richardson - ''Champions all: camera studies by E.R. Hall'' (Frederick Muller, 1938)
* Ulster Vintage Car Club - ''The Ards TT'' (Blackstaff Press, 1978)
* Michael Ellman-Brown - ''Bentley - The Silent Sportscar'' (Redwood Burn Ltd., 1989)
* Alec Harvey-Bailey - ''Rolls-Royce - the Derby Bentleys'' (Sir Henry Royce Memorial Foundation, 1985)
*
* Debra Wenlock - ''Campari and Soda Bread'' (Linenopolis, 2003)
External links
''Bradshaw's Brae'' painting by Debra Wenlock*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hall, E.R.
1900 births
1982 deaths
Sportspeople from Huddersfield
24 Hours of Le Mans drivers
Bentley
Bobsledders at the 1928 Winter Olympics
BRDC Gold Star winners
Brooklands people
English male bobsledders
English racing drivers
Olympic bobsledders of Great Britain