1953 Rolls-Royce Silver Dawn Sports Saloon

1953 Rolls-Royce Silver Dawn Sports Saloon

LSNF35 dates from that later series of cars with the enlarged stowage and increased engine capacity. The car was ordered new through J.S. Inskip by Mrs. Solange R Pew of Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. Mrs. Pew was the wife of Walter C. Pew, whose family had founded Sun Oil (later Sunoco) and funded the Pew Charitable Trust.

Her family's successful oil business afforded her the opportunity to buy an understated Masons Black with Grey coachline over Grey leather, headliner and carpet Silver Dawn. Nicely optioned with an automatic gearbox, turn signals, radio, pyrene bumpers, white wall tires, and sealed beam headlights, the Rolls was completed in the early winter of 1953 and delivered on Christmas Eve of that year—an lovely holiday gift for the lucky Mrs. Pew.

The Rolls would remain in the Philadelphia area for some time, in the 1960s with serial Rolls-Royce collector Dr. Leon Miller of Jenkintown, Pennsylvania and in the early 1970s with Karl Israel of King of Prussia, Pennsylvania. After Mr. Israel sold the car in 1971, the history is not known until it turned up in Yerington, Nevada—some 80 miles southeast of Reno—in 1982 in the ownership of 'P S I'. Eventually making its way to the Netherlands, it was acquired by the current owner in 2008.

The subject of an older restoration, during which the interior color was changed to sandstone beige, it looks to have been generally well kept cosmetically. On static display since acquisition, mechanical recommissioning is recommended prior to active touring and use.

Descriptions and pictures by bonhams & other