Monday mystery: a home-brewed Dutch special?

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Today's mystery photo comes to us from Hans Bramer, and it's the usual sort of story: we know where the photo was taken, and we could have a stab at guessing when, but we know nothing at all about the car itself. To begin with, let's just confirm the location: it's Bergen, a town in the North Holland region of the Netherlands at the shores of the North Sea. The town had a surprising motoring connection in that it was home for several decades to the Auto Union Museum, although sadly that closed in 2014.

Moving onto the date, we'd guess this photograph was taken in the mid-1930s based both on the appearance of the people and the style of the car. At first glance it looks like a two-seat sports body, but the woman at the rear is positioned in such a way which suggests she is making use of a dickey seat. The appearance of the bodywork could be misleading, though, because we're sure it's not original to the car. There's a certain crudeness to the bodywork which suggests to us it must have been an amateur job, and the wings stand out as being particularly unusual. Not only are they wafer-thin, they also look a little twisted so that the rear wing almost looks as if it had been crumpled in a collision. It seems to have been a deliberate effort on the part of the body-builder, though, perhaps in an effort to give the wings a bit of a rakish flare.

The non-originality of the body being established, it could be that the chassis is some 10 years older. The radiator and bonnet certainly look as if they could date from around 1925 or 1926, but this is where we're starting to struggle. We just can't quite place the radiator. Plenty of European manufacturers used radiators of a similar shape, Delage being one and Ansaldo another, but we don't think either of them are the right answer.

The problem might be beyond our abilities to solve, but it's still a nice clear picture and somebody out there is sure to recognise it. If you know what it is, let us know below...

Words: Zack Stiling; photograph: Hans Bramer
 

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