Memoirs of Giochino Colombo, edited by Valcrio Morctti

Today Ferrari has become a “legend”,  one of the few contemporary legends  unanimously recognised all over the  world. The beginnings of this legend,  the hesitant and difficult steps taken by  Ferrari in the first years of its activity,  are recalled here, accurately and calmly,  by Gioachino Colombo, the young  technician to whom Enzo Ferrari  entrusted the realisation of his dreams  as a maker of cars.  The brief period which Gioachino  Colombo spent with Ferrari was only  one episode in a long and successful  career as a designer of Grand Prix  vehicles: before moving to Ferrari, he  had designed the celebrated /l/fella, and  after Ferrari he was to design the last  Bugatti and the Maserati with which  Fangio won the World Championship.  However, it was his twelve-cylinder  engine, adventurously designed for  Ferrari in the bedroom of his lodgings  in Milan, that guaranteed Colombo a  place in the front rank of the history of  motoring.  This volume is edited by Valerio  Moretti, one of the leading Italian  motoring historians.        Gioachino Colombo (born Legnano I903)  was one of the most famous designers of  Grand Prix cars. Trained in the school of another very famous designer, Vittorio  Jano, be became his principal collaborator,  building all the most famous Alfa Romeos  for Jano.  Colombo ’s first project in his  own right was the Alfetta, the single seater Grand  Prix built in Modena together with Enzo  Ferrari. After the war he was invited by  Ferrari to design the  famous twelve-  cylinder engine, which made the fortunes of the Maranello firm; its eventful history is recorded in this book.  Later he again worked for Alfa  Romeo as well as Bugatti, Maserati, Arbath, Mercedes-Benz and Osca: He   designed engines for cars, motorcycles, and  helicopters, remaining active as a designer  until the end of the seventies.  Mr. Colombo died in Milan, in 1987.  Valcrio Morctti (born Rome I935) is an  arcliitect and freelance writer