The appeal of Gordon Buehrig’s Cord, described in its patent application as a “unique and ornamental design for an automobile,” was and remains the sheer audacity of its modernity. It appropriated features like semi-unitary body construction, hidden door hinges, a front-opening hood, and concealed headlamps far ahead of its Detroit competition, to the point where the whole was so chock-a-block with revolution that it blew all else out of the water. Further, with its front-wheel-drive drivetrain, electro-vacuum pre-selector transmission, and potent V-8, it felt as modern as it looked. It was the ultimate driver’s car of its generation, never more so than as the dramatic two-passenger cabriolet.

The 812 Supercharged Cabriolet offered here is one of the Cords originally completed as 1936 810 models, and that, after remaining unsold, were subsequently renumbered by the factory and sold the following year—hence why its frame number does not directly correlate to the serial number in the usual Cord fashion, and the car is equipped with numerous 810 trim pieces, all perfectly legitimate in this instance! It was upgraded with a supercharged engine, likely early in life, as regularly occurred with numerous Cords.

Edward N. Van Kleeck of Berkeley, California, is known to have owned the car by 1952, when it won First Prize in its class at the International Sport Car Show in San Francisco. He subsequently joined the Auburn Cord Duesenberg Club as an early member, listing the car with the organization in 1955. Van Kleeck sold his Cord in 1960 to the famed Harrah’s Automobile Collection, then in the process of swelling into what would eventually become, by the early 1980s, the world’s largest and most comprehensive collection of vintage cars in a sprawling complex just outside of Reno, Nevada. Still being in good condition as-acquired, it was put on display in the halls of the collection more or less as-purchased, and there remained for a quarter-century in the company of Bugatti Type 41 Royales, multiple Duesenbergs, and other grand machines.

When the Harrah’s collection was dispersed in the mid-1980s at a series of legendary auctions, the Cord was sold as a featured lot at the first, in 1984. It was purchased at the auction by none other than William Cord Hummel, the 31-year-old grandson of E.L. Cord and a future president of the ACD Club. Hummel immediately dispatched the car from the auction to the Auburn Cord Duesenberg Museum in Auburn, Indiana, where it was placed on display in the famous original Art Deco showroom of the Auburn Automobile Company.

After fifteen years on loan to the museum, the cabriolet was sold in 1999 to the present owner, another longtime ACD Club member. Like many Cords, a marque where little was gospel for the entire run of production, some unusual touches were found on the still largely unrestored car. The original pleated interior, found intact under a later set of flat covers, had one more pleat across the seat cushion than was standard; the steering column and shifter stalk had original black paint, rather than the “correct” red, with the dashboard having been refinished to match before the windshield was installed; and the wheels were painted red—apparently from new. These features were faithfully duplicated during the restoration work, in which the body was refinished and the interior retrimmed.

Since its freshening the Cord has continued to be well-maintained and very well-loved, as a beautiful automobile but also as a faithful tour vehicle for its owners. It has completed four long-distance CCCA CARavans: the O Canada! CARavan in 2002, A Shore Thing in 2014, A Canadian Rockies Experience in 2015, and the Nordic CARavan in the South in 2017, covering hundreds of miles in each. In addition, it has occasionally participated in the ACD Club’s National Reunion, and after inspection there received its Category 1 certification in 2011, in addition to a Primary Second Place award that same year. When not traveling, it has been regularly enjoyed by its owners around town during the warm weather months—in particular, as one of the lady of the house’s favorite “drivers” in their collection.

A well-respected, much-loved supercharged Cord 812 Cabriolet that has never required full restoration, only the appreciation and excellent care of its owners, this car awaits future CCCA and ACD Club events with the next name in its proud history.