Brown Ferrari Daytona up for bid at Barrett-Jackson

There was promise in the early 1970s, even with dark clouds muddling the horizon. The death of Meredith Hunter at the hands of the Hell's Angels brought to light flower power's icky underbelly. Within 10 years, the Stones would become enamored of disco. Insurance companies had begun their clampdown on high-powered machines.

Still, in 1972, Roxy Music recorded their debut album. Black Sabbath loosed the mournful, ripping Vol. 4 upon the world and the Partridge Family released three albums. Fine, 1972 was no 1967, but, for a Ferrari man, it could hardly be called a bad year, for the Daytona could still be had. What's more, the Daytona could be ordered in an impossibly rich brown.

New York banker Howard O'Flynn took full advantage of the glorious opportunity afforded him. For the first 16 years of its life, the brown horse lived on the East Coast, then spent its 20's and 30's down in Texas. Now, at the ripe age of 41, this plum example of Ferrari's last carbureted front-engined GT makes the trip to Scottsdale, Ariz., to be auctioned off by Barrett-Jackson.

The winning bidder scores a 365 GTB/4 with a mere 9,769 on the clock. The winning bidder will no doubt rapidly make close pals with somebody who is very, very good at caring for aged Colombo V12s. That close pal will likely request very large sums of money. Still, brown Daytona. Even if everything goes wrong with the car, even if it turns out to be worst possible buy in the history of auctions, you've still got a brown Daytona. Which means that there's absolutely no way it could ever be the worst possible buy in the history of auctions.

Say it with us: “Brown Daytona.”

Now intone it like a hypnotized Lorenzo Music: “Brown Daytona.”

See? You're getting it. “Brown Daytona.”

Somebody help us here? We think it's stuck.

By Davey G. Johnson