Exotic Car Marketplace

On Ferrari Friday’s, William Ross from the Exotic Car Marketplace will be discussing all things Ferrari and interviewing people that live and breathe the Ferrari brand. Topics range from road cars to racing; drivers to owners, as well as auctions, private sales and trends in the collector market.

• 00:00 Introduction to the Show
• 02:04 Celebrating Women’s History Month
• 02:11 The Enigmatic Laura Ferrari
• 03:35 Early Relationship with Enzo
• 05:18 Marriage and Early Challenges
• 07:29 Laura’s Increasing Involvement in Ferrari
• 11:23 The Palace Revolt and Aftermath
• 15:07 Laura’s Legacy in Ferrari
• 17:45 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

[00:00:00] As part of Ferrari Fridays, William Ross from the Exotic Car Marketplace will be discussing all things Ferrari and interviewing people that live and breathe the Ferrari brand. Topics range from road cars to racing, drivers to owners, as well as auctions, private sales, and trends in the collector market.

Welcome back to the Ferrari Marketplace Podcast. I’m your host, William Ross. Thanks for listening. I really appreciate the support. I’d like to give a shout out to a few of our sponsors and supporters before we jump into things here. I want to give a shout out to the Exotic Car Marketplace. For everything exotic cars from Ferrari, Porsche, Lamborghini, and Koenigsegg, check out ExoticCarMarketplace.

com for all your exotic car needs before, after, and during ownership. The Motoring Podcast Network. Check out the family of automotive podcasts at motoringpodcast. net. If you’re into anything with wheels and a motor, this is the site to [00:01:00] check out. Check out slotmods. com. Let your imagination run wild with what they could build for you in these outrageous and beautiful and minutely detailed slot car tracks.

And finally, to Grand Touring Motorsports covering all aspects of auto racing, be sure to check out the monthly e zine at gtmotorsports. org. All the links are posted up in the description. And I’d also like to kind of give a heads up to everyone. Our second annual Rockin Revs Automotive Festival happening here in Fairview Park, Ohio on July 27th.

This event is put together to help raise money for two near and dear things to my heart. One is ACBC, known as Aluminum Cans for Burned Children. Who raised money to support pediatric burn survivors and send them some camps a couple of times a year and anything that may require at their home, but also the Island Safe Harbor Animal Sanctuary in Marblehead, Ohio.

To Nancy and her team up there that take in all the older dogs and dogs with medical needs and whatnot that are usually very difficult to kind of get adopted out. They tackle them head on and give these beautiful, beautiful animals a nice warm place to stay [00:02:00] and live to hopefully get adopted out. But if not, she keeps them.

So anyways, onto our topic. Month of March is Women’s History Month. So what we’re going to delve into Laura Ferrari. Yes. Enzo’s wife, the enigmatic lady behind the man that created probably the most famous car brand known to man. A lot of this stuff is going to come from just what you can find in Witchcreed, which is not a lot.

And if you kind of referenced the Michael Mann movie from a few years ago, you know, a lot of the stuff they try to do for Penelope Cruz to portray her, they had a very, very difficult time trying to get the truth, get the story, get the history, kind of get anything on her. Because, well, I wouldn’t say very close to the vest, but there really wasn’t much written about her.

Back then was such a different time. You’re talking early 1900s of all the way up to the 1970s when she passed, especially in Italy and Italian heritage, who my producer Eric should be familiar with, is back then it was very, very different times in regards to having a [00:03:00] wife, a mistress, girlfriend, what have you.

It was common and it was not, I want to say frowned upon maybe, but kind of just, all right, it’s accepted. Very different times in very different ways things were done. But again, also back then women were never viewed as equals of men, which is a sad, sad situation, but it was just how things were done and how people were brought up.

And this day and age, we still have a long way to go. But back then it was horrific. Some of the stuff here is just baffling to me. But anyways, we’re going to talk about Laura. I’m going to give what I can give, what I’d be able to dig up. This is just my viewpoint. Now Enzo and Laura met 1920, 1921, somewhere around in that era.

They Supposedly met at a train station, but other hearsay, other stuff, you know, she was actually a go go dancer at a, um, I don’t want to say discotheque, but you know, nightclub, whatever you want to call it back then. An Enzo dashing racing driver, racing alpha males, this kind of stuff. So, you know, he had that charisma of the [00:04:00] genesis.

Allure, I guess you could say, you know, women get drawn to. So they had met and again, either at the train station or whatnot, but they actually, I want to say had a whirlwind romance. But from my understanding is, you know, they jumped into bed pretty quickly and started basically having, you know, obviously romantic relationship from the get go.

Again, back then, especially in Italy and how. strong the catholic faith is in that country. Having sex before marriage was a big no no. They always wanted, oh you marry a virgin, that kind of stupid shit. So, they kind of kept it hush hush. But what’s interesting for image wise, Enzo Referred to her very early in the relationship as Laura Ferrari as his wife, basically, because the circles he was going in.

And again, this is just that weird dynamic and the way things were done back then him being a single guy and whatnot with the girlfriend was not viewed very good. They kind of, I don’t want to say shun their nose at her, but that they, I don’t know if it was immaturity or whatnot, or just weird because, you know, this is someone in [00:05:00] their early twenties, this day and age, you look at someone that’s married in the early twenties, like what the hell’s wrong with you?

Did you marry high school sweetheart? I mean, you don’t get married that young, that early, so frequently anymore. It’s just not as common. But back then, got married in 1819, you know, you bam, right out of the thing. And I think that had to do with the fact is, you know, you married the first girl and you had at it.

But anyways, He came out of the gate pretty early within the first year or something like that and correspondence or something like that was stating the fact and referring to her as Laura Ferrari as his wife. So he would be received more favorably. Being a racing car driver, obviously you’re running around people with money, you know, royalty with clout.

Obviously perception is key. So he wanted to be perceived, you know, as a man that I have a wife, I’m a stable guy, you know, I got a good head on my shoulders. So he started referring to her that way. In the early days, everything was hunky dory, everything’s good. Laura was a very outgoing person, you know, very charismatic from my understanding, from what I could see.

She attended, went to all the races, went to them, everything like [00:06:00] that. Even after they got married, she attended a lot of the races. Within the first year or two, but then after they got married, it kind of started waning. She started spending a lot more time, you want to say vacationing, but she was more on, you know, a wellness situation, going up into the hills of the Italian River areas and getting the better air, going to stay at her sister’s and stuff like that.

So you have a period of time in there after their marriage in the first few years where things started waning in regards to that relationship, partnership, and it got to the point. Where supposedly Enzo had sent her a, basically a letter that is either you come home or no, we’re done. So he just kind of got fed up with it.

I think the image part of it was, may have been the situation may have been as a problem. He’s married, but okay, where’s your wife? Well, she’s hundreds of miles away in the Riviera to Snatton. In this time that this is happening, his company’s going to shit. And him trying to build what he was trying to build wasn’t coming together.

Just wasn’t working out his racing career, everything like that. He was a good racer, that’s for [00:07:00] sure, but gave her an ultimatum. So all of a sudden she comes back and she comes back to a situation where everything’s kind of the finances and stuff are all kind of in disarray. And as we all know Enzo’s story, then he goes on to start looking over the Alfa Romeo race team to snap.

But again, Laura’s nowhere to be found. She hasn’t come to races. She come to. If you’re here and there, she was in the one photo of Scuderia Ferrari’s first victory and that stuff. So she was in that photo. So she still traveled a bit, but just not quite as frequently as she used to in the past. Now, this is when after 12 years of marriage and all this turbulent times or anything like that, they have a son, Dino Alfredo.

So, we all know Dino died at a very young age, and basically it was from muscular dystrophy, Duchenne muscular dystrophy, I guess you get more specific. And the one thing about it is Enzo found out, or back in the time, and I don’t know, I’m not a doctor, so I don’t know how true this is or what not, but this is passed on to a child from a chromosome from the mother.

So Enzo basically blamed [00:08:00] her for Dino’s death. So many years later from this horrible disease, obviously things got that much more strenuous after the passing of Dino. But here’s the one other side of this, not long after them getting, honestly not getting married, but I’m going to say in the early 30s.

Before Dino was born, Lena Lardy came into Enzo’s life. So this is an interesting dynamic because again, how I stated earlier was back then in that day. It wasn’t, I don’t want to say final, maybe it was final, but it was like, it was accepted that you had a wife, you had a mistress, plain and simple. So I mean, I guess this is how it was back then.

Kept hot shots, she really didn’t know about Lena until many years later, but this is when Enzo started to have, I want to say a double life. Spending time with her and splitting all his time, so I mean, I don’t honestly, I don’t know how he did it. It’s not like this day and age where you got cell phones, all this kind of stuff, and All these guys, you’re talking about a time when, you know, you had to drive and all this stuff and it’s, it’s unbelievable how he was, you know, did it.

But anyways, we’re jumping, not doing the early [00:09:00] stuff. We’re going to get into the meat of stuff in regards to where Laura’s story is more prominent in the history of Ferrari. Ferrari’s up and going by the time Dino’s 24 when he passes. Ferrari itself is embedded in the racing world and, you know, they’re starting to make their, uh, production road cars to support the racing.

You know, getting into this fact is, well, After Dino passes, there’s always this head biting. Laura, after a bit of mourning, everything like that, all of a sudden she becomes very, very involved with the running of Ferrari. She gets into more of the financial side of things, looking at the books, looking at expenses, everything like that.

And all of a sudden, She starts going to all the races now mind you Enzo as he got in the things He stopped going to races unless it was in Italy within a few hours or what have you he would go But anything else of that he would get phone calls from the team managers They would pass along the results the information to him to telephone telegraph what have you, but Laura [00:10:00] Would go and this is where this kind of becomes an odd situation.

Is she reporting back to him? Whatnot people don’t know, but she’s all of a sudden going thing. You see her in photos, everything like that, but she’s more prominent within the running of Ferrari itself and looking over the finances to be sure dollars aren’t getting spent, whether it’s supposed to that kind of thing, which needs to be done, you can’t just run haphazardly and, you know, stay in business.

So. That side of it, I think her taking that over, I think is brilliant because I think it actually, to an extent, saved Ferrari from probably going under and going bankrupt or broke in the early years where they would never even gotten to the point where Fiat would have came in and saved them or all that stuff playing that little game with Ford and everything like that.

So I think that’s kind of a very, very, I don’t want to say underrated. I don’t think people talk about it enough and saying, you know, this. Woman came in and started going over the books started mining expenses started going to the races are like that and watching what people were Doing in regards to what money they were spending what expenditure like every dollar counts So I think that was a very I would say brilliant [00:11:00] move But I think it was a very pragmatic move in regards to the history of Ferrari and keeping the doors open and getting where they Are today at this point in time by some things are happening.

Enzo’s got his girlfriend Lena Piero was born. We’ll get into that a little bit more with how Laura handled that. And again, it’s just a weird dynamic and the times back then were completely different in how the thoughts were and you don’t know how someone was thinking. You don’t, can’t get in someone’s brain.

But in 1961, they had the Palace Revolt because there’s All these engineers and managers were getting upset and pissed off. They felt, and again, this is probably the male ego involved saying a woman shouldn’t be on the floor. A woman shouldn’t be telling us what to do, dah, dah, dah, this and that. Cause she was getting into everything, coming on the floor, getting a thing and probably minding the P’s and Q’s of the finances, trying to find out what’s going on and hey, my husband owns a company.

I own the company too as well. Then you listen to what I do. And headstrong Italian men probably didn’t take kindly to that. So they basically. So a lawyer net, they go to Enzo and say, she’s got to go. It’s either her or [00:12:00] us. Well, guess what? They went, which there were some very, very prominent people that left the company on that day, but then also elevated Ferrari because of for Gary came on board, you know, was there and very young was early twenties and he gets elevated to the team manager, all this stuff and everything happened.

It seemed, you know, Hey, it all worked out, obviously. Enzo Bacchus and he kicked them out. So even though all those problems were there that head butting everything like that He still stood by and I’m supporting my wife, which was awesome to see, you know, so everyone leaves So there’s a big swift times change whatnot They had the next couple years in the racing department that did not go very well because I want to say starting from scratch But basically is because you know, you have that core that’s working.

I think they all leave. Okay, you guys start over So for the next two seasons They didn’t do too good. Obviously, they came roaring back. We know what happened after that. They just dominated F1. They dominated endurance racing, everything, everything and everything under the sun. Taking lemons, making lemonade, I guess you say.

So that was kind of an interesting [00:13:00] little dynamic, even though, and I don’t want to say animosity, but I want to say, you know, just the friction between Enzo and Laura. Going on, he still stood behind her. And up until 1970 in Italy, you couldn’t get divorced anyways because the Catholic Church wouldn’t allow it because you had to go to the church to get permission to get divorced.

So unless there was some really strenuous circumstances that would justify, you weren’t getting divorced back then. It wasn’t happening. I guess maybe that goes back to things, hey, you could have a mistress, whatnot, but hey, you kept the family together, everything like that. So in this time, then all of a sudden, Laura finds out about Lena.

Lardy, Enzo’s mistress. And Piero! Watching the Ferrari movie, you probably saw all this stuff about her hunting her down or anything. Now, a lot of that’s relatively true in regards to her laying down the law and fighting it. But one of the big things that came out of that is says, Piero will not take your last name, Enzo, until after I’m dead.

He was always Pyrrha, now in the movie they say it somehow is true because Lena Lardy, she kept everything close to the chest and she wouldn’t divulge much and kudos to her. Now hey, it’s no one’s [00:14:00] business, it’s her business, between her and Enzo. But after obviously the Lord died in 1978, Piero took the last name Ferrari, and there you go, as Enzo’s only surviving son, who’s still alive today, and he’s got his own kids, and one of them is named Enzo, I think, going to school in California, something like that, so, the legacy lives on, and I think he owns 5%, 10 percent of the car, I don’t know, he’s got a nice chunk of it, where, you know, he’s, Obviously having that last name he’s, he’s enjoying life.

All this is going on and Lena does not live all that far. She lives in Modena and the fact is she’s not living all that far from where Laura and them are living. It’s not like she’s on the other side of the country or other side of the world or anything like that. Obviously back then you’re not following someone on Instagram or Facebook stalking them.

Enzo put them up in a nice little house, you know, Laura and them, they were living in this apartment. Again, it’s something you try and wrap your head around now. You’re just like, how is that possible? How can you, you know, it’s like, there’s just no way. I mean, you hear stories and stuff all the time. And you know, he had a second family, all this stuff.

But back then it was, oh, that’s his mistress. Oh, this and that, you know, it was just basically, oh, that’s what that is. [00:15:00] So anyways, you know, she just put it to him after the fact. And she got involved with Ferrari, which I believe her involvement. I want to say save the company. Now, I know in the movie they kind of said, Oh, she had half the shares and then she needed to give some back to him and she wanted a half a million dollars, dah, dah, dah, about the timeframes were off and whatnot, and it’s basically not true.

Obviously that thing for the story, for the movie, you got to build something up. That wasn’t true, but she did have the ownership in the company, but having that half the shares and all this stuff and holding it over Enzo’s head, as far as anyone knows, and as far as I know, I could find that wasn’t true.

She was a very prominent figure with Ferrari. And I honestly think her role in the story of Ferrari itself, the company needs to be, I want to say more prominent in regards to what her roles and what she did and how much she actually contributed to the company. Cause again, I think when she stepped in and started doing the finances and everything like that, that wasn’t Enzo’s forte.

His thing was corralling good people, getting them to do what he wanted them to do. And he was a leader, got the right people, put them in the right positions [00:16:00] and just cracked the whip, going like that. Accounting wasn’t his thing of doing finance, but you know, Laura, she stepped in and I honestly believe, I think she saved the company, kept it from going under.

Probably had a huge part in that. Yes, he built great road cars for that, but you got to remember they weren’t building all that many cars back then. So it wasn’t like they’re cranking out tens of thousands of cars a year and say, Oh, we got all this money coming in. It was a tight thing. And the amount of race cars and racing they’re doing, I mean, you got to go to shipping, all this kind of stuff.

I mean, there’s a lot of costs involved in that. So it’s like. You got to get money for someone or whatnot. So you got to mind your P’s and Q’s. So I believe she needs to be recognized more in regards to the story of Ferrari itself, the company and stepping in. And again, a lot of this stuff you read about is, I would say hearsay, but it’s from stories from other people.

Everyone’s, Oh, it’s this or that. Some of the stuff you can figure out like Laura and Enzo’s mother. He didn’t get along, but. How common is that, that the daughter in law doesn’t, doesn’t get along with their mother in law and [00:17:00] especially back then because the hierarchy was and everything like that, your mother was God, so to speak, you know, it’s just commonplace, but you hear those stories and I just think she’s always been put in a negative light wrongly, what she put up with, what she had to deal with.

Enzo was a difficult, difficult man, ego, whatnot. I mean, just, For what she had to do and what she had to tolerate, a mistress. A mistress having Enzo’s love child, and that kind of situation. Being accepted or what not back then, still doesn’t matter. I mean, it’s a slap in the face in regards to your wife.

It’s like, you don’t respect me. But again, it’s just such a different time back then. You know, and then you’re talking, you know, a time it was in Italy, that was old world, just different, different time. So, I hope you appreciated my ramblings. About Laura Ferrari and like you said celebrating women’s history month here I wanted to get out there look I think for her role what she did and contributed to Ferrari is Undervalued and I think there needs [00:18:00] to be more Celebration of regards to how much she contributed to the company I honestly believe she saved it from financial ruin when she finally started taking over the finances, getting involved more, going to the races, everything like that.

I think she actually probably saved the company. So I think she needs to be celebrated a lot more in regards to the story of Ferrari to where it is today. Because everything always lines up in place. You look at something that’s getting close to 100 years old. It’s an entity lasting that long. You have your ups, your downs, your peaks, your valleys.

All these things happen. Hindsight, you can look and say, oh well. That happened, the Palace Revolt, but then this happened, which was successful for them. So it’s like, oh, look it, the man upstairs, oh, he’s got a plan, that kind of stuff. Everything lined up, but you know, certain things, I think, you know, also happen that you just, they don’t get spoken about or I don’t think they get brought to more people’s attention in regards to that.

I just feel that she needs to be celebrated more in regards to this history and the story of Ferrari. That’s all I want to say about that. Again, I appreciate you guys listening. Go check out Zotacar Marketplace. Firemarketplace. com website. It’s in the [00:19:00] family of the Zotacar Marketplace website. Check out motoringpodcast.

net. And check out your favorite automotive podcast. Be sure to go and check that out because there’s a lot of cool stuff. Go through the archives. Definitely subscribe to all what you can because we’re adding more and more podcasts as we speak. Getting some new stuff on there to just expand what we can offer everyone.

So everyone’s got something to listen to. I appreciate you listening. Celebrate Women’s History Month. If your mom’s still around, give her a big kiss because without her, you wouldn’t be here.

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patreon. com forward slash GT motor sports. [00:20:00] Please note that the content opinions and materials presented and expressed in this episode are those of its creator and this episode has been Published with their consent. If you have any inquiries about this program Please contact the creators of this episode via email or social media as mentioned in the episode