2007 Jaguar S-Type SE: owner review

Finally, a Jaguar.

What did a boy growing up in 1950s England want? He wanted his team to win the FA Cup and he wanted to own a Jag. Come March 1961, it was a Jaguar E-Type. Enzo Ferrari was not wrong when he described this glorious machine as, “the most beautiful car in the world”.

I remember the first one I saw in the metal. It was British racing green and the longing just to sit inside it was visceral. In my naiveté I wondered how anyone in our town could have the wherewithal to buy such a piece of exotica. Later on, I learned that some people in my town could purchase even more glamorous conveyances. I cannot say for certain, but I doubt whether any of the boys with whom I shared a classroom ever owned an E-Type, or indeed a Jaguar of any description. We were the products of the Secondary Modern schools destined to follow our fathers into the shipyards of the Tyne as welders, shipwrights and carpenters. The best among us might make it as draughtsmen and go to work in jacket and trousers and smart footwear.

I settled into reality and drove second or third hand Fords, all of which served me well enough. When I was 17, my third hand Ford Corsair took the family all the way from North Shields to Somerset, a distance of some three hundred and fifty miles, to visit my elder, married, sister. Though my mother had worked in Birmingham during the war, the trip to Somerset was as far as she had ever been outside of the realms of Northumberland.

Now, finally, approaching 70 years of age, I am the exuberant owner of a 14 year old, 3.0-litre V6 Jaguar S-Type — to my mind, the last Jag that still looks like a Jag. Though in some measure I still feel a fraud as I get behind the wheel — stock brokers drive Jaguars and not retired school teachers — I cannot tell you how much pleasure it gives me to slide into the elegant, beige leather seats, sit behind the beautiful walnut-veneered dashboard and grip the likewise timbered steering wheel. Perhaps these are things that only someone of my vintage might appreciate? On road the car has impeccable manners: acceleration is swift, steering precise, and the suspension firm enough to encourage some adventurous cornering without disturbing one’s vertebrae. The S-Type may be one of the older cars at Thursday afternoon vets tennis, but it is clearly the car that attracts most interest.

Of course, a Jaguar of this era makes little claim to green credentials, but I salve my conscience with the knowledge that from the age of 14, when I started work, until 65, when I retired, I either walked or cycled to work almost every day. Perhaps I drove on as many as 50 occasions, but surely no more.

Incidentally my team, Newcastle United, last won the F.A. Cup in 1955 — I was four years old. Sixty-five years and counting, but it is the mark of a good Geordie to support the team in success and failure — mainly failure.

Owner: Alan Whittaker

MORE: Everything Jaguar