Il Mago di Modena

We tell the story of the ‘wizard’ of Modena, Stanguellini, through two of his exceptional and pioneering race cars

- Matt Zuchowski

Driving along Via Emilia Est in Modena, among the numerous car dealerships, you will eventually stumble upon a sign that few will recognise: Stanguellini. It wasn’t always like that, though. Only a brief walk from here (and half a century back in time), the very same name hung on the Modena’s largest Fiat dealership, which would attract motorsport professionals and enthusiasts from all over the world. There was a time when the Stanguellini name was one of the brightest stars on the motorsport scene, regularly beating the likes of Scuderia Ferrari and achieving dominance in Formula Junior.

As it turns out, the Stanguellini family has always been good at two things: doing business and racing. The first success came around 150 years ago with the production of orchestral kettledrums (!) patented by Celso Sanguellini. Celso’s son Francesco introduced the people of Modena to motorised tricycles in the early 20th century, then registered Modena’s first ever car, a 1908 Fiat Tipo (registered MO 1, it’s still in the possession of the Stanguellini family). Francesco soon became Modena’s first motorsport competitor, racing Ceiranos and Fiats, and in 1925 he set up a successful scuderia armed with Modena-made Mignon motorcycles. These activities were financed by Stanguellini’s car dealership, Francesco having become Modena’s first official car dealer in 1910.

So it was that the Stanguellini family could be said to have laid the foundations for the Maserati brothers and for Enzo Ferrari; they all knew each other well. It was a devastating blow that Francesco died prematurely in 1932, leaving the business to his son, Vittorio, then aged just 22.