A Cad Called Wanda

Meet another Car of the Year contender: Wanda, Nick Parker’s glorious 1973 Cadillac Sedan deVille, a car that’s given a big surprise to every owner she’s had – including Nick…

- Mike Renaut

There’s no denying these Cadillacs are sizeable. Even today, in a world of increasingly sized ‘small’family cars, the Cadillac seems long and wide. So I’m surprised when owner Nick Parker says he wishes Wanda − his Sedan deVille − was larger. “I love big cars,” says Nick, who also owns a 1957 Plymouth. “I like a lot of metal around me. This one is a nice size – it fills the road, but ideally it could be bigger.” Other than a limousine, I can’t think what other car Nick could buy. Wanda measures just shy of 19 feet in length and weighs 4985lb.

“I went out looking for a full-size American car from the early Seventies,” continues Nick. “I’d spent ages on eBay and finally spotted this in 2009.” He drove to Aldershot where all pretences about “just going over for a look” vanished. “It was on the driveway under a cover, I pulled up outside and said, ‘if that runs I’m buying it!’ I drove it home on Friday the 13th.” You’d expect if anything was going to go wrong it would happen then, but no, the Cadillac kindly waited a day.

“On the Saturday I went out for a drive and the seal on the brake reservoir burst, the brake pedal dropped to the floor and I barely got the car stopped,” laughs Nick. “Fortunately I was able to order a complete new master cylinder and once I bolted it on the brakes were absolutely fine. Oddly, it had been fitted with new flexi hoses, brakes and pads all round just before I bought it, so whether that overwhelmed the old master cylinder, I don’t know.