HERE’S something of interest for classic car buffs.

Looking Back reader Eileen Goddin is appealing for people to help her trace the car in this picture from a 1958 edition of the Dorset Evening Echo.

Eileen wants to find the Alvis TB 14 and recreate the photo, featuring three women inside, which was in the paper on June 17 1958 and was used to promote a Weymouth Operatic Society production of the Gipsy Princess.

Eileen said: “I am trying to trace which car it is in the picture and would hope that someone might have a picture showing the number plate or know the car.

“As the picture only shows part of the car I have enclosed a photo of a matching TB 14 I used to own, it might help jog peoples’ memories.

“The car in your picture is most likely red or green.”

Eileen said Alvis only had 100 chassis with this bodywork and many of these were left hand drive and went overseas.

She said: “The best guess is that there may be about 30 or 40 left but even now we still get the odd one popping out from a long spell in a barn.

“It could be described as a Marmite car, you love it or hate the styling.

“It is the only Alvis without a ‘proper’ radiator. I love the styling and for a time owned the car in the photo I have sent.

“Most people think it is American and it is often used in ‘Guess what make this car is’?

Eileen also has an entry from an old Alvis Club Bulletin of July 1958 which mentions the Alvis TB.

The wording in the bulletin reads: “A club member reports the choice of a TB 14 roadster by the Weymouth Operatic Society to advertise their production of the ‘Gipsy Princess’.

“The substantiating photograph in the Dorset Echo of June 17 taken on Weymouth Esplanade sets a difficult problem in attraction value – the immaculate car or its lovely load! Or both?”

She said: “I shall keep my fingers crossed we can identify the car.

“With the car identified and if it still exists we might be able to get the ‘girls’ to recreate the photo for another story or if the car does not exist maybe use another TB 14.”

Eileen is currently TA/TB 14 model secretary of the Alvis Owner Club and runs the TA/TB 14 website for the Alvis Archive site. See alvisfourteen.wordpress.com. Anyone with information should contact her on 01227 772479 or 07702 684463.