The Timed Online Auction of Models from the Collection of Bill Ahearn
- A Lifetime Passion -
Bill Ahearn's love of motorsport and all things automotive was first sparked at aged 13. He can still vividly remember attending his first race meeting at Lakeside in 1966 for the International 99 event where he first laid eyes on his childhood heroes battling it out on track. Names like Brabham, Hulme, Hill, Courage and the Geoghegan brothers all came to influence Bills love of motorsport. Bill had a career as a car salesman and manager, and worked at dealerships such as Peters Holden in Charters Towers, Jeff Wignall Motors Frankston and Chadstone Mitsubishi & Kia.
Bill started collecting models around 1975, with Matchbox – “I grew from there with at one stage I had over 5000 Diecast Models of all different scales, I really never had real favourites at the start but later on I got a real penchant for Fire and Rescue Vehicles and Trucks however basically, I bought what appealed to me”.
Bill's passion was mainly for diecast models but also 1/1 scale cars, having a couple classic cars in his garage and owning nearly 50 cars over his life. At 74 Bill still avidly follows and travels to Supercars Championship race rounds and historic vehicle displays – “I guess it never really gets out of the blood”. Bill travelled to America in 2013 and attended the Austin 400 V8 Supercars race, The NASCAR Bojangles Southern 500 and the Indianapolis 500.
