FERRARI’S SPECTACULAR 365 GTB/4

A paragon of 20th Century sports car design, Ferrari’s 365 GTB/4 featured revolutionary styling by Leonardo Fioravanti, unlike anything else yet created in the company’s history, and marked their first use of a 4.3-liter dual-overhead-cam engine in a road car. Actually a stopgap model while a forthcoming rear-engine, flat-twelve model remained in development, it surprised everyone with its sheer success, and developed a special, lasting cachet among the marque’s vintage front-engined V-12 berlinettas.

With a staggering output of 352 horsepower, the 365 GTB/4 dethroned the Lamborghini Miura as the world’s fastest production car. Utilizing dry-sump lubrication that enabled a lower placement of the engine, a five-speed transaxle that provided ideal 50/50 weight distribution, and all-wheel independent suspension, the Daytona offered crisp handling characteristics at speed. Wide wheels with superior tire contact and four-wheel disc brakes rounded out a superb all-around package that eventually proved worthy of competition applications.

As the final front-engine Ferrari to feature a derivation of Gioacchino Colombo’s classic short-block V-12, the Daytona was the ultimate evolution of 20 years of development, constituting the triumphant conclusion of a generation of vintage Ferraris. Such was its performance that it was nicknamed Daytona, honoring Ferrari’s dominating 1-2-3 podium sweep in the 1967 24 Hours of Daytona, something that became a point of legend—even if the name was not officially sanctioned by Enzo Ferrari.

CHASSIS NUMBER 16943

Marque authority Marcel Massini notes that the 365 GTB/4 Daytona offered here, chassis number 16943, was completed on 23 October 1973, and delivered to East Coast distributor Luigi Chinetti Motors of Greenwich, Connecticut. Massini indicates that the car may have been exhibited by Lake Forest, Illinois, dealer Knauz Continental at the 66th Annual Chicago International Auto Show in the spring of 1974. Actual final delivery was not until that September, when yet another famed Ferrari impresario, Algar Enterprises of Paoli, Pennsylvania, sold the car to Ian S. Murray, a vice-president of the agricultural commodities brokerage firm, Cook Industries, in Memphis, Tennessee.

By 1976 the car was in the ownership of Frederick Fitzgerald, who advertised it in both the New York Times and AutoWeek as having 3,100 miles and “never driven in rain.” It was sold in 1977 to the partnership of Dick Barbour and O. Edgar Rouhe of California, eventually passing to Mr. Rouhe alone; he retained ownership of the car for nine years. It then passed to Bruno Broseghini and then to longtime Ferrari connoisseur and enthusiast, Charles T. Wegner, returning to Illinois with 3,980 miles.

Mr. Wegner sold the car in 1995 to Arthur E. Coia II of Providence, Rhode Island, who the following year had it refinished to the original color by Shelton Ferrari in Fort Lauderdale, Florida—still the most major work that the Ferrari has received in its low-mileage life. Mr. Coia occasionally exhibited the car, including winning its Platinum award at the Cavallino Classic in Palm Beach in 1999.

In 2004, chassis number 16943 passed to Marc Fisher of Greenwich, Connecticut, who repeated its Platinum at the Cavallino Classic four years later. After keeping the car for nine years, he sold it to another East Coast enthusiast, beginning a series of short-term ownerships, eventually culminating with its arrival in the present significant collection in the summer of 2014. It has remained in good company there for the last decade. It is in beautiful condition for its age, with satisfying originality of components (including the numbers-matching engine and gearbox) throughout, as noted in the accompanying Ferrari Classiche Red Book issued in 2024.

Displaying only 5,710 miles at time of cataloguing, believed to be its original mileage since new, this Daytona remains original and unrestored aside from the aforementioned refinish to its correct color. In addition to its Ferrari Classiche Red Book, it is accompanied by its original warranty card.

Surely one of the lowest-mileage Daytonas available, this car has led the sedate life that all deserved but few did, and is worthy of the finest collection.