by Murray Hubbard
Mister Cars is Murray Hubbard, a hard-hitting, award-winning investigative journalist and, for more than ten years motoring editor of the Gold Coast Sun.
His entertaining and informative stories on new cars, and his passion for not-so-new cars in CarsGuide, led to his articles being reproduced throughout Australia in News Limited suburban papers.
Murray started his career as a cadet at the Melbourne Sun News Pictorial. He later worked for the `The Age', at police rounds, magistrates’ courts and as Country Court reporter. His first published newspaper story was on motor sport in the Melbourne Herald in 1968.
A triple Walkley Award finalist, three-time Queensland Country Press Journalist of the Year, and Golden Quill Award winner in the Gold Coast Media Awards, Murray tells is as it is – and that also goes for cars.
To indulge in his passion for cars, Murray has now set up the mister-cars.com website. Aimed at the full-on car enthusiast, mister-cars.com is an interactive site where car lovers can communicate with Murray, other contributing journalists, and with one another by way of blogs.
Murray’s passion for cars has run through his life. He owned his first car at seven months, so it's not hard to see why he's always been fascinated by the automobile. His first real car was an EH Holden and he eventually punted around a 1968 HK 327 Bathurst Monaro, a car he sold during the fuel crisis of 1974. It seemed to make sense at the time, he’s certainly regretted it since ...
Murray has two major projects to his credit: the biography, `The Search for Harold Lasseter' (Harper Collins, 1993) and the script he co-researched and wrote the manuscript used as the basis for the Ten network’s multi-award winning 1998 doco-drama, `The Day of the Roses', an investigative report into the causes and cover-ups involved in Sydney's 1977 Granville Rail Disaster.
Murray is currently writing his third book – on the intriguing events that led up to the first attempt at the Australian land speed record, set on Surfers Paradise beach on Christmas Day, 1916.
Journalist: Ewan Kennedy
Ewan has been using the internet since 1980 – that's right, 1980 – long before the general public was aware that such a thing as the internet existed.
At the time Kennedy was working as chief librarian in the Technical Research Department of the NRMA in Sydney. In those early days the internet, though that name hadn’t yet been invented, consisted of just 187 sites, all of them being serious operations in technical and academic fields. How things have changed!
Kennedy began writing about cars as a teenager during the 1960s, submitting various articles to the Volkswagen Club of NSW newsletter. An active member of that club, he discovered the joys of handbrake turns and sideways motoring in back paddocks in various competitions. Not to mention rallying, cruising with, and chatting to, other car guys about their favourite machines.
Paid freelance work began with a series of articles on used cars in Modern Motor magazine from mid 1977. He joined Motor full-time in 1985 as technical editor. Then left Motor to set up his own full-time freelance motoring business late in 1987 and has worked for himself ever since. He was the founding editor of Hot 4s and Wild Rotaries magazine. Ewan has also written for the Sydney Morning Herald, The Australian, Readers Digest Books and various other outlets.
And has even tried a bit of TV and radio work, without, it must be said, a great deal of luck ... (perhaps something to do with the ugly face and lousy speaking voice!) Ewan has written a number of books on cars, concentrating on Australian vehicles, or overseas models with a strong following in Australia. These, as well as motoring books by other authors, are produced by Kennedy’s publishing company, Marque Publishing.
In his current position as editorial director at ‘Automotive News Service’ Ewan writes a weekly syndicated column for around 250 newspapers Australia wide. Subject matter includes road tests, news stories, simplified technical explanations and general automotive industry comment. His hard-hitting opinion pieces often generate heated discussion and he just loves to stir up the authorities who seem intent in taking all the fun out of motoring.
When not test driving and writing about cars he also spends a fair bit of restoring an old 1980 Deltacraft Islander cabin cruiser and can often be seen puttering around the lakes, canals and rivers near his home on the Gold Coast.
Journalist: Derek Ogden
On graduating with an honours degree in applied science in London, Derek Ogden worked for the BBC in local radio and several British newspapers as a production journalist and writer. Derek moved to Australia in 1975 and worked as a sub-editor with The Courier Mail and Sunday Mail in Brisbane, moving to the Gold Coast Bulletin in 1980 where he continued as a production journalist. He was the paper's motoring editor for more than 20 years, taking the weekly section from a few pages at the back of the book to a full colour liftout of up to 36 pages. He left the publication in 2009.
Journalist: Pedr Davis
 One of Australia's best known motoring journalists, Pedr has been reporting on the local motoring scene for over 50 years, contributing to Wheels and Modern Motor magazines as well as to numerous newspapers and magazines in Australia and overseas.
A qualified engineer and highly experienced motorist he has driven over 3000 cars and is the author of 34 books. The books are mainly about motoring, but he has also written a biography of Charles Kingsford Smith and books on aircraft.
Now in semi-retirement, Davis continues to write road tests for the syndicated motoring column that bears his name.
When not writing he devotes time to restoring and driving classic cars, including a 1926 Bugatti Sports and a 1952 MG TD two-seater..
Journalist: John Crawford
 John started working around cars in 1965 as a freelance automotive journalist, later he went on to become a fulltime motoring writer, taking over as editor of Modern Motor magazine in 1972. He served there until 1977, when he left to compete in the London to Sydney Car Rally.
His corporate automotive career began in 1977 when he was hired as PR manager for Leyland Australia, building up to the formation of JRA Limited (Jaguar Rover Australia) in 1985. In 1990 John moved to the USA to help Jaguar back on its feet in the North American market.
He returned to Australia in 1994 to help launch the Daewoo company. In 1998 he went back to the USA to establish a solo image for Bentley as it moved out of the shadow of Rolls-Royce.
John has returned to Australia and lives on the Gold Coast. He writes for Automotive News Service and has also written for The Bulletin magazine, Money magazine, Qantas magazine, Wheels.com, and the Cathay Pacific Marco Polo magazine.
Journalist/Administrator: Alistair Kennedy
 Alistair is Automotive News Service and Marque Publishing's business manager and the company's jack-of-all-trades. He is also the web administrator of Mister-Cars.
An accountant by profession he designs the Marque range of motoring book titles, operates the company's motoring bookshop on the NSW Central Coast and the associated web site, as well as its huge digital and hard copy database.
Whenever we can escape from the office he does so to cover new vehicle releases and contributes news stories. Alistair's other interests include cricket and family history on which subjects he has written and published three books.
Contributor: Julie Saville
 Julie was introduced to cars by her big brother who had an assortment of European vehicles in various states of disrepair during his 20s. She started a love affair with Saabs whilst helping him to push start his Saab turbo all the way from Victoria to Queensland in 1982.
She has driven a wide assortment of cars from Aston Martins to VW Beetles (of which she has owned no fewer than three).
Julie was born and bred on the Gold Coast and loves driving, thinking nothing of motoring all the way to Canberra to visit friends. When not working, a drive in the Gold Coast hinterland or down to Northern Rivers of NSW is a must and she knows all the interesting back roads.
Julie’s background is in fashion and construction/development and now works for one of the local universities. She hopes that her non-technical and feminine point of view will appeal to lady readers, and perhaps to some of the non-revhead men as well.
She is pictured here road testing one of her possible future vehicles! |
