Renowned Jaguar Test Driver Dies at 98

Norman Dewis, a long-time test driver and development engineer for Jaguar, died on Saturday at the age of 98.

During his official career with the British carmaker, which spanned from 1952 to 1985, Dewis logged nearly 1.3 million miles behind the wheel of various Jaguar cars. He later served another 30 years as a brand ambassador.

After his father died in 1934, Dewis left school at the age of 14 to work for early U.K. carmakers such as Humber and Armstrong-Siddeley. He served as a tail gunner in a Bristol Blenheim airplane during World War II, then briefly worked for another British carmaker, Lea-Francis.

One of Dewis’ first jobs at Jaguar was to help adapt disc brakes, which were widely used by airplanes, for car applications. To test the technology, he drove with Stirling Moss in the 1952 Mille Miglia endurance race in Italy. Jaguar and other carmakers began offering disc brakes on production vehicles in the mid-1950s.

Dewis, who also raced in the 1955 Le Mans endurance race, set a land speed record for a production car of 172 mph with an XK120 in 1953. He survived at least three high-speed crashes as a test driver. One of the accidents involved Jaguar’s legendary XJ13 race car. The prototype was later repaired ,and Dewis had dreamed of driving it again at 100 mph on his 100th birthday.