CRAZY FOR CARS OJAI MAN'S DREAM COLLECTION GOING ON DISPLAY.

Byline: Andrea Cavanaugh Staff Writer

SANTA PAULA - Mike Taggart loved race cars from the first moment he heard their throaty roar from his Indianapolis elementary school in the 1930s. The 73-year-old Ojai man longed to own a fleet of the high-performance cars, but his modest means kept the dream at bay.

Then a large inheritance a decade ago - he is heir to the fortune of the Wonder Bread founder - changed everything. Taggart began collecting the dream machines of his younger years - British race cars and motorcycles from the 1950s and 1960s.

Now part of his collection - three cars and two motorcycles - is on display in an exhibit at Santa Paula's California Oil Museum.

The show celebrates the revolution in auto racing that shifted engines from the front of the car to the rear, and transformed the cars' boxy tractorlike look into sleek silhouettes.

``It's those little cigar-shaped beauties with the engine in the rear that really turn me on,'' Taggart said. ``I go down to the garage sometimes and just look at them.''

The exhibit features a 1956 Cooper Formula Bobtail, one of only five such cars owned in the United States, a 1962 Formula Jr. open-wheel racer, and a 1963 British Lola Formula II car.

A 1960 Matchless G50 motorcycle, a 1952 Norton Manx racing bike, and a rare 1964 Mini Cooper owned by another Ventura County collector round out the exhibit, which runs through Oct. 19.

The cars on display in Santa Paula were chosen for the exhibit because they fit with the ``Racing Revolution'' theme, Taggart said.

The exhibit is a good match for the California Oil Museum, which chronicles Santa Paula's history as a petroleum giant in the late 19th century, said Mike Nelson, the museum's administrator.

``This was the oil capital of California in the late 1880s,'' Nelson said. ``The major use of petroleum became gasoline. The whole world changed. It's a perfect fit.''

Taggart keeps 12 more cars and 38 motorcycles at his home in Ojai. He's hard-pressed to name his favorite.

He loves his ``testosterone car,'' a 1970 Can-Am Lola T-165 once raced by actor Paul Newman, for its sheer road-ripping power. But the beautiful lines of his 1956 D-Type Jaguar still make him shiver with pleasure.

``It's like children - you might have one smart child and one handsome child,'' Taggart said. ``You love them all for slightly different reasons.''

Although he employs professional drivers to race his cars at speedways, Taggart still tests the cars himself, he said. Some of his vintage race cars can go 175 mph, he said.

``Until you drive a pure race car you don't realize what a compromise street cars are,'' he said. ``You can get in so much more trouble so much faster.''

Unlike street cars, driving a race car requires uncompromising concentration, Taggart said.

``Your horizon collapses into a tunnel in front of you,'' he said. ``It starts at the dashboard and ends at the next turn. All of your capacities are focused totally on getting through the next turn.''

Although his grandfather founded the Wonder Bread company, Taggart grew up simply in Indiana, going to school just blocks from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, he said.

He went to college, served in the U.S. Army, and took a job teaching English in Indianapolis in the 1950s.

Each day as he went to work, he passed a British car dealer and gazed longingly at the high-performance machines. In 1954, he took the plunge and bought a 1952 Jaguar XK120M. The payment sucked $87 from his $200 monthly salary, but it was worth every penny, Taggart said. < Over the years, Taggart taught English at California Lutheran University and Ventura College, and indulged his love of racing one car at a time, always parting with the last car to purchase the latest object of his of desire, he said.

After the death of his mother in 1994, Taggart inherited the family fortune and was able to pursue his hobby with gusto, he said.

Although he has been able to buy and sell countless cars since then, he still longs for a car he couldn't afford to buy five decades ago.

``There was an Austin Healy back in Indianapolis in 1954,'' he said. ``I still dream about that car. I've never forgotten it.''

Andrea Cavanaugh, [phone]

andrea.cavanaugh(at)dailynews.com

IF YOU GO

``Revolution in Racing: British Race Cars that Changed the World.'' California Oil Museum, 1001 E. Main Street, Santa Paula. Opening reception from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. today. The exhibit, which runs through Oct. 19, is open Wednesday through Sunday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission is $4 for adults, $3 for seniors and $1 for children.

CAPTION(S):

3 photos, box

Photo:

(1 -- color -- ran in Simi edition only) Mike Taggart, 73, who grew up longing for cars in Indianapolis, stands next to one of the vehicles to go on display in Santa Paula.

(2) Mike Taggart sits at the Santa Paula museum in one of his fleet of racing cars, many of which he bought after inheriting a Wonder Bread fortune.

Joe Binoya/Staff Photographer

(3 -- color) John Nichols of the Santa Paula Oil Museum sits in the midst of the Taggart car collection to be exhibited until the fall.

Michael Owen Baker/Staff Photographer

Box:

IF YOU GO (see text)