Harry was born in Geraldton WA on the 1st April 1914, son of William Alfred Smith and Dorothy Glady’s Wiley (divorced 1931).
He was married in April 1938 (Fremantle) to Ethel May Sharp and in 1942 they built their own home. Harold was a roof tiler by trade and also worked on a milk run with a horse and cart
Harold decided to build his own design of a milk/bread cart for clients, orders started coming in so he built a shed on Welshpool Rd (Welshpool) and started building buses and caravans as well. The first bus was built using timber but he progressed to steel square tubing. He built the first bus constructed in tubular steel in WA (and was on the cover of the Aug 1950 cover of the RACWA official Journal). To further fund the business they sold their house and moved into a caravan behind the shed.
Things were going well and by 1946 they were employing a dozen men, contracts for government and school buses were coming in.
Then Harold decided to build a race car
We don’t know much more than this, the car was reported to have cost over 3000 pounds to build (well over $100,000 today) and was finished around February just in time for the Grand Prix in March. Tragically, under considerable financial strain, Harry committed suicide in September that year, just six months after the race and the car was sold by his wife and brother to settle debts
