Dino Provenance File
Marc Rabineau
Volume 49 Issue 19
Oct 12, 2024
Marc Rabineau describes the experience in helping to fill in the ownership blanks of a Dino.
When I moved to Lyon, France, in 2004 I took with me my lovely original and never restored Dino 246 GT, S/N 07426 (Blu Dino metallizzato with tan interior).
At that time, I was dating a young lady from Lyon who soon became my wife.
She accepted immediately the idea to have a garage by the house we were buying, dedicated to the Dino and one of the main reasons, I still believe, is both of them were from 1973!
Two kids followed in 2007 and 2009, and life goes on…
One day I had a call from a guy who heard of me through my mechanic; he told me that he was restoring Dino 246 GT, S/N 05330. His car was like mine, same color and interior.
The following weekend I drove to his place with S/N 07426 and I was thrilled to reunify two twin Dino with Charles Pozzi provenance.
His name was Serge Cellufica and we got along together immediately. He inspected closely my Dino which had never been restored and had only 35,000 kms on the clock at this time.
I helped him to find the missing parts of his Dino like rubber mouldings and some details that you don’t think about unless the sister car is near you.
Serge was living most of the year in the wild island of Madagascar where lifestyle is cool and being rarely home he decided one day to sell S/N 05330.
When I visited Retromobile in Paris this year, I was introduced to a young gentleman, Mr Gary A., who eventually acquired S/N 05330 early this year through a dealer and was anxious to obtain the ownership history of his car.
I told him that I had contributed to the restoration of his Dino but the former owner Serge was living in Madagascar, and as far as I knew had no memory of the provenance of S/N 05330.
When I got back home in Lyon, I looked in my files and found the first owner through the Pozzi file that I was able to consult 20 years ago.
His name was Gabriel Legesne and the Dino was registered in the middle of France in January 1973 (département du Cher). This file also confirmed that S/N 05330 was Blu Dino metallizzato.
The second owner of the Dino had registered the car in 1974 under the name of his company: Etablissements Rosini, based in Suresnes (Paris area).
Then a succession of custodians were mentioned in the file but my concern was to fill the gap between Rosini and the third owner in 1980.
The only person able to tell me where the Dino was after Rosini’s ownership was Mr. Rosini himself, but this was back in the mid-1970s, roughly 50 years ago!
When I met Gary a few weeks ago in Paris to offer him the file, we went through the different owners and when I mentioned to him that I was concerned with Mr. Rosini’s next ownership, the name immediately rang a bell to him.
Gary told me that he has a very close friend by the name of Rosini who eventually became his partner and his older son’s godfather.
The problem was that his friend Rosini was born in 1981, but nevertheless spent his youth in Suresnes.
Would it be possible that Rosini junior was related to Etablissements Rosini, second owner of S/N 05330 in 1974?
A quick phone call from Gary to Rosini junior confirmed the full early history of S/N 05330.
Mr. Rosini bought the Dino in late 1974 but when Rosini junior was born in 1981, his father decided to sell the Dino, and he bought a more comfortable and practical car to travel with his family.
Rosini junior never heard of the existence of S/N 05330 and recently Gary showed up in front of the Rosini family with Dino S/N 05330.
I will let you imagine the thrill of joyfulness among all the participants of that special day!!
In April of this year, we published the story of Dino 03278 by John Cilmi who tracked down every owner of his car.
This story is another case where the history has interesting turns and becomes serendipitous.
Every owner should revere their Ferrari’s history and make sure that history is transferred to the next caretaker.
The Ferrari Market Letter can help using our extensive database. Call us!