Back in 1984 on the West coast of North America, a group of like-minded Roverphiles gathered together to form a club. This organization, named LROA (Land-Rover Owners Association) served as a gathering point for folks passionate for the Land-Rover marque.
LROA was meant to be many things - a local club organizing trips and social events for local members, an umbrella organization for chapers of the club across the US, and a channel for Rover owners to meet and share data about all sorts of subjects of interest.
Part of the organization's value to the members was the club newsletter, called the "Aluminum Workhorse". The AW was the channel which the members used to communicate with the club and each other - sharing tips, tricks, and the thousand and one different pieces of information that can help an owner to live with a car as unique as an old Land-Rover. Time passes, and as it does organizations sometimes go by the wayside. LROA disbanded in the late 1990s and with that event production of the newsletter ceased. Unfortunately, none of the content was easily available in electronic format, so other than in dusty piles of paper in ex-members' libraries the information was lost to view.
Then, in late Summer of 2007, Larry Simpson of the Land-Rover Owners mailing list in the US was given a pile of the original newsletters - and a plan was hatched to make the information in it accessible electronically. What principals of the long-defunct club that could be reached happily gave their permission to make the information in the newsletters electronically accessible, and the project began. The original newsletters were distributed to folks with scanners, and the scanned images sent to other folks who could assemble them into PDF files for easy access. These were then hosted on the RoverWeb for the enjoyment of the Land-Rover reading public. The result of all this labor is what you see here - a snapshot of the Land-Rover club scene of its time. Reproduction is essentially what you see here - some of the issues we scanned were photocopies and reproduction electronically suffered as a result. Enjoy! - AJR - 10/11/2007 |
