A remembrance by Peter Walker

AROC MEMBERS THROUGHOUT THE NORTHEAST are stunned to learn of the sudden death of fellow Alfista, Fred Frey. Fred was the owner of a number of lovingly restored Alfas: a 1973 Giulia Super, a Junior Z 1600, and a 1972 GTV. He also kept a four-door 1983 Alfasud SC 1.3 in Holland for his summer travels. Among his “lesser” cars he had a 1968 Fiat Dino Spider and a modern Fiat 500 Abarth (tuned with a hot chip, he would add). Fred took great pride in these cars and was closely involved in a hands-on way in their restorations. For instance, where just removing and replacing a wiring harness is intimidating enough, he fabricated from scratch an entirely new wiring harness for the Giulia Super. Another time, as he once told me, he spent part of a winter under the Dino Spider scraping off old undercoating. And when the 1300 engine in the Giulia Super needed replacing, he bought in Holland (for next to nothing) a seized 1600 engine, which he transported for a while in the back of his rental car, a modern Fiat 500, before delivering it to the Dutch shipper who took responsibility for delivery to the U.S.

Fred was an avid photographer, and on his website (well worth visiting) he posted fascinating photo essays about the restorations and some of the repairs to his cars, about his travels, and about other topics (including the right way to make Italian-style pizza if one does not have a proper wood-burning pizza oven).

Everyone at AONE who knew Fred will surely have favorite memories of him. These range from his grumbling once at the slow pace of one driving tour (not even at the speed limit, much less beyond it) to his enjoying so much his first visit to Austin, Texas, for the U.S. Grand Prix that he decided to find an apartment there to spend his winters. Fred was a frequent participant in the fall AONE Berkshire Sorties. He was one of the Spider drivers caught in the sudden massive downpour near the exit from Conway, Mass., on route 116. This was the famous moment where our group rounded a 90-degree right turn, crossed a small bridge, and was instantly inundated by the heavens opening up on us in full force. Luckily immediately on the right was a large area with space enough for all of our cars to pull off. Within seconds the Alfa type 105/115 Spiders had raised and snugged down our tops. Three other open cars were not so lucky: the Dursos’ 4C Spider, Roger Carlson’s 1959 2000 Spider, and Fred’s Dino. The tops of none of these cars work so easily, and Fred was among those who took quite a drenching while raising his top.

On another Sortie, though, Fred saved the day when the tour leader (yours truly) had a senior moment and led our group down a wrong turn, which eventually turned into a dirt road. Fortunately, a few days earlier, when Fred received the route directions, he painstakingly entered them manually into his phone’s GPS. In his Giulia Super, he was leading the middle of the pack, and as the tour leader misled the front of the pack down one wrong turn after another, we crossed Fred’s group, who promptly led us back to the planned—entirely asphalt—route.

AONE members will always remember Fred accompanied by his wonderful wife, artist Beverley Fisher, and by their dog Nico, who has to be the best-trained and -behaved dog I have ever seen. After one Rhode Island tour, Nico lay patiently in a corner of the restaurant’s private banquet room where we gathered in considerable (and noisy) number for a late lunch. Nico must also be one of the world’s most travelled dogs, having sat or lain patiently in the back of Fred’s cars during countless trips and club tours, and having stayed patiently in his crate during countless trans-Atlantic flights.

I am sure I speak for all AONE members who knew Fred when I say that we will miss him terribly. How much more Beverley and Nico will miss him is hard to imagine. But hopefully they will take some consolation from two things: that our collective hearts go out to them and that we will miss them too very much if they do not come out in the future to any AONE gatherings.