1928 Mercedes-Benz Model S Tourer

Mercedes-Benz introduced its S Series as a 6.8-liter fast tourer in 1927. Designed by chief engineer Prof. Dr. Ferdinand Porsche, it featured a 'kick-down' supercharger that temporarily boosted acceleration and produced what the British magazine The Motor described as 'a threatening high-pitched whine.' Competition versions of the Mercedes-Benz 680S excelled in endurance racing and helped sell these road-going touring cars to sporting-minded drivers around the world.

Calvin Pardee III, the first owner of this Mercedes-Benz Model S, was a patient man; he ordered this Sports Tourer in June 1928 and waited until July 1929 for its delivery to him in the United States. Seventy years later, in 1999, the car returned to Germany and was eventually restored under the ownership of Friedhelm Loh. He drove it on the 2005 Pebble Beach Motoring Classic, successfully covering 1,500 miles of winding and sometimes mountainous terrain, before competing with it at the Pebble Beach Concours, placing Third in Class, and earning the Mercedes-Benz Trophy. The Tourer passed next to The Keller Collection, which shared the car at Pebble Beach in 2015, placing First in Class. It returned in 2023, wearing a new paint scheme than it did in 2015, where it was displayed in the Mercedes-Benz S class (exhibition only; not judged).

This example was first exported to the United States where it stayed for 70 years before returning to the country of its origin to be part of an important collection. Its current owner brought the car back to the States, and 2015 marked the first time it was shown at the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance.