La Dawri

[1] Les Dawes began a small fiberglass manufacturing business in the early to mid fifties.

During his spare time, Les designed a fiberglass bodied sports car, from an idea he is said to have had in the late 1940s.

The 1958 Daytona and the smaller Sebring were similar to the Conquest/Quest but with a single grill opening and front end styling.

A hardtop mold for the Conquest and Daytona models was being constructed with production scheduled for Fall 2008 available through LaDawri.com, but this did not proceed.

Its first model, the S1A was designed by Hugh Jorgensen, a Los Angeles Art Centre graduate, and William "Doc" Boyce-Smith in either 1951 or 1952.

Only a couple of the original C2 Coupes are known to exist but a newly restored C2 was at the Monterey Motorsports Reunion (Historics) held at Laguna Seca RaceWay in 2017.

In 1958 Victress was approached by George Lippincott Sr. of the Nic-L-Silver battery company to create a fiberglass body for a battery-powered sports car.

The 'Merrill Powell' design was years ahead of its time and copied by a number of European car manufacturers into the '60's as well as General Motors and the Corvette.

In the 1940s Keen had assembled a Stanley steam engine powered car on what is believed to be a Plymouth chassis with a Chevrolet body.

In 1957 or 1958 Jim Savage and his father constructed a fibreglass car as part of his portfolio to be accepted at Art Center College of Design.

After the company closed, Les used the Formula Libre molds to build one prototype called the Vendetta.

After the company folded Les Dawes worked for a big aircraft firm, designing escape hatches for planes.

The 50th anniversary of the LaDawri Conquest was celebrated in March 2007 at the Amelia Island Concours d'Elegance, with members of the Dawes family attending.