As a child, I was a voracious reader. I was reading basic books by the time I was three years old, and by the time I was five I was able to read and explain the Constitution of the United States to my aunts, who were suffering through college classes, to the amazement of my mother and grandfather. I read Encyclopædia Britannica installments for fun and would snap up any book in the house that looked appealing. But, much in the same way I got into cars, I got into reading repair manuals the same way: via a 1975 Chevrolet Camaro that my uncle Benjamin bought in either 1988 or early 1989.

The image is clear: blue book, a cutaway of a rubber-bumper car in detail on the cover, filled with black-and-white photographs and instructions that at the time meant little to me. Nobody was trusting a five-year-old with a wrench…they had already learned the hard way to not leave keys around me. I didn’t do any wrenching but more than a couple of times I was found outside, with the Camaro’s hood up, checking the oil for the tenth time, or underneath the dash looking at the fuse box, or maybe just sitting at the kitchen table with a sheet of paper, trying to trace out the car on the cover.

Those Haynes manuals that Benny swore by originated from a Royal Air Force veteran who realized that the factory manual for a “bugeye” Austin-Healey Sprite was very underwhelming in scope and detail. John Harold Haynes’ first manual included the step-by-step photographic coverage of dismantling, exploded diagrams, and covered the car bumper-to-bumper. The Austin Healey Sprite Haynes Manual, the first one to be issued, came out in 1966 and it’s first run of 3,000 copies was sold out in three months. By 1979 the Haynes Publishing Group PLC had made it onto the London Stock Exchange. In 1995 Haynes was made an Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (OBE) for his services to publishing and in 2005 The Open University presented him with an honorary degree of Master of the University.

Haynes was an avid car collector as well, thanks to his success. The Haynes International Motor Museum in Sparkford, Somerset, England started out with the 30 cars he offered up and is now home to over 400 vehicles. He supported the museum with vehicle donations and with donations he personally made. He was the Chairman of Haynes Publishing Group until 2010, and remained active afterwards as the Founder Director as well as being the Chairman of Trustees for the museum.

John Haynes passed on after a short illness on February 8th, 2019, at the age of 80, surrounded by family. His contribution to the automotive world cannot be forgotten…many of us have reminders of his life’s work sitting on the shelves of our garages, waiting for the moment when a bit of insight is needed.