One of America's most notable Ferrari fans once never considered owning one.

“I always wanted Ferraris,” admits Jon Shirley, “but I knew that I could barely afford a Jaguar E-type, much less a Ferrari, so I never really considered owning them.” This was, of course, before Shirley worked his way up to president of mega-giant Microsoft, before he began trading barely common Ferraris for even more unique models, and before he was able to own, and drive, the very cars that his heroes--Nuvolari, Fangio, Schumacher--had driven.

“My first car was a Sunbeam Alpine; it was a great car, except for the fins on the back. I drove it across the country several times.” He bought the Alpine roadster after he moved from Boston. “I was living in Boston, and car insurance in Boston for someone under 25 years old was higher than it cost to take taxis everywhere, and I’d rent a convertible every weekend, and it was still cheaper.”

Today, Jon Shirley has a collection of significant and important Ferraris, but he’s most proud of his Alfa Romeo P3 grand prix car (tended by Enzo Ferrari’s Scuderia) that whipped more powerful Auto Union cars in 1935 at the German Grand Prix. The more important the car in history, the better he likes it. And to house these machines, he’s built an enormous metal building that gives each car enough space for people to wander and gaze at various distances to view the cars. It’s not a museum—all of the cars run, and Shirley drives them in vintage racing events and at events he puts on by himself, renting race tracks such as Phoenix International Raceway for practice runs.

Shirley found the space to build his garage in the Pacific Northwest next to another building that was already being used by two car enthusiasts, and he was leasing one floor of the building to store his cars and a burgeoning car model collection. He called the building his “clean room”, where he kept his vintage racing cars when they weren’t at the mechanic’s shop.

In the new garage building there are currently about 24 cars, but they are spaced generously, with a lot of room between them to walk and step back to gaze. One end of the building has a couple of offices with a mezzanine above them. The other end houses a workshop, separated by a large system of folding glass doors. The workshop has a hydraulic lift, a full set of tools, parts storage, and a separate door to the outside. This area is used to keep the cars maintained, but at times has been used for major work as well. To keep the large new building functioning, a full-time caretaker for the cars is necessary. Local enthusiast John Bennett, who had recently retired from a career at AT&T, took the job: “When we first started we thought we could do this three days a week. But we found there’s no way we could get everything done even in five days a week.” A bookkeeper occupies an office underneath the mezzanine four days a week.

The hardest part keeping up the building, says Bennett, is keeping the dust off of the cars.

“It still collects a lot of dust, so we have to clean the floor every week.” Fortunately part of the building design included two central vacuum systems, with hose outlets all along the walls. The mammoth air ducts are designed to change the air in the building three times every hour, mostly, says Bennett, to keep any exhaust from the cars from building up. “These fans will turn on if the system detects any emissions in here. They’ll automatically turn on and flush everything out.”

The main floor is simply set up to store cars, and all of the light maintenance is done on the other side of the folding glass wall. “That’s where we do all of our oil and filter, brake fluid, antifreeze and other things,” says Bennett.

Bennett does the maintenance on the cars himself, and also keeps track of which car needs what: “I inventory everything and keep records on the cars. I’ve got two maintenance manuals I use, and I’ve also got a pre-drive manual I use on all the cars.” All of the cars are kept ready to drive at a moment’s notice.

Bennett says they originally thought of putting air lines in the walls, but decided against the task because of its added complexity. The workshop area is well-designed, with built-in cabinets and two parts rooms, along with side-mounted lights. “This parts room in here is definitely not fancy. We’ve got all of our molds, race tires, spare tires, and race parts on the back side of that wall.”

Usually, says Bennett, the shop is full of vintage race cars in various stages of preparation for racing season. “The way this is set up is I manage this building and collection, but all the vintage preparation and all the Pebble Beach show cars are done at another shop. This is the clean place; we are constantly moving cars in and out of here. Every one of them gets driven. And so they spend time here. Usually John will call up and say bring these over to my house--he’s only got a three car garage on his house, and they’re filled up always with cars.”

About five times a year the garage hosts meetings for the Ferrari, Alfa, BMW, and other car clubs. “When the vintage races were in town, we once had a barbeque and luckily it didn’t rain, and it was outside and the weather was great. We invited everyone, the corner workers, the other racers, and it was a big party,” says Bennett. Shirley’s also had charity events where a private party for 20 lucky folks is auctioned off. The catered events get a tour and a talk about each car from Shirley.

Bennett mentions that the amount of wall space in the huge garage poses a problem for decoration: “The whole picture thing is kind of funny. We started out with a few pieces of art. And then Jon would bring three or four over once we had everything sorted and on the wall, and we would end up moving 22 pictures just to put one or two up.”

Shirley is proud of his efforts to find clean un-restored versions of cars he feels are significant. “I had to work to find this Austin Healy, and the XK120 with British Racing Green, and the 67 E-type that was not modified. It’s hard to find one with miles on it that’s still original and hasn’t been rebuilt or restored.”

“My interest is in Ferraris, from the time I first rode in one. I like dual-purpose cars, ones that can be raced, and have a significant racing history, and also be driven to the track on the street or around town for shopping errands. I like a great racing history. That’s why I like the front-engine Ferraris. That also means the GTO is the last year for those cars.”

“I also developed an interest in Alfas, after I saw the P3 racer. That is the best history of any car I have. It was driven by Nuvolari and it beat the Germans, and they must have stood around and scratched their heads because they had faster cars, but Nuvolari still beat them.”

Because Shirley drives a lot of Ferraris on the racetrack and at events like the 1000-mile Mille Miglia rally in Italy, Bennett has gathered some insight about old Ferraris: “Ferraris can be on their death bed and they still run, they still go.” This year Shirley drove an Alfa, however. “I just got back from the Mille Miglia and I had a ’38 touring Alfa on that. It was a fantastic drive. I love driving the cars.”

The quickest car that Shirley has driven is the ’97 F310B Ferrari driven by Michael Schumacher. “The brakes are so much better than anything I’d ever experienced. Of course the acceleration is high, but the brakes are so good. When I first drove the car when I used the brakes my glasses came forward and hit the inside of the helmet visor. I had to tape the glasses to keep them from sliding off of my head. The g forces are so high, you have to belt yourself in so tight. I just got back from driving it at Phoenix a month ago,” he recalls. “We rented the track for two days. If there’s a hot Formula Atlantic and a competent driver and he’s setting good times, you can go out in the Ferrari race car and match his times without trying very hard. That’s without going into the corners quick enough to risk sliding off.”

Shirley also bought the first publicly available ‘05 Ford GT, the spiritual successor to the Ford GT40, the legendary Ferrari-beater of the late1960s, and he took it to the racetrack as well. “When we took the car to Laguna to run it,” recalls Bennett, “Ford flew one of their test drivers out, and we never got the car on the track because that was the day the car was recalled to fix the suspension. The car was grounded for four months, and then they had to come out here and spend 12 hours reinstalling everything. Each time, Ford sent one of their Roush mechanics out. Every one of those guys is a college graduate engineer, it was impressive. When we went to the track they sent out a pallet full of oil, all new rotors, pads, everything, and they never charged us for it. Great guys.”

Although Shirley favors older Ferraris because they’re classic front-engine designs, the new front-engine cars intrigue him. “The next car I guess I’d like to drive would be the new series of front engine Ferraris, the 599. I’d like to drive a Maranello. I’ve seen the 360/430; the 355 I love very much. I haven’t driven a 250 SWB but I’d like to on the track.”

Shirley learned to drive early. “My uncle in Alabama let me drive the tractor around the farm.” Shirley’s father ran a Marine base in Puerto Rico. “In junior high in Puerto Rico, I used to drive around the base. My father told the Marines to look out for me and let him know if I was doing anything I shouldn’t. I became a competent driver there.”

Shirley credits his fantastic collection of Ferraris to the timing he chose to retire from Microsoft in 1990. “It was a great time to retire because the market for Ferraris had just fallen apart in 1989. It was great time to buy cars. People would tell me that I was paying too much for a 166MM, for example, and they would say that’s more than the car’s worth. But I would tell them that I’m not buying the cars as investments, I’m buying them because I like them. Well, in the long run, though, they did go way up in value.”

He’s shown some of his cars at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance. “We have been to Pebble six times, and right after we finish a car there, we take it on a tour. Cars are meant to be driven. It’s too bad there are some people who don’t drive them.”

Shirley gets his hands dirty during restoration, too. “I restored completely an XK120, just like the one I have now. Exactly like it.” And if he’s not doing the actual wrenching during a restoration, he’s right in there with the mechanic. “When I have someone restore a car for me now, I do it with them. We pull the engine apart and look at the rods to figure out if they’re stock or if the engine has been rebuilt. It’s the only way to see what the car really looks like inside. If they’re Carrillo rods or something, we know it’s been rebuilt.”

Shirley started collecting models of his favorite cars also around the time he retired. He estimates that he has about 500 now, enough that he had to store them with his real cars, since they wouldn’t fit in his home. He designed the glass cases where the models are on display, and he arranges them himself. “I don’t spend as much time here in the garage as I’d like to, or in my garage at home. I came back from Italy with some models that were made in Belgium, some Alfa models, and I wanted to rearrange the display cases and add them to the cases,” he recalls. “I spent a Saturday and Sunday alone here.” When he says that, you get the idea that life doesn’t get any better than that.