Saturday night, mid-October, 1958. The Presidential Bar at Riverside’s historic Mission Inn is jammed with people talking about tomorrow’s race, the first Los Angeles Times U.S. Grand Prix. Masten Gregory and Carroll Shelby sit at our table; both will drive cars—a Ferrari 410 Sport and a Maserati 450S, respectively—brought by my father, John Edgar. The rest of the racing talent is just as impressive: Jean Behra, Roy Salvadori, Ken Miles, Lance Reventlow, Chuck Daigh and Dan Gurney, driving a mix of Ferraris, Maseratis, Aston Martins, Jaguars and Scarabs.

And then there’s 31-year-old Phil Hill. Hill, who had won both Sebring and Le Mans earlier in the year, will be driving John von Neumann’s Ferrari 412 MI (s/n 0744MI). The red, alloy-bodied Scaglietti Spyder is Maranello’s most potent sports-racer to date, its 4,023cc V12 delivering a factory-claimed 447 horsepower at 8,500 rpm.

West Coast Ferrari distributor von Neumann paid twice the price of a new 250 TR for the 412 MI, built expressly to beat Reventlow’s Scarabs. Hill’s first outing in s/n 0744, in a Formula Libre race three weeks earlier at Watkins Glen, was plagued by handling problems (“The roadholding of my car was diabolical, behaving as if the left-rear shock was not working properly, and I slid off the road five times before I finally retired the Ferrari,” he wrote), but the car’s brute strength was dramatically evident. With its suspension now sorted, the one-off 412 MI appears poised to end Scarab supremacy.

Sunday morning at the track brings 70,000 spectators and scorching heat; the mercury hits 100 degrees before the green flag waves. Hill, in black helmet, red polo shirt and chinos, sits in s/n 0744 on the front row. He is bracketed by a pair of blue 5.5-liter Scarabs—Reventlow in powder blue to his right, Daigh in an orange jump suit on his left. A legendary duel is about to begin.

Straight from the start, nose-to-tail and side-by-side, Hill and Daigh swap the lead lap after lap. They once trade places twice in the same turn. The unimaginably loud Ferrari V12 can be heard above all of the other 42 starters, its radical firing order based on that of Maranello’s four-cylinder engines.

Shockingly, Hill pits on Lap 21—the afternoon’s severe heat had caused vapor lock. The 412 MI, like many Ferraris of the era, has both a mechanical and an electric fuel pump. If the mechanical pump gets too hot, the driver has to turn on the electric pump. He only has a short window to do so, however, before the electric pump can’t save it, and that’s what happened at Riverside.

Daigh pulls out a commanding lead as the Ferrari returns to the pits twice more. Finally, on Lap 58, with only four to go, Hill parks s/n 0744 and climbs out. Daigh wins, and Scarab again proves itself mightier than Ferrari.

Hill later described this exact 4-liter four-cam V12, developed by Vittorio Bellentani and other engineers at Ferrari, first as the Tipo 136, then 140 and 141, as “my favorite engine.” The V12 has a fascinating history, one which involves three chassis—two of which Hill drove.

The four cam was first fitted to the 335 S (s/n 0646) driven by the Marquis Alfonso de Portago in the 1957 Mille Miglia. But the car crashed on a fast straight just short of the finish at Brescia, killing de Portago and his navigator, the American Eddie Nelson, along with 10 spectators. The engine was removed from the wrecked chassis, then repaired and hopped-up at the factory with higher compression, hotter cams and bigger carburetors.

The following year, the V12 found a new home in a 375 F1 monoposto for the Race of Two Worlds. Held at Monza in June, this unusual 500-mile race featured American Indy roadsters and drivers taking on the best that Europe had to offer. Ferrari entered two cars for the contest: the 375 F1, piloted by Luigi Musso and Mike Hawthorn and called the 412 MI for 4 liters, 12 cylinders and “Monza Indianapolis,” and a reworked F2 single-seater powered by a 3-liter Dino V6, driven by Hill.

When his car retired, Hill joined Musso and Hawthorn in the 412 MI. In the third and final 63-lap race, Hill, deafened by the engine and thoroughly beat-up by the rough track and extreme banking at 170 mph, pushed the car to its best finish, third overall, behind two Indy roadsters.

After the “Monzanapolis” race, the 4-liter engine was pulled from the 375 chassis and shelved—but not for long. Like the possessed Dr. Frankenstein in Mary Shelley’s monster tale, Ferrari’s engineers stitched together a new 412 MI for von Neumann, combining the four-cam V12 with an experimental Tipo 524 312 S chassis that had been raced as a works entry by Olivier Gendebien at Spa-Francorchamps in May 1958. Personally tested by Hill in Modena, the intended Scarab killer was christened by the factory as 412 MI s/n 0744, and freighted off in late August to Ferrari Representatives of California—ready to enter the battle it was created for.

Before its trip overseas, however, the four-cam twelve was reworked for its new role. For example, the six twin-choke Weber 42 DNC carburetors had been bored out to 46mm for the wide-open Monza, but were sleeved back to 42mm for von Neumann.

The 312 S chassis featured a transverse four-speed gearbox in unit with the differential and a rear-mounted starter activated by a lever between the seats. Suspension in back was classic Ferrari de Dion with transverse leaf spring and Houdaille hydraulic-lever shock absorbers. Upper and lower A-arms, coil springs and another pair of Houdailles resided up front. The car was delivered to von Neumann with drum brakes, but these were converted to Dunlop discs after Hill’s race at Riverside. Some time later, the center throttle was moved to the right of the brake and clutch pedals.