Mini masterpieces

MV itself had contested the class for some years with its own two stroke, which began life as a 98cc and was the brainchild of Domenico Agusta, son of the company founder Count Giovanni Agusta. The Agusta empire had begun in 1923 as an aircraft company – Construzioni Aeronautiche Giovanni Agusta – in the northern Italian town of Verghera, but the Count passed away in 1927 leaving his wife Giuseppina to run the company, which she did very well. The company prospered but the war put a stop to that, and post-war Giuseppina and her sons Domenico and Vincenzo were faced with finding work for the company’s many employees. Domenico knew there would be