Sandra Button is chairman of the California-based Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance, the most prestigious vintage-car event in the U.S. She discusses her favorite automobile, as told to A.J. Baime:

I can't remember a time when I wasn't interested in cars. I have always loved old cars and old-car people. What's not to like? There's history, and you get to go places.

There's no escaping the fact that the car world is a man's world. I was 6 feet tall at 11 years old, so I guess I've always hung out with the guys. It's been over 10 years since I became chairman of the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance, the oldest continuously running classic car competition in the world. People are always asking me: Which car is your favorite?

When I married my husband, he owned a 1937 Jaguar SS100, so it became ours. It's a quintessential English sports car. It's well-mannered. It does exactly what you ask of it. It has enough power and it has real brakes, so it stops when you want it to. It's a tight little car; you almost feel like you're wearing it as you drive it.

The thing about the SS100 is: We've had so many adventures together—times with friends, times on the road and times on the side of the road. This car has taken us all over England, through the Swiss and Italian Alps into Venice, Budapest and Prague and all the places in between, through Patagonia in Argentina. I can close my eyes and see all these great places we've been with this car. It's the same age as my mother, and it feels like an old friend, a trusted steed.