Modified '41 Continental in 1945 Movie

[TG57Roadmaster]

In the <span style="font-style: italic">Film Noir</span> flic, "Detour" (1945, with Tom Neal & Ann Savage), there's a most unusual '41 Continental that dominates the film. It's been modified though, having no hood ornament and wearing '42-style rear fenders, while keeping the previous models' verticle, slanted taillights.

I know I'm not dreaming, but could this have been a wartime conversion (say an accident repair)? Most of all, does this ersatz, prewar-postwar example still exist? Try explaining <span style="font-weight: bold">those</span> mods to your judging team captain!

This "B" film, while grainy and poorly shot, does possess a great deal of "Vanishing America" roadside visuals, making it definitely worth a look-see. Both the sordid plot & period dialog redeem it wonderfully, too.

TG

(I apologize ahead of time for the fuzzy pix.)

[Guest]

Post deleted by psatchwill

[Pontiac59]

Turning sedans into trucks was pretty common, my friend and I each have model A Fords that became pickups and I almost got a third one, and I have a LaSalle cowl that has NYS truck GVW figures painted on it as they used to require.

Given that it's really too old for moviemakers and carmakers to care about trademarks and the like, it's probably just whatever they could come up with at the time, and probably just an accident repair job -

[West Peterson]

Tom

It reminds me of Bob Anderson's 1939 Lincoln Continental prototype convertible that he recently restored. When the designer of the car, Bob Gregorie, received the car from Edsel Ford in the 1940s, one of the first things he did was to change the back end to the 1942-47 style, as he did not like the look of the original Continental back end (he said it looked like a scared dog with its tail tucked between its legs).

[Guest Silverghost]

HELLO: Many of the Once Great Large Classics were turned into tow trucks, farm wagons,funeral cars,etc... I even know of a Rolls~Royce being turned into a stake-pocket estate trash wagon!!!

Another was turned into an early bus-style camper!!!

Many of these large CU.IN. long stroke engines were used later in life to drive sawmills,pump water,drive farm equipment etc...

A 1914 R~R Silverghost engine was found about a year ago in the Phila. area on a large estate .

It had been converted for use as a back-up water pump engine in the estate's mechanical house most likely in the 20s!!!

The main pump engine was a steam engine!!!

I was the one who found this engine!!!

The old Rolls~Royce Radiator was still coupled to the engine!!! No Flying Lady!!!

What a rare find indeed...Now if I could have only found the rest of the old Ghost's chassis!!!

I was also contacted some years ago by a man who had an old 20s Pierce Arrow engine coupled to an antique sawmill in Scullville NJ. The engine still ran!!!

[mrpushbutton]

There was almost no secondary market for the top echelon cars, so many of them became utility vehicles, especially town cars.

[Guest De Soto Frank]

The tail-lights look like '40-'41 Merc ?

[Pontiac59]

We have a '32 Packard Standard Eight that was last used as a sawmill power plant. What's amazing is even with the chassis cut off at about the front of the seat, the axle, steering and fenders removed, what's left still weighs close to 4000 lbs. This one they left the hood and grille shell on along with the cowl. Back then cars lasted longer, even when they had no value people found a use for them. We also have a '37 Plymouth sedan that's cut off behind the front doors, has big truck wheels welded to the drums, and was rigged up as a drivable buzz-saw. To run the saw, you aired up the right rear tire and jacked up the back of the car; to drive it, you let the air out. Guys were more resourceful then - the most recent things I've seen like that were a Chevette turned pickup and a Dodge Omni that had rail wheels bolted on it, a very small railroad used it instead of a hi-rail truck.

[TG57Roadmaster]

Come on guys, the taillights are <span style="font-style: italic">definitely</span> 1st generation Continental. What's even more odd, is that the fenders are seamless to the body; all Connies had fender welts clearly visible. I think this was someone's Hollywood Hot Rod, done during a stateside lull in War Bond drives.

Here's the '41 Mercury's rear end, which doesn't remotely resemble the car in question.

TG

[Guest Silverghost]

I agree that people were more resorceful years ago!!! We had an older famiy friend who used his old 50 Ford pick-up to drive a water well & also drive pilings!!! As a Kid I saw him take the truck to the edge of his field...Jack up the rear-end remove one tire and wheel and replace it with a spare empty rim. He then wrapped a rope around it to lift an old flathead 6 engine block on a pully in a rigged tri-pod to drive the well pipe...It worked...In sandy soil he sunk 75 feet of 1 1/2 pipe to a point that water started to flow!!! He had struck an arteasion well !!! He used this to water his tomatoes & Corn!!!

To this day it still is flowing...some 40 years later!!! The pipe is a bit rusty...but water flows 24/7 !!! I does not freeze!!!

He also had a 1924 Doge brothers home-made tractor!!! He called it his doodlebug tractor!!!

[Guest De Soto Frank]

Mea culpa...

Haven't had to opportunity to view the south end of many ( any?) pre-war Continentals... <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" />

For some reason I was thinking that I had seen that style tailight on a more common auto... ( of Ford lineage)...

[jrbartlett]

In northeastern Texas three decades back there was a Duesenberg Model J engine running a sawmill ripsaw. Car guys used to go look at it (long gone now).

I also knew a fellow who found a Model J engine in a shrimp boat in Panama. That's the engine now on display in the ACD Museum in Auburn, Indiana.