john2dameron

I have another story to tell. There's a Chevy dealer about 30 miles away that I have bought several cars from. I went there looking for a car and the salesman talked me into driving a Buick crossover about 3 years old (can't recall the model name). He went to get a tag to put on the car and the boss said I couldn't drive it because they had filled it up with gas to take some guys to another town to bring back a car. I don't know if that was the only car they had in shape to make a 2-hour trip or if they didn't have money enough to fill another gas tank but I left and haven't been back.

Flattop, I also read that story in a book written by a retired preacher who was telling how he got lost getting to the cemetery to preach a funeral and the digger's remark was he'd never before heard anyone pray like that for a septic tank. Sorry, but I had to tell you.

A wise lady I once knew, whose husband owned a few Model T's (because he loved Model T's, not because it was all he could afford) told me when I commented on how nice a wealthy person had been to me at a car show said, "John, it not the people who have money that you have to be wary of, it's the people who want you to think they have money." Several years ago the Rolls-Royce Bentley Owners met at the Homestead Hotel in Hot Springs, Virginia and announced Thursday that their cars would be on display Friday. I went up there and spent several hours talking to the car owners and taking pictures and I don't think I have ever felt more welcome or met nicer people at a car show.

Old trucks never die. We just bury them away.

I have actually been denied the opportunity to testd rive a vehicle that I was absolutely serious about wanting to buy. I went to look at a LUV pickup one afternoon at a Chevy dealer and the salesman took me for a ride but would not let me drive it; he did all the driving. I didn't know what he was trying to hide but I decided to let him keep it.

Buckster, cars have different types of appeal. Thus you see people not wanting the same car their neighbor has. My opinion is that the Chrysler and DeSoto 4-door sedans from 1946 to the early 1949 models had a look of class about them that a lot of cars never came close to. I don't have any advice for you; I just want to say I admire your choice of a car.

Pete O. Thank you for the reply. I had found info that Foo-Dog was a mythical Chinese lion-dog type of animal but could not determine a relationship to an AACA trophy.

I no longer trust gas stablizers. I used it in a chain saw and a lawn mower and it stopped up everything with a red putty-like gel. Never again.

I read the March/April Antique Automobile magazine today for the second time and noticed that among the awards given at the annual meeting was a Foo-Dog Award. Now I'm curious. What does the Foo-Dog award represent?

Sebastian, Welcome to the site. The Buick looks great. I have friends who have long been into older cars. The older guy is about my age (75), the dad might be pushing 50, and his son is about 18. He finished restoring a '66 Buick Wildcat hardtop sedan about a year ago and did a very nice job with it. I like to see the younger folk taking care of the older cars.

Thanks Keiser. My mind was saying DeSoto and everyone else was saying Chrysler and I was thinking, What the heck.

It was a big deal in the fifties to put dual exhausts with a pair of Smithy mufflers on your car if it had a V-8 engine. Even the street rodded flathead Fords of the thirties were usually so equipped. One of the better sounding cars in our neighborhood was a '52 Chevy with a GMC straight six engine and a split header on it feeding into a pair of glass packs. Many people often got tickets for their cars being excessively noisy but the guys would continue to run the loud exhausts and hope to get off the gas if they spotted a cop before he heard them and gave them a ticket. I ran a lake pipe on a '65 Chevrolet pickup. I usually kept it capped when in Virginia but some days I'd pull the cap and get on it and make a run for home. I put a glasspack on a '60 Chevy pickup but it hardly had enough power to make it sound good. However I discovered the day after I put it on that I could turn the ignition switch off and quickly back on and get quite an explosion from it. Coming down the road the day after I put the glasspack on I cut the switch off and back on and it got really loud. Came in the next turn and two trooper cars were sitting there. Someone had wrecked and they were investigating the wreck. I expected them to give chase to me but they did not. I got home and the muffler was split wide open from one end to the other. Strangely enough it was guaranteed not to split. As a word of warning let me say cutting the ignition off and on can ruin an engine.

Rocketraider, My mom came from Madison County, Virginia. My father-in-law had a farm in Summer's County West Virginia. That red clay gets slick when it rains and you can hardly drive on it plus it will not come off your shoes. Now I'm fifty miles from F-I-L's farm and 150 from Grand daddy's farm and never want to deal with red clay again. I love living in the hills.

Mine came Saturday or Monday. I opened it one day and went through most of it. I've been putting together an album of photos of antique cars for a young lad for his upcoming birthday so the magazine kind of got laid back but I must have opened it Monday. The young friend will be 9 in September so I'm working on it real early. When I finish it there will be about 100 5 x 7 photos in it and some extensive, informative captions. It will take a lot of time but he's worth it and no, he is not kin to me. Just an exceptionally nice young man that likes cars.

Shane, I like the mountains better then the flatter country; therefore I'd want to choose something along I-81 over I-95. That would include (from the north) Winchester, Stephens City, Harrisonburg, Staunton/Waynesboro, Lexington, and Roanoke. Farther south nearing Tennessee are Wytheville, Abingdon, and Bristol. Winchester and Roanoke areas have AACA chapters. When I say mountains I don't mean rugged mountains but moderate mountains. I much prefer the Blue Ridge Mountain area to the Piedmont area with it's red clay soil but each to his own likings.

I know of a couple of towns that still have brick streets here and there. Driving any vehicle on them is a memorable experience. I can only imagine how it would be in a high-wheeler. Never the less, I love seeing the Sears and Holsman and International Harvester high-wheelers at shows.

Isn't there a Corvette collection that covers all years?

Bob, Some Henry J's did have trunk lids. I think it was a running change during the 1951 model year. I have photos of them with and without trunklids.

Unless I am badly mistaken, 426 wedge and Hemi engines were never offered in Chrysler cars, only the Plymouth and Dodge brands. The 440 was first offered in 1966.

Or become a politician.

Apparently Virginia State Police required troopers to furnish their own vehicle at one time. Local trooper had a '47-'48 Pontiac coupe that he traded on a '49 Ford V-8. A resident of WV bought the Pontiac and was using it to commute to work in Covington, VA. One evening the trooper spotted his former Pontiac moving too fast and gave chase but the Pontiac outran the Ford. He found out who had bought his tradein and tried to buy it back but Williard would not sell it. About 1952 that same trooper became sheriff of Alleghany County and apparently liked unmarked cars. My friend came out of the military in 1953, was hired as a deputy and given a brown '53 Plymouth. Can you imagine that car outrunning anything unless it was a Model A Ford. In '54 the rest of the dept. got '54 Chevrolet 150 sedan. I think there were four, black, powder blue, turquoise and one more that I do not remember. They must kept the Chevys several years. The next thing I remember is a friend getting hired as a deputy as driving a pale lime green '59 Ford. The next county cars I remember were '62 Dodges. Those things were hideous. They were traded on '67 Dodge Coronets and two of our neighbors bought the '62 Dodges. One was white and the other was brown. Another friend wrecked his '67 Coronet one night during a chase and when he came back to work they got him a '68 Plymouth Fury I, an unmarked white car with a 440 magnum V-8. I had a '68 Chrysler 300 with a 440 and it was fast but that Plymouth would fly. He'd hit the gas and you'd hear the carb sucking air and that thing would leap forward screaming. I'm thinking the '67 Dodges might have been replaced by AMC's and I think that lot was all the one color, brown. Before that you knew which deputy you met by the color of the car he drove. Now they have an assortment of Fords, Chevys, and Dodges, some marked, some unmarked but for years all the sheriff cars were unmarked. I had several late night rides in that '68 Fury and one night I was instructed to pickup an army carbine from the floor and use it if I needed to to but that is another story.

The portholes on the Buick at the far left of the first photo appear to be those used by Buick in 1956. The oldest car I see in the 2nd photo is the -55 Studebaker wagon, and the Plymouth wagon in the 3rd photo is a '56 model.

Someone posted a photo of a 1937 Chevrolet COE on the ATHS thread on Facebook just a day or two ago and said Ford offered a COE one year earlier, which would be 1936. I'm not saying it is true; I'm just saying someone thought it was.

About 1948 I started clipping photos of antique cars from magazines my uncle gave dad, including Look, Life, Colliers, and Saturday Evening Post. About that time or soon thereafter Thompson Products were running ads in the SEP featuring cars from their collection. Buried deep somewhere I have two scrap books of the pictures and articles I clipped.

It seems to me that they put out a similar plea for donations a year or two ago.