Jump to content

What are some of the great "missing" Classics, prewar American?


trimacar

Recommended Posts

On 12/9/2018 at 7:20 PM, alsancle said:

Is the Pirate still around?

 

image.png.d3e86878026b4805d969ee441a1f8aea.png

 Paul is correct: Not that 1930 Pirate Sedan, as far as the Franklin Club knows about.   I want to say in one of the Aircooled News it discusses the car and references that when new it was stolen and vandalized/burnt (that being said wives-tale or not, I believe one or two other Autoshow photos of it exist).

 

Sidenote:  What is really interesting is the high volume of Custom Built Franklins - photos so far have not even been even close to tip of the iceberg.  Also, while this pirate sedan has sidemounted spare tire (they moved them forward), the wheelbase on a Franklin are relatively small with the large Series chassis being 132" and the unlike other makes it is not uncommon to see custom cars with rear mounted spares. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, PFitz said:

Walt,

 

Yes that Derham town car has been carried over in the Club's Rosters. I tend to forget it as a "known survivor" because one of my customers tried very hard to track it down a few years ago with no success as to if it's still around somewhere. 

 

But, I do get to see and re-enjoy yours now that Bob has been bringing it the Trek. And I get to see the Berline body & chassis everytime I go in our Saratoga Springs garage. So I'm certain those two exist.    :D

 

Paul

Driv side doors open.JPG

Paul, it is interesting that the front doors are designed for a use as a Town Car, though the roof does not have Town Car functionality. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

33 minutes ago, RICHELIEUMOTORCAR said:

 I could not help myself, this is such a good topic so I dug out more of my uncle's photo albums and what I have been finding has been amazing. Most photos have dates on the back along with the make of car, some have owner's names from the time the photos were taken. I will post photos, all I ask is that if someone would like to use a photo for anything unrelated to the forum and this topic is to reach out to me before you use any photos. Fair enough? Here are a few to start with. First photo says on back, "30 and 36 Benz, 1962". Second photo says, "29 SS Hershey 67 Charlie". I think that may be Charles Mulhern's old car. Next photo of classics dated May 1959. I think the first J photo I posted was part of this row of cars. Next photo, hard to view, it says, 11 Mercer, 08 Napier June 1952.

IMG_6107.JPG

 

The 540k was owned by Charles Thetford of NJ in the late 50s and early 60s.

 

Edited by alsancle (see edit history)
Link to comment
Share on other sites

20 minutes ago, RICHELIEUMOTORCAR said:

OK one more for the road. This photo says, "Judges in a huddle" Also dated 1968. Anyone know where this Rolls Royce is today? Enjoy.

IMG_6112.JPG

 

Yes, I was looking at the car less than two weeks ago, and ate lunch today with the owners son at the time the photo was taken. I use to own that Pierce next to it........small world!

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The 1934 LeBaron coupe that John Lindhardt owned that you showed a photo of is owned by Bob Bahre in Maine. It was sold new to a fellow who lived in Roslyn, long island , NY. I have a period photo of it ca. 1950. I attended the former pre 1942 car show held each September in Ridgefield , Ct. that was run by the Fairfield County Region HCCA once in that Packard - wow it could really move!  It was an amazing original car.

Perhaps I may be wrong but I thought that the Harrah Franklin town car was still in that collection.

Re the front  doors on the Franklin Berline coming from a town car - most likely the Berline and town car shared this build as Derham wanted a very narrow profile windshield post and a new door design that would have a heavier frame ( like on the rear doors) would ruin the look - they had the castings so probably used them and never gave it a thought.

WG

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes, that's the 34 LeBaron Coupe that Bob Bahre in Maine owns today, still in fantastic original condition. I had the pleasure of helping his collection manager Jeff O. measure the car to see if it would fit in the elevator at the Atlanta Museum of Modern Art. The car was on display there most of the year. It's a top three collection in the world...........and possibly even higher, depending on your taste in vehicles. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A one off from my hometown. Very well done, cut down from a 1931 V-12 sedan. They even did the wheels right............and check out the hub caps.......attention to detail. You just don't get anyone making that kind of effort anymore. The shop evolved and was in business till about five years ago. The truck is gone as far as I know.

IMG_0145.jpg

Edited by edinmass (see edit history)
Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, RICHELIEUMOTORCAR said:

 Wow! I think most of us remember this Packard custom right? I recall seeing a blue one at Amelia Island a while back or maybe Pebble Beach? I also recall my uncle saying one of the coupes was cooked in a fire in the mid 1950s? Anyways, Photo says "Aero Sport Coupe LeBaron 4 built" New York J.G. Linhardt 1968. I wonder who has the car today? I have a number of old photos of this coupe.

IMG_6114.JPG

Whoa!! Now that story rings a bell. Sometime in the middle 80s while I was drooling over Rob Myers work at the infant RM Restorations  in Chatham Ontario I watched them rebuild that burned out coupe. Don't know who it was for but they had either borrowed or bought one of the other 3 coupes and completely fabricated everything - hinges, fittings, the whole body using it as a pattern. . What they started with was the cowl. the front fenders, engine and chassis . I saw the remains of the original - I think it had been consigned to a fencerow for years - and to say it was rough would be an understatement.  I think the main body had been so used up in the fire that it had been torn off, leaving a sorry derelict chassis. They showed me the serial numbers stamped into the firewall that identified it positively as one of the 4 custom bodied coupes. With Myers trademark attention to detail, the rebuilt coupe was/is gorgeous. Does anyone know where it is now?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The rebuilt coupe is in a major collection along the east coast, with about three or four dozen other Packards. I saw photos of it while it was still out in the open, it was a major undertaking to bring it back, When I saw it last year, it looked like it was new. To my knowledge it hasn’t been out of the garage in quite some time. Ed

Link to comment
Share on other sites

While I'm really enjoying seeing the contemporary photos from relatively recent car shows (post 1942), may I request that a new thread with those types of photos be started? The focus of this thread, if I'm not mistaken (David correct me if I'm wrong) is to post photos of cars that are for the most part not known to exist, or if they do, only known by a scant few. Perhaps the new thread could be called, "Where are they now?"

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Went through my files and found these perfectly awful photos of the aforementioned 1929 Duesenberg dual cowl on which I worked when I was a kid. Not much to identify it beyond my notes on the back that say "1929 Duesenberg J Dual Cowl Phaeton, Hale Farm & Village Car Show, August 1985, owner Sey Rosenblatt." I'm sure I took a photo of the back of the car because I got to install the taillights and help with the trunk rack.

 

Duesenberg1.thumb.jpg.c0aef18af9dea3415d0fc434c9a0c54f.jpg

 

 

 

Here are two other local Duesenbergs some of you might recognize:

 

Duesenberg2.thumb.jpg.ef322d919003fdf835612e8ca7eac236.jpg
 

Both photos were obviously taken at the same event, but only the phaeton on the bottom has a note indicating, "1931 Duesenberg dual cowl phaeton, Western Reserve Concours, July 13, 1985, owner Alfred Ferrara," which I'm sure I just copied from the info card at the show. I do not know if the sedan was/is also Ferrara's. It is not the big sedan I saw the year before, which I specifically recall having blackwalls (which I HATED as a kid--sorry, AJ). 

 

Again, sorry for the dreadful photography. I was experimenting with being a photographer around this time, including setting up my own dark room, but it turns out I was really, really bad at it. Probably best left to others

 

And just since I found the photos and am having a good memory from childhood, here is my all-time favorite car--nothing amazing, just a 1933 Packard Twelve 5P sedan. It's still in the same family's ownership today, and if I could have only one car forever, this would probably be it. Don't know why I love it so much other than I spent a lot of great days in the back seat listening to the big V12 purr. This is when everyone drove their cars and they probably worked pretty well. These photos were taken at two different shows, the aforementioned Western Reserve show on top and Stan Hywet on the bottom, both summer 1985.

 

Packard1.thumb.jpg.15f073f56017e51552194ff18bb56286.jpg

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

23 minutes ago, K8096 said:

Ed, this Pierce was on the Eastside of Cleveland in the 1950's.  Any idea if it survived?  I think it's a 1935 eight cylinder.  It hasn't turned up around here.   

 

 

IMG_3563.JPG

 

Looks like the car I bought about eight years ago in Amherst Ohio. (Just outside of Cleavland.) Same year, series, and body style. Purchased it out of a barn from a working farm. Restoration was started. It was mostly apart. We cut it up, and sold off almost every piece. The entire body and all the tin went to replace the Coachwork on a very rusty car in Utica New York. My best guess it a ninty five  percent chance it’s the car I had.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, alsancle said:

Dupont’s are very cool but NEVER publically available. I can think of 2 in the last 15 years.

 

I assume they try to keep them all in the family.  The one person I know who had two was a du Pont, and I didn't see either up for sale after he passed away.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 hours ago, West Peterson said:

While I'm really enjoying seeing the contemporary photos from relatively recent car shows (post 1942), may I request that a new thread with those types of photos be started? The focus of this thread, if I'm not mistaken (David correct me if I'm wrong) is to post photos of cars that are for the most part not known to exist, or if they do, only known by a scant few. Perhaps the new thread could be called, "Where are they now?"

Yes, West, that was my original intent, but the variances haven't really bothered me.  It's all interesting.  

 

I think that any car shown in a picture post-1950 is still around, although in the case of some particular cars may have been rebodied.  A lot of Duesenberg sedans have had bodies removed for more "desirable" coachwork, for example, and I still wonder where those bodies end up gathering dust......

 

I think a "where are they now" would be a good thread, although I'd bet you'd start getting 10 year old pictures of much newer cars....

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This amazing thread is mostly about customs and one-offs, but I hope the crew won't mind if I add a much less unique missing pre-war American classic, and the caveat that I am pretty much directly violating West's proposed rule.  :)  Anyway, the below is a 1931 Cadillac 370A (V-12) Coupe, bodied by Fisher, Engine number 1003689.  Here it is one of the last times I saw it, in the mid 1980s, when it hadn't run in decades  The engine was later pulled and in pieces in a failed effort to get it running, and the car was left in a barn near Long Valley, New Jersey, until it was given away around 2004.  I haven't been able to tell what happened to it: Might have been scrapped or parted out, sadly.  Not a high dollar car relative to the ones in this thread, of course.

 

1931Cadillac.jpeg.7f49458d1d73e275c46917df2ffcc5c1.jpeg

 

 

 

Edited by 1935Packard (see edit history)
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Orin, that 31 Caddy is a very nice car.........after all, my first old car was an identical machine........minus 4 cylinders. If my memory serves me, there are four remaining including the one shown above. Back in the 90's, the count was only three, but a friend put one cut down into a pick up truck back together. Looks like a very solid car.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

This has been a great thread....almost seven thousand views in five days........it's covered fantastic cars.........explored missing and found cars.......and a few that disappeared in recent times.........while viewing this thread just remember one thing.......the most interesting cars can't be posted, as there are people trying to land them and roll them out for a future concours........off the top of my head I can think of about a dozen world class cars that are conspicuously absent........and I hope it stays that way.............landing a "sleeper" is one of the great things in out hobby. I am sure Dave who started this topic is OK with it morphing into people posting photos of old family cars or "neighborhood cars" that have go missing over the years. It's perfectly fine to open up the scope of what's posted here.........keep it going and pay it forward.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hupp36.......thats a big task..........finding original owners today becomes almost impossible. BUT....don't give up. In the last three days I actually found some very early paperwork on one of the one off cars in this thread. (Auto show car.) I managed for the family members of the current owner to purchase the archive, which had fantastic provenance on the car not known, including paperwork with bill of sale, registrations, names of unknown owners, and a bunch of other stuff. I didn't make a dime on the stuff....and it actually cost me about 150 dollars out of pocket. I was more intrested that the materials get to where they belong. Someone is going to have a GREAT Christmas. I'll be sure that some of the archive is posted here Christmas morning. The stuff was so good, I had to have copies for myself. Never stop looking. In the pile of materials we were able to find the seconed owners son, now in his 80's. Hopefully we can get him on the phone to see if he has more information, and maybe some more photos of the car when it was new......or just a few years old. Time will tell. It's the second time this year I was able to make contact with lost people in the cars history, and secure information and additional photos of back in the day. Here is a photo of the car we took to Pebble this year, and a guy actually walked up to me and said...."My old car!" It was a great moment to meet a guy who drove it as an every day car while going college back in the very early fifties.The photo was taken just as the guy came up to me and was asking about the car. 

 

IMG_7663.JPG

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just now, 1937hd45 said:

I can't help but notice that closed cars are now popular, and I guess it is ok to pour funds into their restorations. Bob 

 

Time makes all things come full circle. At the true top of the market, whether a car is open or closed doesn't influence price.......closed cars regularly sell for more than opens today, and that goes for pre and post war cars. Personally I like the fit, finish, and attention to detail seen on closed cars that you just don't find on the open cars. I am a particular fan of town cars......which today no one seems to appreciate, so with a bit of luck I should be able to find one that fits my budget.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/11/2018 at 8:55 PM, K8096 said:

And here's one of the three 1934 Packard Twelve Dietrich convertible coupes at Dennison University, Ohio, 1957.  This one was battleship grey at the time.   

To K8096,

To you and all the bloggers, this thread is more fun then a treasure hunt for kids!  Throughly enjoying the photos and the history lessons.  

In regards to the photo that you posted of the 34 Dietrich conv coupe, would you happen to know who was the owner of the car back then and do you have any idea which one of the three that I am admiring?  Any chance you have more photos of this beauty?

 

Brian

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...