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Pennsylvania: Miquon (Closed Junkyard)


md murray

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From the map it looks like this little hamlet is right across the river from the Philadelphia country club. There is a great series of photos from the 1940's that show a number of junk but all very high end 1920's/30's cars laying around a large property.  They are so special in fact that one would think that there must be an old timer from the area that remembers them ( I'll bet Bayard Badenhausen would know). I had wanted to post a few of them here but If I am to respect the wishes of The Revs Institute digital library I guess I can only post a link? They are definitely worth a look- several early Rolls, Cadillac, a Napier everything-pretty interesting all taken by Smith Hempstone Oliver who would appear to have been a pretty cool guy that captured pictures of some amazing stuff back in the day. Anyhow, it would be pretty neat if someone remembered how and who exactly saved all these special cars-Hopefully they avoided the scrap heap.

https://library.revsinstitute.org/digital/custom/single-image?id=276452&collection=p17257coll1

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His name was Lockhart (as I recall) he and was well known to all the Philadelphia area car collectors. Cars were mostly left outside to rot and have trees grow up through them. Many sad stories of very high end cars. Hemp Oliver was a frequent visitor to many of the early AACA meets in the Philadelphia area and well known by all the early collectors.   Most of the cars, or remains thereof, ended up as scrap I believe.

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I think there may have been a article in either the Bulb Horn ( VMCCA) or an issue of the Antique Automobile in either the e1950s or 1960s about this collection, and the article probably was authored by Hemp Oliver.

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Walt, thank you -that solves the mystery! There is a man in coveralls standing next to the Napier who appears in another Oliver photo sitting next to club co-founder Tom McKean. This man is named FRANK LOCKWOOD. Very interesting stuff for sure- Now I'm on a mission to do some digging and find the article you're referring to!

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Thanks for the correction re Frank Lockwood's name. I have several pictures of Frank standing next to Tom McKean and Tom's Scripps-Booth at an early meet. Tom and Hemp Oliver were doth founding members of the VMCCA. Tom's great, great (?) grandfather was a signer of the Declaration of Independence and Tom was the 6th AACA president. I remember him from the Devon, Pa. meets that preceded Hershey. Tom's extensive literarure collection is the one being given to the Simeone Foundation and the AACA library.

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46 minutes ago, A. Ballard 35R said:

Thanks for the correction re Frank Lockwood's name. I have several pictures of Frank standing next to Tom McKean and Tom's Scripps-Booth at an early meet. Tom and Hemp Oliver were doth founding members of the VMCCA. Tom's great, great (?) grandfather was a signer of the Declaration of Independence and Tom was the 6th AACA president. I remember him from the Devon, Pa. meets that preceded Hershey. Tom's extensive literarure collection is the one being given to the Simeone Foundation and the AACA library.

That Tom McKean has got be the most photogenic AACA member in history- every picture of him just exudes total Charisma! There is a Hemp Oliver picture from the Devon meet with Mr. McKean and his lovely wife in a very early Pierce with his kids seated next to them in a smaller toy car and everybody is just beaming-totally having a blast. It's one of the happiest little vignettes I've ever seen and it very neatly sums up everything we should all ever strive for and hope to get out of our involvement in this club of ours. The AACA should seriously frame the picture and hang it up in the headquarters somewhere.

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Yes, I was at that Devon meet and have that same picture of Tom in his Pierce Motorette that had just been finished early that same morning. The little electric car beside him has Jay Van Sciver III in it. I have posted the picture on this forum quite a while ago and it is indeed a great photo. As you probably know, Tom met a very untimely death around 1949 when his Alvis went off the road on the way to a car event in Connecticut.

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Oh that's very sad- I had no idea. All those young guys look like they had a wonderful time with some spectacular cars back in the day. Some of the best pictures in the collection show the gang with their cars all lined up along the infield at the Indy 500 just after the war. There is an 851/852 speedster(with New York plates-so they had quite a road trip), Packard 733 and Duesenberg all lined up and everyone is stretched out, laying on the hoods and hanging out in the sun watching the action. I'm almost tempted to pay the Revs Institute their $40 fee for a copy of this one!

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