History We ALL Love a DARE! PIX of TRULY Extinct Makes?

Hiya, Zerk, and welcome anytime to this theme we have going here. I'm sure my compadres (the regulars) appreciate the pat on the back as much as I do. We have had FUN looking WAY back into U.S. (and world) auto history, with an eye to how early auto development was, indeed, the harbinger -- and laid the engineering groundwork -- for modern hotrodding!!! Ryan and the guys must have wondered about us, occasionally, BUT it really does ALL fit together in the same, car-loving ball-O-wax!

 

Okay, okay, I'm not looking for a cut-and-paste history of this Minnesota company. They were a respected make, around quite a while. And there's plenty of info on the internet about them.

BUT, THIS car amazes me. The FACTS exist about how it came about. The PROBLEM is:

WHAT HAPPENED TO IT?
DOES IT STILL EXIST?
IF SO, DOES THE CURRENT OWNER HAVE ANY NICE PIX?

 

I would guess sometime in the 1960s. That car in the current market might bring 75k.

 

Continuing on with ID'ing my frames, I think there is some real merit to these frames being from a Huffman truck. I went up into the ceiling today and got a few more close-up pictures. It's hard to see the outside of the frames because someone has scabbed some wood boards on them (for a nailing surface), and then bolted the boards on through some of the miscellaneous holes in the frame. Therefore, all my pics are made from inside the frame.

I did measure the width of the frame, and it comes out to an even 32". I made up the following comparison picture using the one that was attached previously in this thread as a reference. I may be wrong, but these look about the same.

http://i600.photobucket.com/albums/tt90/Griznant8175/Random Pics/comparison.jpg?t=1266003041

 

That is great detective work!!! I have not been able to find an address. I suggest contacting the Elkhart chamber of commerce or the library or county auditor to find some land plot records. That should confirm the location and really nail it. I am 99% the are Huffman frames. There is guy JFranklin on ther AACA forums with a Huffman. That is where I got the pic from. Here is the link. Try to contact him. There might be an address on the VIN tag or he might have more info.

http://forums.aaca.org/f122/1920-s-huffman-trucks-257410.html

Here is another contact:

Re: Huffman truck - Elkhart Indiana

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Please contact me and I may be able to help you out.

http://forums.aaca.org/f122/huffman-truck-elkhart-indiana-210319.html

Bob
hoosier@pwrtc.com

My Indiana Truck page

Good Luck

Mike

 

I've never seen that car before. I only know of one Luverne in Minnesota, a touring car that has been in the same family since 1950. Unfortunately, the fellow who owned it passed in 1982 and one son inherited it and it just sits in the barn and never goes anywhere.

 

Just wanted to see if you guys were paying attention. LOL Daniel Strohl posted it on his Hemmings Blog website on May 23rd 2009 with the following title. Sure hope it stayed stock.

Weekend dreamin’: Long-gone deals on Jensens, Lancias, Packards and Willys

Here's a picture of what seems to be another stock '40 Willys

 

1940 Willys 440 Business Coupe (Holden Bodied).

 

In the early 40s USCHo/USB&F built a small run of station wagon bodies for Willys. Five examples were built on the Model 440 chassis in 1940, and a second group of five in on 1941’s Model 441 chassis. All Willys Town & Country wagons featured a single door on the driver’s side and the beltline on the 1941 models differed from that of those built in 1940. At least one Mifflinburg-bodied 1941 Model 441 wagon is known to have been produced, but it was a one-off and not part of the official Willys wagon program.

First image is a 1940, second is a 1941, last three images are said to be one of the five originals.

 

I'll try and see if I can contact JFranklin. I've actually talked to Bob a few years ago, and he's the one who provided me with the Huffman picture I posted, and told me about the Valley connection as well. Unfortunately, he didn't have anything else to share as to the identity, so we still didn't know if that's what they were or not.

Thanks!

Grant

 

FDRS 1940 Willys Roadster on display at Little White Historic Site in Warm Springs Georgia

 

Jim-Bo, I SINCERELY like this Willys. WHAT great styling!!!

 

Here's a front shot of the same car.

 

My friend Don Moyer's Rebel Reaper at the Gasser reunion at Thompson, Ohio last June. AMC 401 power.

 

Since we've discussed a number of scarce convertibles, here's a beaut, I think (?) '53. I can't quote figures, but few 'verts were sold once Hudson went to the step-down unibody design. I imagine cost was a factor there. Besides unique styling, the step-down Hudsons were nicely appointed inside and were extremely comfortable to ride in and drive! HAMBer RareRodder posted these shots on another thread some months ago.

 

Would you look at this beast, dwarfing the mere mortal human beings?
Looks 1930, give or take a year, but I'm baffled on the MAKE. If I had
to guess, I'd say Peerless or, maybe, the most senior Nash. Help me
out, folks, will ya???
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I this some rare one off concept car my dad took a picture of in 1957????? Possibly 1958.

Anyone recognize this?





He was on vacation, and spotted this and took pictures.
I have no further info...........

 

1930 McLaughlin Buick


1930 Buick Buick 4dr sedan Model 47

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Thanks, HJ! It was the grillshell and how the lines flowed into the hood that left me blank! But, holy mackerel! The SIZE of this car!

 

HJ! HAMBer AxeGrinder posted this on another thread (which
SWI visits). What a mind-blowing pic! Please scratch your
head & speculate on the year and what's going on in this, obviously,
publicity photo, will ya?

 

10,000th Henry J would be the first year, 1951.

Total model year production was 81,942 units, with the six-cylinder DeLuxe slightly leading the four-cylinder standard version.

Production of the 1951 Henry J DeLuxe:
43,400 (estimated)

This looks like shipping staging at Willow Run in Ypsilanti, Mi.

 

Since the 1915 Luverne Special Speedster was a one-off car, and no other photos have surfaced to show it survived, I guess we may have another EXTINCT car. But it was obviously a well-styled speedster of contemporary lines, as evidenced by the 1913 Mercer, shown below for comparison's sake.



Introduced for 1911, the Mercer Type 35-J Raceabout was more powerful and nimble than the earlier Type 30. The raceabout's handling and balance often enabled it to beat other, more powerful cars, such as the Stutz. The T-head four engine was improved from the Model 30. Displacing 298 cubic inches, it was rated at 56 brake horsepower at only 1,900 rpms.


This sharp photo of a 1913 Mercer Type 35-J Raceabout was taken by Richard Owen in 2008 and is shown on SuperCars.net, to whom sincere appreciation is expressed. This restored car was sold by Christie's for more than $865,000. It sold for under $2,000 new.

 

Going through my dads old slides, I ran across this, but that is the only picture of the vehicle, so far I have not been able to identify it

To set the vintage, thereewere other pictures at the auto show:

 

SWI, maybe that does give a timeframe. To me, it looks much like
a '54 Olds F-88 concept -- some call it the Olds version of the Corvette.



This other one is wild, but it doesn't strike me as GM, nor Exner's Ghia
concepts for MoPar. More like one of the Ford or Merc concepts of
the '50s, which really took a different visual tack from MoPar and GM.
They often (not always) seemed to evoke aerospace visual themes.

 

Nice job, HJ! I'd recently run across the Atmos name, but I didn't connect it with a visual of this futuristic car. As a kid back in the Sputnik days, I can remember seeing futuristic cars like THIS on TV and on mag covers, all the time! It was the rage, I suppose you could say!

 

Here is one you definitely DON'T see every day! A '58 Packard Hawk !!! This Stude has seen better days, BUT there are still decent parts here! Check out the hood; these are usually BROKEN back by the hinges, and this one's not! This boneyard shot was posted in August last year by HAMBer NotSoFast of Illinois on another thread, WITH lots of junkyard shots of HAMB-friendly cars! Check it out at thread, "Re: Who has Junkyard or abandoned carpics?" <!-- / icon and title --><!-- message -->


Only 558 to 588 were built, and though all had McCullough superchargers (yielding 275-horse from 289-CID) and posi rears (dubbed "Twin-Traction"), only 28 of these cars had a standard trans. This was the FASTEST production Packard, EVER. Kind of hard to imagine something THAT scarce still winding up junked, isn't it? Below is an example, thanks to Wikipedia and the WikiMedia Commons project, of how these looked NEW.

 

I think I mentioned before that I always felt FoMoCo admired many
of Packard's style touches in the early '50s. And I think if you
examine the looks of a lot of Lincolns and Mercurys, even into the
early '60s, you can see some things that are too similar to be mere
coincidences. ONE of these is Packard's idea of a slant-back rear
windscreen. I seem to recall Packard using the idea on their Balboa,
but also in much more exaggerated form on their '56 Predictor show car.

Now, as a kid, I was almost entranced by the '63 Merc Monterey.
Please look at these photos and see what you conclude.


Publications International, Ltd., THANKS to ConceptCarz.com

 

Bumper to Bumper, ten years from concept to production?

1960 Plymouth XNR (Ghia)