share yer "good ole days" hotrodin stories

ok, so everytime i hang out with my granddaddy he tells me more stories of him and his hoodlum buddies back in the day and all the stunts they pulled, and it gave me the idea of puttin all those stories together as an article for one of the magazines i occasionally write pieces for. yall got any or ever heard any you'd like to share? (i'd imagine there's one or two floatin around this board)
for example, most of papa's involve bustin up cars while tryin to impress a random girl (what is it with you guys and your confused priorities?) but my favorite was when him and his buddies got ahold of a 27 roadster, ran it til it gave out, then pushed it up the biggest hill they could find, jumped in and rode it downhill. (it crashed into a creek and only one guy ended up with a broken arm) his uncle pulled it out of the creek (with a horse, of course) and encased it in cement to keep them from tearin it up anymore cause it was his back in the day. (his uncle was a bit of a whack job) but it's still in a cement block out on my great uncle bobby joe's farm.
anyhow, whatever yall can share would be good (stories about you or someone else, doesn't matter), and i need the exact model of car, cause if i use yer story i'm doing pictures too. thanks!

 

That must have been a common thing to do. My grandfather told me they used to buy model a's and take them out in the field and roll them on purpose just for the fun of it. Sicko's

 

I was at stopped an intersection and the old timer in the car next to me told me he made his wife a woman in the back seat of an Olds just like that. Still my favorite intersection story.

 

weeeeellll, papa never really "bought" those cars, per say...he did buy his 42 chevy for $10 up in missouri (good prices back in the 50s, i'd say) and rigged it all the way back to arkansas. it's still sittin out at his brother donald's and their "negotiating" over whether or not i can have it. (my fingers are crossed )

 

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I was at stopped an intersection and the old timer in the car next to me told me he made his wife a woman in the back seat of an Olds just like that. Still my favorite intersection story.

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encouraging, aint it? i get more stories from ol boys about the advantages of wrap around backseats like mine than i even care to discuss....

 

We were at a cruise night thing in my buddies 49 ford and some old guy came up to me and told me he had the same car, but he switched the column shift from the right side to the left side. He told me he had this girl that would let him hang on to her boob while driving. (Qoute from him) "Son once you get a girl to let you hang on to her tit while driving you dont ever let go" I almost shit myself I was laughing so hard.

 

My grandpa moved to Detroit from Birmingham during the depression to find work... he went to the auto plant (he never told me which one) to apply and they asked him if he had ever done the job before and he lied and said yes... then learned on the job... he said there must have been some fucked up cars that rolled off the assembly line that first week until he figured out what he was doing.

 

I cant wait until I am old and my grandkids will say grandpa tell us about the time you took that Taurus SHO and jumped it behind sams club until the headlight and battery fell out.

 

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I cant wait until I am old and my grandkids will say grandpa tell us about the time you took that Taurus SHO and jumped it behind sams club until the headlight and battery fell out.

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i was just gonna say i can't wait till i'm old and can share dirty stories about girls and people find it funny and not perverted. haha

 

I drove a Monza with a water leak until the engine melted into one piece, then I beat the body up as much as I could with my fist. I guess the hot rod part is that some people used to put V8s in them (and don't even tell me that a 262 is a real V8).

 

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he said there must have been some fucked up cars that rolled off the assembly line that first week until he figured out what he was doing.

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that's beautiful! you gotta find out what factory!!!

 

In 1962 I bought my 50 Merc. I'd already had lot's of hot rods but nothing with a roomy back seat. I was inspired by the Hirohata Merc and my Squeze of the time. She was a good sport and nice roomy back seat would make lifes indevers more convient for us. One night while inspecting the upholstery she needed more room and pushed the Quarter window open with her foot. The window was latched at the time but the poor latch didn't stand a chance. I still own the car and ocasionaly some one will offer up a piece to repair the latch. I just smile and say " no thanks".
Thanks for the memories.
The Wizzard

 

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"Son once you get a girl to let you hang on to her tit while driving you dont ever let go"

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i think that's the quote of the day!

gotta warn ya though, yall boys be careful; my granma's favorite story is from when she an papa used to race on the main street of their town (her 52 chevy vs his 53 dodge) and one night she and her best friend pulled up next to him to race and he had another girl in the car with him. she yelled out "ya havin a good time?!!?" and proceeded to leave him in a cloud of rubber and smoke, just to embarass him. lesson learned: never scorn a hotrod girl; she WILL embarass your ass

 

An 'ol-timer' friend of mine down south of here tells the story of how he & his buddies used to race the cops round town in their hot rods back in the late '50's...They would turn up a side alley, kill the lights & go (as he put it) crazy ass speed down them till they lost the Police & then go hide out in the local Burger Joint till it got quiet again...

Seems after he got back from Korea, he needed some money, so decided to partake in a little racing action to turn a few $$$....

Police chase ensues (as usual) Jerry hits the usual alleyway & kills the lights.....wakes up the next day in hospital.

They had built a garage half way down his escape alley....

Broke his arm, nose, wrist & ankle...and wrecked his flattie powered A



Dave

 

Hi Cherry, You've got to post a picture of the block of cement with the A in it. My best time with my first street rod was back in 86 when I was finishing my Auto Restoration degree in McPherson college in Mcpherson Kansas, My ride was a 48 Ford F-1 with a 429 Caddy with a turbo 400,the truck was rough,right off the farm,no two body panels were the same color,the only give away was the 60's sieries tires in the back, the main street in town was a perfect drag strip, 4 lanes with stop light then a nice long stretch at the end of town,I spent every weekend cruising and racing,one night a guy in a late 60's dodge 1/2 ton pickup pulled along side and started egging me on,so we raced down main at each light,then when we got to the end we both nailed it,by the time I got into high he was well behind,usually after racing we got togather to talk this guy turn off and left,later that week I pulled into the parts store and there was the dodge,this was a real parts store where guys would hang out and talk,there were a couple guys at the counter talking one gets up and looks out at my truck,as I was leaving he finally approached and asked"that your truck" yeah"were driving the other night"yeah" does that thing really have a flat head in it?",no it's a caddy,why?"I've got a 440 in the dodge and my buddies said you were driving a flat head."He was greatly relieved and we talked for a while,but he never tried me again.

 

My Grandfather was in a street gang in Wylam Alabama in his younger days... his name till the day he died at 89 was Snake... cuz he was mean as a snake. His best friend was my great uncle "Slick" (the gambler). I have tons of "Slick and Snake" stories... they're classic!

Like the time some guy in town had bought a new knife and was going around town squawking that he was gonna cut up ol Snake... so at the local union hall dance the guy was out front, and Pop's buds went up to the guy and "hey let me see that knife yer gonna cut up Snake with... and he handed it to them, they looked at it and then yelled "Got it Snake" and Pop came out of the bushes and beat the living hell out of the poor dummy. hahaha

 

i love it.
i live on memorial here in t-town and any of the guys can tell ya it's a fast and furious goon playground on fri and sat nights. (not a good thing for moi) anyhow, the gas station a block up is where all the crotchrocket kids hang out, and i pulled in for gas one night, there's maybe twenty + of them around, and as i'm leaving one of them asks me what engine i've got and do i wanna race...yeah...cause a tbird cruiser can out run a new japanese race bike. well, i was pullin onto 61st going toward sheridan at the time, which invovles a massive hill that's impossible to brake on without wreckin if you don't start breakin close to the top so i say sure, race him to the top, and start slowin down so i can watch him race through the redlight at the bottom of the hill (he shoulda braked...) and a cop goes peelin out after him. good times. next time maybe they'll get real wheels...

 

When I was in highschool in Palmdale CA in 1961 or '62, way back when they still spelled skool with a ch in it, my pop used to let me take his old '52 Hudson Hornet out on the weekend some times. That was a big old green 4 door Hornet, step down sedan. It had a 308 " flathead six with two carbs. When my pops bought it in '60 the back windows were COVERED in Lion's Drag Strip trophy stickers. He scraped them off and said a sleeper was more fun. That ol' boat hauled serious ass. Ran high 14's at the Beach. (Lion's) I'd show the other kids the flathead six and taunt them with…"it's just a six in a 4 door, kid. I'm just gonna OUT DRIVE you, that's all." I'd take their $20 every time. It was fun until word got around town, then I couldn't get any fish to give me money or beer.

And yes, I'm sort of ashamed to admit it, but back when cars were cheap or better yet free, we rolled 4 doors for fun. We swiped the fenders and front glass and things that we wanted for our coupes and 2 doors, but we wrecked those 40 Ford Fordors all the time.

CP

 

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And yes, I'm sort of ashamed to admit it, but back when cars were cheap or better yet free, we rolled 4 doors for fun. We swiped the fenders and front glass and things that we wanted for our coupes and 2 doors, but we wrecked those 40 Ford Fordors all the time.

CP

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argh....
me and some of the guys were getting lunch one day and some ol boy saw red's 56 chevy and asked what parts went for now, and when we told him, he told us how he used to get em out of junkyards to race and wreck. apparently there's a rusted pile of em layin at the bottom of a bluff on his daddy's old property. it looked like we were all gonna cry!

 

I have a TON of stories. This one is kinda long, but I’ll share it with you.

Ok, I grew up here in Colorado (Arvada, for those of you that live here).

Most every weekend my friends (and girlfriends, when we had them) would go cruzing. At that time, the place to go was a stretch of road called (West) Colfax Ave.

I was in high school, and I drove a 66 Impala SS. I worked after school at an auto parts store, and saved all my money to buy that car, which only cost me $850 (keep in mind this was the early 80’s and nobody wanted big old cars like that). The car was really nice, had a 396, TH400, and very low miles.

The Impala was all stock, but I soon had swapped out the cam, intake and carb with performance parts. I also took out the 3.08 gears and replaced them with a set of 4.11’s.

So one night my girlfriend and I are coming home from a night of crusing and I spy my friend, Dave Bolton, up ahead in his bright yellow 64 Chevy panel (350, 4-speed, 4.56 gears) and I catch up with him at the next light.

Well, its like 1am, so there’s no one around, so we decide to “get after it” when the light turns green. Well, long story short, there WAS someone around and it was a cop. I got pulled over, my friend Dave turned down a few side roads and didn’t. One “Exhibition of Speed” ticket for me.

I had no intension of telling my parents about the ticket; I would take care of it my self.

Well, a few days later, out of the blue, my mom asks me about my “racing ticket”! It just so happens that a good friend of hers, who’s husband was a cop, was listening to a police scanner that night and heard them radio my name in. She told my mom the next day. So much for me being sneaky.


I sold the Impala about 10 years later.
My friend Dave Bolton committed suicide after we graduated.
My high school girlfriend left after a few years because I was too busy racing and working on cars to give her the attention she deserved.

Man I wish I could go back in time….

 

Fun racing stories involving foreign cars.
I bought a 1958 bug with a "big" engine about 150hp. The night I bought it I wanted to see what it would do, so I am in the left turn lane behind some chopstick nationals drag race civic about to turn on a 3 lane road. The light turns green he takes off I punch it and hit second gear in the intersection go around the outside of him sideways while flipping him off get third and left him by 8 car lengths.

Another supid civic revved up on me one night when I was in my gti at a red light so I pulled the e-brake dumped the clutch and did a burn out until redline second gear. I couldnt see the girl in the passenger seat anymore and traffic going the other way stopped because of all the smoke. He did not want to race after that.

Same gti now with nitrous and other goodies. A member of the Persian mafia pulls up to me in a new BMW M3 which is pretty fast wants to race me I beat him bad. We get to the next light and he asks what I have in that thing I tell him cd player, can of mountain dew and leather seats.

Kids do not street race it is dumb.

 

hey crap... i can appreciate a good vw story, but i don't think a vr6 gti really classifies as "good old days hotrodin stories" haha. i'm enjoying what the "old" dudes have to say.

 

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hey crap... i can appreciate a good vw story, but i don't think a vr6 gti really classifies as "good old days hotrodin stories" haha. i'm enjoying what the "old" dudes have to say.

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By the time I am old enough to say "good old days" that car will be old as hell.

 

I was just showing my roadster project to my grandfather this last week, and he got to talking about the kids in his high school that had hotrod model A's. He said he remembers one guy who would do doughnuts in the gravel lot and spray the gravel all around. But the girls still rode with him!

Turns out my father-in-law's first car was a Model A. He's helping with the build with ideas, and an offer to find a drive shaft.

I have lot's of story's myself, but they aren't from "good ol days". I'm still too young, but my favorite is about a buddy of mine, Pat, that had 2 cars. One was an old Plymouth Fury, and the other was an Impala. The Fury's lights didn't work, so it was the "day car", and we cruised in the Impala by night. Our favorite thing to do on Fri and Sat. nights was to go find someone to play cat and mouse, and scream around backstreats. One night we were screwing with a car, and got them to chase us. It was great until they finally caught up, and out came the defensive line for the football team. They jumped the car, and one got in and was beating on my buddy as I pulled away. Pat managed to shove him out the door into a yard as we took off. That was the end of Cat and Mouse!

 

My dad told me one night in bout 1965 or so he was drivin his 55 (with rochester fuel injection he got for FREE!) and he shifted into 4th gear and the hood flew off.
I guess this isnt car really but when my uncle was bout 14 so around 1961 he and his friends would take road flares and burn em in the side of cars melting parts of the panels!
Also when they found a car parked on a steep hill and it had a column shift theyd take it outta park

 

This story affected me as a child when my father told it to me. It showed me at a young age what friends and fellow enthusiest mean to one another when sharing a common bond. The story my father told to me was approx in the summer of 69 or 70 my dad could not remember exactly. My father was part of a car club called the T-timers. They would goto the local drag strips and race each other, and other local car clubs. My father told me of one of the biggset car clubs in Los Angels at the time was the L.A. street racers whos president was Big Willy who drove a 69 Plymouth Superbird with a 426 Hemi, he drove around with a mobile christmas tree in his truck, so they could set up those races on the run in the streets of L.A. My dad told me of one time that has been seared into my brain, about who he was riding with one of his buddies to a local street race. When the car started to miss so my dads friend pulled over and they both got out to see what was wrong. My dads friend was on the drivers side while my dad was on the passenger side looking for the problem. My dad told me that a car came flying down the street and swiped the side of his friends car hitting his friend so hard that it knocked him across the street. My dad told me that the driver of the other car never even hit the brakes just kept driving on like nothing happended. My dad went to his friends aid but could tell that he was dead. After the police was there and asked my father of what had happened. They loked for the hit and run vehical, but was unsucessful. At the view kids from all over came to give respect to a fallen friend. On the way to the cemitary there were over 300 cars in persession all with uncorked headers singing their song. My father said that not one police officer fallowed or spoke up about the excessive noise that day but let them respect a fallen brother.

Sorry it was so long I tried to keep it short but I thought this was a good story that was told to me that I would share with you.

Jonney

 

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argh....
me and some of the guys were getting lunch one day and some ol boy saw red's 56 chevy and asked what parts went for now, and when we told him, he told us how he used to get em out of junkyards to race and wreck. apparently there's a rusted pile of em layin at the bottom of a bluff on his daddy's old property. it looked like we were all gonna cry!

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My pops and buddies would get cars outta the yards in Pittsburgh, steal the parts late at night and race the "wealthier" guys for money or pink slips. They learned how to make broken junk fast, which I always thought was pretty cool. Especially saying my dad was more a fifties beatnik/comic book geek than a hardass greaser or something. He says he wishes he still had some of the rides they wrecked street racing.

 

We do a car show for the old folks home a couple times a year. One time I had a blue haired old lady in a wheelchair looking at the roadster. I asked her if she wanted a ride.

She looks at me and says "You got any idea how damned many grandkids I've got because of one of them things?"

Then she grins at the look on my face and says let's go.

After we got her in the car, she looks at me and says: Sit down, shut up and DRIVE!"

 

not so long ago maybe, early '70's.
but when i was in the army they had a tracked scout vehicle that was running a smal block chey. people, not me!, would steal the feulie heads for their own cars.

coming home one night from a party, i was cruising down the freeway when a 70's chev truck came along side of me. reving his engine like he was a badass. i down shifted to 3rd and took off with him trying to stay alongside. hit 4th and didn't see him again.

started to slow from about 110, got to about 70 when he started to come by me still running hard. about then i saw aset of headlights cross my mirror. looked out my window in time to see the hiway patrol emblems on his door! stopped the other guy, i didn't wait around to see what thew outcome was.


jerry

 

Grandpa had an uncle, who was only a couple years older than him at the time (pre the big one). They used to raise all kinds of hell, and one time they were out and got stuck on some railroad tracks (no doubt alittle "under the influence", we are Pollacks anyway). So Grandpa thinks he hears something, turns out a train is bearing down on them. Teddy tries to get the A going, but no use... they get blasted off the tracks. After the laughter and shock wore off, they proceeded to roll it back over, and go home!

Course, Grandpa used to run shine too... across the Detroit river, but he won't share THOSE stories, yet...

I gotta go call him!

Jay