Been lurkin a looong time. This is not my first account. Growing up all my uncles were mechanics and had hot cars. But by the time I had a chance to play , they had all gotten out of it. said they were to tired of workin on everybody else's cars to mess with their own. So I went into construction and only worked on my own(and friends) cars, seems to have worked as I'm still into cars all these yrs. later. 20 yrs. ago I got laid off from the neon sign shop where I was working and sold a few project cars to make ends meet. One was a '59 El Camino that was rusted out beyond my skill's at the time. It was purhased by an older custom painter who happened to pass by the sign shop on his way to and from work and had watched me perform my first frame off that I did in the driveway of the shop over 7 weeks nights and weekends.(wish I still had that kind of energy!) Based on that He offered me a job and I've been lucky enough to work on a lot of cool car's since then. unfortunately most of them were not Hamb friendly. But it was my introduction to the local ol' school car crowd(Lansing, MI) and when one of the guy's stopped by my place and noticed my magazine collection he decided to donate his collection. Word got around and a few others donated their's too. These mag's were a lot older then mine and are what inspired my interest in hot rod history. I ended up buying o lot more off that auction site which was a lot better place to buy back then. I now have a wall of mag's that extends back to 1951 and I've read each one cover to cover at least 3 times. I never posted here because I still don't have a hamb era hot rod. But I have recently been allowed to work on a real deal survivor still owned by it's original builder/owner and I just had to tell ya'll about it. which I will do shortly. Ryan has built up a helluva place here and I am glad to finally take part in it. Thanks, Les Hawkins
The Jalopy Journal
