Hot Rods The car that changed your life!

The movie cars of AG And TLB, the Willys in Hot Rod, and X almighty!

 

The car that changed my life is my grandfathers 1937 Ford pickup. I remember riding in it in 1956, then he parked it by the barn. I pretended to drive it until I got old enough to find hotrod magazines and realized I could fix it and drive it . I still have it

 

I have two-

Doug Anderson's Boogie Woogie

I grew up and still live in a very small town in upstate NY a population of about 800. There were a handful of old cars, a few street rods, and 10-15 oval track stockcars. (Yes, 10-15 stockcars in a town of 800.)
My dad worked on many of those racecars and built several stock car chassis.

By the mid 90's dad was burned out on working on everyone else's racecars, and I was becoming interested in period correct hot rods.

About that time I started seeing a cream and red scalloped chopped and channeled 30 A coupe, white walls and period correct small block Chevy it would drive through town about 2 or 3 times a year
It was often traveling with a chopped and channeled early 60 style 30/31 A truck purple with flames multiple carbureted Nailhead.

There were no cars like that is this area, after about 4 or 5 years I was finally able to catch up with the car and the owner/builder Doug Anderson.

That was the first period correct hot rod I ever saw in person! Doug lived about an hour away he and I got to be friends,

Doug passed in 2022....




as I have gotten older I gotten back into oval track with vintage racing and Charlie Jarzombek's Bug major influence on my build!

 

10943699_10203682089796347_2284603393024878785_n by onetrickpony posted Oct 22, 2015 at 12:03 PM

I'm pretty sure it was this Model T roadster pickup.

 

That’s awesome! I remember when you bought it.
Can’t wait to check it out in Oct!

 

My grandfather's 1957 olds holiday coupe , white over red with the J-2 option , I was 9 when he pulled in the drive to show it off , lasting impression .

 

Hello,

At first, the title pointed at the 58 black Impala. But, then there was the first build of a 283 c.i. SBC motor, then a 671 supercharged 292 c.i. SBC motor in our 1940 Willys Coupe. Those certainly gave me the impetus to get involved and stay involved in hot rods, drag racing and motorcycle racing all this time. In looking back, those were stopping points of the teenage years. It was the information gathering phase, as we all grew up to battle the rules of the community, and to get along with 800 other teenagers in our old high school campus.

As the high school years started expanding to other aspects of life in So Cal for teenagers, we all began to see the possibilities of our future lives. Some were destined to go to college, others the military, while some were in a state of mental growth, but still confused as to what lies ahead. We all got stuck at this phase.
1940 Flathead Ford Sedan Delivery
Surfing locally, meeting new people and then the long road trips to discover places we had never gone before was truly “eye opening.” So Cal has plenty of places that were new and exciting. The long coastal area, the deserts and the local mountains allowed us a wider playground. We tried to take advantage of it as we continued our young lives.

As the road trips continued, other places began to show a different character for us to try and understand. Baja Mexico with the relaxed attitude and lifestyle was fun. But, once back in the USA proper, there were rules that made us aware that is how we all had to cope to get along with others.

Jnaki

So if the 58 Impala and the 40 Ford Flathead Sedan Delivery were the starter points of the long journey, what was the turning point?

A nice 1965 Red El Camino parked behind the Steinhart Aquarium in San Francisco...

Yes, those long road trips I had to drive by myself to my college apartment in northern california. The 400+ miles one way gave me plenty of time listening to music, wandering my eyes all over the highways for other cars, the country side and/or coastal routes when I had plenty of time to get there and back for vacations. The people I met were almost in the same situation as I was and although most were from Northern California.

But, as I got to the 2nd year there, there was a longing for the simple So Cal lifestyle I was getting set in place. Get up, go check the surf, surf for hours and then finish classes at the local college for the last 2 years. I was enjoying that routine and the need for learning was evident. But the key element was meeting new people.

Some of my old friends were also finishing their last two years and it was a fun time. So, as I explored many different classes, I met one person who literally, “hit me over the head” with her looks, styling and personality when we finally talked together. I was now awake in her presence. We hung out on campus together with numerous coffee breaks, lunch hour and long walks to classrooms.

But, as we found more things about each other, we expanded to go sit down in the harbor for an off campus lunch hour, plus. The blue water, the sailboats, the atmosphere of the ocean was an added value to the moment(s). Who knew those college era lunches in front of rows of sailboats on the water, were the start of our “sailing together” years…

NOTE:

Soon, I learned that hot rods gave me a base to which I developed into mechanically. Meeting my college companion, date, then eventually my wife, was all it took to see the future clearly. We took coastal California road trips to San Francisco in the El Camino as many times as we could. That in itself was a new horizon and experiences for both of us.

It played into our continued lifestyle of being together and figuring out how to get along with others,while learning to cope with other new situations. Future job or living locations were all a part of discovering those things, as we cruised along for hours along the coastline to S.F.

When we got married, that opened another door of being by ourselves, doing what we wanted and that there was no rush to jump into the corporate businesses at the time. Being together, a learned environment was all it took to see how it was going to be for us. Hot rods/drag racing /motorcycles/surfing or not… We both worked together to make things work and it has endured all that we have seen together.

Note 2:

Something must have been going right for us. Our 20 something granddaughter saw photos and stories from our college days and said she wanted to be with us at that time period, as a college student. Our outlook and lifestyle appealed to her and was all smiles… to our grand satisfaction… YRMV

 

Hands down.... Butchies altered wheelbase, 427 big block Chevy powered Falcon. Driving it convinced me that one can never have enough HP. Then, when he followed it up with the big block Bantam... well... what can you say. Stay well John.