Found the book, Customs and Leadsleds. In the feature it says Jim started with a hardtop and found a convertible parts car, thus the conversion. The engine is a 425 out of a 65 Olds. . The rear bumper is a shortened 56 Chevy. Ed, it says he won the Little Guy Award for the best Custom built by a non professional in Springfield Illinois.
That would be great @devilleish! We miss "seeing" Switchblade327 around here. He's been gone for quite a while. The "Half Breed" Merc is one we never found out who the owner was. Always nice to put the names and cars together. Here's a link to the "Half Breed" Merc write up in case anyone wants to go back and check it out again. E https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/what-ever-happened-to.1016572/page-80#post-12501358 Cool information Jim. I can't imagine the work it took to convert a hardtop to a functional, chopped convertible! Looks like @s55mercury66 was right about the mill being an Olds. Good eye, man! In the article in the book, when it mentioned Mr. Geiger winning the Little Guy award, it said it was in Springfield, Illinois. That would mean that Jim had his car at the Leadsleds in '86 (Springfield, Missouri) and '87 (Springfield, Illinois). Never saw the car on the '87 video though..........E
I believe the car next to the Royal Emperor at the '95 Oakland show is Richard Zocchi's 1954 Mercury.
I wonder if Jim`s car inspired him to build it. Rear bumper looks to be the same. Along with a bunch of other mods as well. The book also came out in 90 and the Zocchie car was debuted in 95?
Jim's car has a 56 Chevy rear bumper, Zocchi's car looks to be Cadillac. Definitely similar builds Stanlow, the inspiration for the 2nd car built could be possible. Great minds think alike?
Yep, the White Pearl was bid to $27,500 online, and didn’t make the reserve. Two auctions, similar results. I think the market has spoken as to value on this one. I did bid on it (at a much lower bid), and technically owned it for a couple hours till I was outbid.
What Ever Happened To..........? number 214. 1950 Mercury Owner: John "Reverend Rick" Pollard Sanford, Maine For this week's custom we are going back to the mild custom side of things. This car was a brain buster for me, and if anything turns up on it I'll be really surprised. Rick took his mild custom Mercury to the 1987 Sled Scene East show. He did an interview with Rowdie covering the show as well as the work that was done to his car. It was a fun interview as Rick had a heavy eastern accent. At the time of Sled Scene East '87, the car wasn't chopped. I wonder if it ever got to that point or if Rick was happy with it the way it was. The car was fully shaved and had rounded hood and door corners, frenched headlights and a louvered hood. The car had shortened side trim, a modification that never seemed too popular, but was a nice change. The front of the car was covered with burgundy flames, which was a big contrast to the white paint. You can see Rick installed lake pipes and a set of overlay Mercury skirts as well. Rick also had a striper put his name on the door. This was something that was big in the 70s and 80s, but is rarely seen today. Sorry for the fuzzy picture. More grainy, hard-to-see video stills. Moving on to the rear of the car, you can see a nicely shaved trunk, frenched custom taillights (that I later found out are '66 Corvette--more on that in a minute) and some striping and a name on the trunk lid. The name on the trunk lid read "Just Reminiscing". Here is a shot that I almost didn't use. I can't stand to see a custom with the hood up, but since it was open for the interview to show off the engine, I included it. Under the hood is a fully dressed flathead that was "60 over" with two deuces. Lots of paint, chrome and clean detail were the rule of the day. Interior shots were hard to capture with the grainy video and it looked like it was cloudy when Rowdie interviewed Rick. The shots were pretty dark. Put that with a darker colored interior and everything goes south quick. The interior was diamond button tuck, but it was hard to tell if it was brown or burgundy Naugahyde, leather, or vinyl. What ever it was, a button tuck interior like that was a real time consuming labor of love. Aside from the interview, the only other time Rick was shown with his Merc was during "How cool can you cruise?". He rolled into the shot, got out of the car wearing a tuxedo coat complete with tails--quite stylish. The fact that he had on shorts instead of long pants made it really funny! He walked to the front row of the crowd watching the event, grabbed a lady's hand and politely walked her to the passenger side of the car. He reached inside, opened the door for her and she climbed inside. He then closed the door and proceeded to walk around to his side of the car. Just as he rounded the front of the car he gave a thumbs up and strutted to his door and climbed in. He fired up the car and rumbled away. The crowd loved it! This shot is just before he drove away. The '87 Sled Scene East video had the most visual information on the car, but magazine and book researched turned up a little bit. Mr. Pollard sent in a photo to the KKOA for submission in the first KKOA book printed in 1993. It is a strange angle in the photo, but you can see Rick with his Merc behind him. It was on page 158 of the book. This is where more of the specs on the car were found that weren't mentioned in the interview. In reading the article, it became very clear to me that Rick was heavily involved in the custom scene way up in the northeast corner of the U.S. and the surrounding states. A little more digging through old KKOA Leadsled'ers and Trendsetter newsletters showed that Rick was indeed the KKOA state colonel for Maine. His name was printed on the colonel list from the late 80s through the early 90s. I took a page out of the @Sancho and @John B book of sleuthing and did a Google search on Mr. Pollard. I did find his name and a phone number that matched the one printed in the KKOA newsletters. It appears that he is still alive and well up in the Sanford, Maine area, but I found nothing that mentioned his car hobbies or anything along those lines. Hopefully Rick is still into customs and maybe he still has his beloved '50 Merc. I hope that one of you east coast kustom faithful that went to a number of Sled Scene East shows will remember him and can share a story or two as he seems like a real character! The "lockdown" continues folks. I hope your patience and sanity haven't been lost yet. Eventually this all has to pass and our car activities can resume with good friends and acquaintances. Be well everyone! See you next week! E
Great thread I've spent the better part of my off time(ya I'm still working in this mess) the last 2 weeks reading it, A big thank you to OG lil E for starting it and taking the time to put it all together Great Job!!!! Sancho and a couple others are great sleuths as it's been said before I'm glad there not looking for me!!!, it would not be the same without all the contributions you guys have made. I started out young building a 36 Plymouth pick up in the late 70's it was a street rod(don't tell Moriarity) sold it in '82 to buy my first house after getting the house redone and garage set up in '87 I thought I was going to build a '50 shoe box custom I found a car that had been started but quickly found out the chop was totally screwed up and the rest in a lot worse shape than I thought while I am a diesel mechanic and totally a armature at body work I was in over my head..........then the kids showed up one day and life got in the way, The '50 got sold and I came out about even so no complaints there. So now that the last kid is out of college working full time and paying his own bills(Ya) I got the itch just to build something again just not sure what........................
Glad the thread helped you kill some time during the weirdness going on right now @Wrench97. Thanks for the kudos! Good luck on your upcoming custom project! E
Just ran across this while browsing Bring A Trailer, apparently it's for sale again: https://bringatrailer.com/2020/04/23/25-years-before-founding-bat-1967-el-camino-returns/
What Ever Happened To..........? number 215. 1956 Chevy "Twilight Time" Owners: David and Carol James Lebanon, Pennsylvania This week's custom is one that I had plenty of pictures and a little information on, but I was lacking the owner's hometown information. Thankfully someone posted a great picture of the car (that looks like a page from a magazine feature) in the Kustom Blues thread and Mr. James' information was on it. I went back to try to find the picture again, but I was unable to find it. That thread is moving along pretty quickly these days. So whoever posted this great picture, thanks a bunch! It helped me out big time! The James' were very active in the KKOA, and seemed to be regulars at Sled Scene East. I never did see their car at a Leadsled Spectacular in my video research, but I'm sure if any of you custom faithful saw it at a Spectacular you'll let us know! I don't have a whole lot of video from the Sled Scene East shows, but I did find proof that they were there from 1991-1994, and again in 2004. I don't have a video of the show for 1991, but in my search for information I found a few pictures from a KKOA Trendsetter newsletter from late 1991 (Volume 6 Number 11) on pages 25 and 27. The car was a hit as it won a "One Fine Nine" award at the show that year. I do have a DVD for the 1992 show, and there was some great footage of the car sitting around the show and even cruising the grounds. In this first pic you can see the tastefully done front end work, with a '57 Chevy front bumper, '54 Chevy grille and frenched headlights. Sorry about the weird angle on the next picture, but you can see the great Desoto side trim. David installed a single frenched antenna in the passenger rear quarter panel. Here's a shot of the rear of the car. I love the Packard taillights along with the Connie kit. You can see "Twilight Time" lettered on it. This shot is from a little further out. You can really notice the chopped top and the use of a '50 Mercury rear window. Lots of 50s customizing tricks on this car! Here's a picture of the James' pulling out of a hamburger place called the Distelfink. There were four people in the car. Who would turn down a ride in such an awesome custom to cruise down to the local hang out and grab a burger, fries and a cool shake on a warm summer evening? The Distelfink was a well known restaurant chain in Pennsylvania. In the Pennsylvania Dutch culture distelfink means goldfinch, and the tulip is a sign of birth. It is basically a symbol of good luck. Here is a picture of the great neon sign at twilight. The ice cream on the cone lit up in sections, starting at the top of the cone itself and going up to the point of the ice cream. Here is another shot of the sign after dark.......... ..........and one last shot of the restaurant when it was still in operation prior to the 2011 closing. At one time there were six of these restaurants in the state, and this location in Gettysburg was the last one. It opened in 1954 and was in operation until 2011. The place fell into bad disrepair and sat vacant for several years. New owners purchased it with the plan to re-open it at one point in time, but I can't find any information that confirms it is open again. I'm including a link to the Distelfink Facebook page. I have very limited access to Facebook, so maybe there is more information I can't see since I'm not a registered member. I hope the place got fully restored and is back in business. https://www.facebook.com/pages/Distelfink-Drive-In-Restaurant/109603545743112 The James' attended Sled Scene east again in 1993 and 1994, but I had trouble getting shots of the car that were good enough to post. The Chevy looked unchanged from 1992. Moving up to 2004, David and Carol were at the show again. They may have attended the show every year from 1995-2003, but have no videos or magazine sightings from those years to confirm that. In 2004 the car still looked great! The only change I could see were the addition of some Jimmy Jones-esc bubble skirts. East coast style all the way! This is a nice view of the rear of the car: And one last shot of the awesome Packard lights and Connie kit. The last pictures I have of the Chevy are some rare interior shots. Very sanitary with lots of great detail like pinstriping, an Impala steering wheel, teardrop dash knobs and tons of tuck'n'roll. Getting behind the wheel of this sled would be a real treat! After the '04 Sled Scene, I couldn't find anymore information on the James' beautiful Chevy. I do seem to recall someone posting pictures of it at an east coast show sometime within the last few years, but my search came up empty for that information. I also seem to remember seeing a shot of it in Customs Illustrated at one time, but I couldn't find it. Maybe someone out there has some shots or information more recent than 2004. I hope the James' are still hitting car shows and cruise nights and wowing people with this great '56. I'm hoping to see it in person for myself at a show one day. That would definitely be something to remember! The Denver area is still on the stay-at-home order, as I'm sure a lot of you still are too. I've been fortunate enough to keep working through all this, but all the extra duties I've been having to perform throughout it are just wearing me down. I hope that normalcy returns some time soon. I hope y'all are well out there! Take care friends! I'll see you next Tuesday! E
What Ever Happened To..........? number 216. 1956 Ford "Candle in the Wind" Owner: Rick Chronic Oklahoma City, Oklahoma This week's car is another that didn't seem to travel to shows very much. As far as I could tell, Mr. Chronic only took his car to two KKOA shows, both in 1987. He went to the Hangin' Dice show in Ft. Smith, Arkansas, and the 1987 Leadsled Spectacular in Springfield, Illinois. Needless to say, the '56 Ford saw some miles that summer! My first sighting of the car was at the '87 Spectacular. I don't know why, but the next time I see Doug Reed (@49toad), I'm going to ask him why at the '87 Spectacular he no longer had ladies doing his interviews. In '87, the owners of the cars themselves talked about their cars and gave specs and talked about how much they liked the show. Rick did his own interview and gave a lot of great information about his Ford. It was Toyota Supra red, with a louvered hood and lots of pinstriping. The topper was the wild flame job. I'm sure this took some long hours to lay out! You'll notice that Rick had a little trailer following his mild custom '56 around. This is something you see all the time these days, but back in the late 80s, custom trailers weren't all that popular yet. Rick took two Coca Cola coolers and mounted them on a small trailer chassis to haul his travelling gear and keep his trunk empty. According to Rick's interview, the larger cooler was an original Coke cooler from 1956 or 1957, and the smaller cooler mounted in the front by the tongue of the trailer was made in '54. It was all painted the same Supra red to match the '56. Under the hood was a warmed up 312 with three deuces linked to a four speed transmission. Strange the hood was never raised to show off the engine compartment on the video, but if it was anything like the rest of the car, it was nicely done. It's hard to see in the next photo, but you can make out the pinstriping job on the hood. Moving to the trunk, you can see more pinstriping and the name "Candle in the Wind" lettered on it. I'm guessing the name came from the Elton John song of the same name that was a Marilyn Monroe tribute. Maybe Mr. Chronic was a Marilyn Monroe fan or an Elton John fan--maybe both. Who knows? For the interior Rick went with red and white tuck'n'roll. Nothing wrong with that! It was hard to get good shots of the interior, but I did manage to catch a neat picture showing the shifter with the shift pattern on it. Kinda rare even in the renaissance custom days of the 80s to see a custom with a 4 speed manual transmission. Late in the video (looks to have been Sunday morning) there were a few good shots of Rick cruising the fairgrounds. Hard to tell, but it might have been his last pass through the grounds on his way out the gate and home to Oklahoma City. The other show Rick attended in '87 was the Hangin' Dice show in Ft. Smith, Arkansas. I have no video footage of any Hangin' Dice shows, but I've seen lots of pictures over the years and it looked to be a good sized show with a nice turnout of some great customs. Thankfully our own @drdave attended that show many times and took plenty of pictures. I found these on Rikster's site. It's nice to see good clear pictures of the car and not my fuzzy stills. The car was a real head turner! I looked through numerous magazines and KKOA newsletters and I found no more on this car or Mr. Chronic. It is one of those cars that made a quick splash and seemed to disappear as soon as it came around. Funny how that works. Let's see if any of you custom faithful have anything on Rick and his "Candle in the Wind". I hope you're all still hangin' in there. I know some of you may be able to get out and about a little more since some states have lifted the stay-at-home orders. Here in Denver it ends Friday, but there are all kinds of rules and regulations about what you can and can't do. Most car activities have been cancelled at least until after Memorial Day, so I guess I keep busy here at home for the most part. I have been getting some things done here in the yard as well as on my off topic car and my bicycles, so that is a good thing. Like many of you though, I'm getting tired of camping out here at home and I do think it's about time to fire up that off topic Mercury and go for a long cruise. Windows down and the oldies blasting throughout the neighborhood. Good therapy to keep hope that summer will be here soon, virus or not! Until next time, stay cool..........E
If it was only a matter of time I could do it, it's the cost of parts needed that is holding me up. I'll get 'er done one of these days! E
Weekend bump. My internet has been slow. Have finally been able to see the pic`s. But I knew what car you were talking about. A pic from Springfield.
What Ever Happened To..........? number 217. 1949 Ford Owner: Phil J. White Farmingdale, Maine This week's custom is probably the most mysterious car we've covered to date. Pictures proved to be very scarce as well as video sightings and information. The car leans towards the radical side of customs and I thought it deserved to be remembered here. I've seen this car on my video of the 1985 Leadsled Spectacular for years, but information on it was nonexistent. I had no information on it at all until recently when I looked closer at a picture of the car in the first KKOA book. Suddenly it all clicked, but the information was still very slight. Mr. White submitted a picture of his '49 to the KKOA for their first book that was published in 1993. The car was accepted and was put on page 160. I wish there was more than just the one shot of it, but at least there was some good information on it in the caption. The thing that finally tipped me off that this was the mysterious shoebox on the '85 video was the Lincoln porthole side windows, but more than that was the round taillight extensions and the fins. This was all stuff that could be seen in the video, but I had no idea what cars the parts were pirated off of. As best as I can tell from the caption, the taillight housing and fins are from a '57 Ford. In the caption it mentions that '59 Cadillac taillights were used, but I've never seen a back shot of the car, so I don't know how they were positioned. I also have no idea of what the trunk area and bumper on this car were. Like I said, very mysterious. Also, in the picture, the car looks to have a painted top, and in the video it looked to be covered with black vinyl. That part is very hard to tell since my grainy video can sometimes be misleading. In the above picture the car also had a Desoto grille, and in the video the grille was very recessed and looked to have a straight bar in the grille opening with a bullet at each end. The shot was so dark the grille looked to be painted the burgundy body color, but it may have very well been chrome and looked a dark color because of the shadowy shot. The last big difference from the '85 video and the '93 book was skirts. In '85 it had none, but in the book it had cruisers. Well, here it is in all it's glory rolling into the fairgrounds in Springfield, Ohio in the summer of '85. Sorry the shots aren't better and that there aren't more of the car. This was absolutely the only shots I've ever found of this car. The shots might have been better if the car was being filmed as it sat, but it was cruising by the camera. I also wish there were shots of the rear as I would love to see the taillight arrangement, how far they stuck out and how the trunk looked in relation to the length of the taillight extensions. I've also wondered what the rear window area of the chop looked like and what rear window was used. I did a little more searching like my buddies @John B and @Sancho would do and I did come across a Facebook page of a Mr. Phil J. White Sr., but I couldn't look at anything on it since it was a private page. Could be our guy, but maybe not. Sorry this week's entry is so vague, but I know if anybody knows anything of this car it's our custom faithful that check out this page out every week. I sure hope more pictures are out there of this unique cruiser from the upper northeastern corner of our country. It seems like things are easing up just a bit and some folks are finally getting out and enjoying the warmer weather. I'm trying to stay positive about the summer car activities, but every time it looks like the door is opening and things are starting to return to normal, it slams shut! I'm beginning to think this will be known as "The Lost Summer of 2020"! I sure hope not. Keep the faith y'all and stay safe! Catch ya' later..........E
Good stuff Ed! Strangely enough with all the time off work, I haven't been online too much, so just getting caught up. Those pics of Rick's '56 Ford and matching trailer were taken in '87. He may have been there other years, but that was the only year I took pics of it....film being expensive and being a poor student and all, tried to keep the dupes down to a minimum. LOL. I don't recall having seen it around the area in a long time. Hopefully still around somewhere.
I've noticed that you've been away lately, Doc. I hope that with the time off it hasn't been all work, chores, household projects and no play, and you've been able to work on your car projects. Haven't seen any updates in a while, how's the Merc coming along? E
Well, turns out I haven't accomplished as much as I would have hoped with two months off. LOL While the office was closed, there was still much work to do with sorting out new requirements, planning reopening, classes, etc. Then there is the yard which of course needs shaping up for summer. LOL Before this all started, I began the process of a new motor for the Chevy, so I have been working on that getting the engine compartment all back in shape and prepped for when I can get the new motor out of quarantine in Texas (was supposed to pick it up the week we all got locked down) and to the machine shop here. Also broke out the interior kit I had already purchased for the A and started redoing the seats. About halfway done with that project. So, in answer to your question, the Merc is the only thing I have running, so I haven't laid a finger on it and just been driving it.
Wow Doc, sounds like you've been burning the candle at both ends. Hope you can get caught up in time to do a little cruisin' and kickin' back at a car show or two! E
The Jalopy Journal
