'70 Plymouth Fury III. 318/auto. Couldn't get out of it's own way! Yanked the 318 for a 383. Sold it to a buddy who put a tunnel ram on it, tweeked the motor but never changed the gears. Could beat anyone in a one mile race!
My first was a hand-me-down from an uncle who was into cars. A '58 Chev BelAir 4dr with 348 PowerPak, and PowerGlide. Looked like a family car but that 348 smoked every TriFive-type car in my high school, and could hold its own against the small-block Chevelles and Camaros that were coming out then (graduated HS in '70).
First car was a 57 Chev 150 more door.... I was 12 and paid $150 for it. Made a 400 mile trip home in it with my dad. First car I actually drove was a 70 Challenger convertible, Factory big block 383 and slapstick. Plum crazy with white roof and interior. Paid $1250 for it. I don't even want to think what that car would bring now................
Mine was a 1970 Dodge Challenger SE with 383 4 barrel. It had the slapstick shifter, rim blow steering wheel, leather interior, A/C, power windows and door locks, factory cruise control, 8 track stereo, it was loaded. An older lady had bought it new and felt she couldn't see out of the rear window anymore. I don't think anyone could see out of that small SE rear widow, even when they were new. I sold it in 1987 because I couldn't afford the gas, my foot was way too heavy on the pedal! Bought a fully restored 1966 VW bug instead. It was a fun car, but I missed the V8 in the Challenger. I talked to the guy that bought the car from me in 1987 last week and asked him if he wanted to the sell the Challenger back to me. He said he was thinking of selling it and I was a the top of the list to buy it! We'll find out!
Bought a 48 Chevy business coupe in 54 from the head purchasing agent at Dayton Power and Light. Paid $250.00 and it had 12,500 miles on it. He ordered an extra for the company then bought it for his wife when it came in to the dealer. Stylemaster body with no back seat and painted an ugly brown almost like an army color. Nosed it, decked it, louvered the hood, installed 49 Lincoln taillights, removed the belt chrome, installed white whites and full moon chrome wheel covers then painted it Artic white. Later removed all the back business coupe stuff (cold chisel on about 1000 spot welds) and relocated the gas tank to the trunk and installed a regular coupe back seat and side panels. In 56 pulled the old 216.5 and installed a 270 Jimmy bored to 292 w/cam and Corvette 3-carb intake and slpit exhaust nanifold. Then repainted it 57 Pontiac limefire green laquer. Traded it 1 57 for a 50 Ford Crestliner from California with Flatty and OD. It was customized in the west and then brought to Ohio. Beautiful body and paint but terrible mechanicaly. Sold it about 6 mos. Later never saw it again. Truckin thru a junk yard in 59 saw the old Chevy coupe layin down was totaled on the right front corner. Sorry 'bout the quality of the pic but it is 50 years old
The year was 1960 - A '47 Ford Coupe, 57 Lincoln engine, '39 Ford trans; everything else was stock. It was my first engine 'rebuild' - I replaced the rings and rod beariings - the fact that the cylinders were so worn you could rock the pistons back and forth about 1/4" didn't bother me at all...... It had one of those goofy Holley 'teapot' 4-barrel carbs, of course I didn't run an air cleaner and I wasn't to good with getting the timing set just right so I had my share of carburetor fires... It didn't run too bad even with my lack of mechanical skills, with all the torque that Lincoln put out even running sick and a 4:11 rear it was OK....as long as nothing broke. And it didn't stop or handle worth a damn.
My grandmother gave me a 38 buick series 90, a huge black 4door almost a limo. It had a big ass straight 8 with 2 chrome 97's. I was 14 or 15. I had no license, and my dad hated that car. He didn't like it parked in front of the house so it got moved to the garage but it was so long we couldn't close the garage door. When we thought we could get away with it one of my friends with a license and I would sneak it out and cruise it, but the rr brake would lock up and we would be stuck. After my grandmother died my dad made me sell the car. I never got to drive it, and as I look back on the experience it was just a huge frustration owning a big black monster that I couldn't drive. My next car was a 50 Olds Holiday hardtop semi custom painted naples orange, a much cooler car I bought already built and pretty much worn out, but much cooler than the Buick. I saw a Buick mujch like my 38 at a show last year with all the modern street rod stuff, It was for sale, I had the money, I just smiled to myself and walked away. By the way I first got the Buick in '58 or '59.
Bought it in 83 or 84 with 53000 original miles on it. It was used by a man that owned a lumber yard or hardware store. One or the other. I drove it until I bought my 67 chevelle ss and then the truck got sold. It ended up in the junk yard. I found out about the truck and went to look at it. This was in 93 or so. There was a guy that worked for the yard owner and he got all bent out of shape when I started looking at "his" truck. He was looney. A couple of weeks later the yard owner killed the guy I had encountered. He had been living on the property and doing scrap work but the owner wanted him off of his land and fired. It went back and forth for a while with the Sheriff involved and no resolution. He and a deer rifle took care of the situation. Well before he went to the big house he dropped the truck off at my dad's house. He knew I wanted it and I didn't even ask. He just did it. He's out now and I can never catch him to give him some cash. World War II vet, former school bus drive, and all around nice guy. Just get off his property when he says to git.
This is the day I got my first car. My grandfather called me up that day to surprise me with it and had my grandmother took the picture of my maiden voyage. Thats my grandfather (Barney Pollard) next to me. He was a big time car nut-try to Yahoo Barney Pollard Car collector- a website by my cousin although some of the stuff my cousin wrote about is questionable in my book. I was eleven (the plate is 1962). Drove the wheels off of it. Still have it (or at least its still in the family-my nephew wanted a car to work on to learn about cars but has never touched it). Was a homebuilt boattail with a Crosley Hot Shot engine. Had two engines for it- one was a hop-up with aluminum goodies. Now its a boattail, my older brother hit a grader while going sideways-so we wrapped some sheetmetal across the back. I look at the construction and the craftsmanship or lack of it- it was pitiful-lucky I never killed myself-Jim
A 1939 Chevy coupe my dad and I started as a project in our home garage while I was still in high school. Fast forward 13 years since it was finished, and I still have it to this day. It now has approx. 70,000 miles on it, including 2 Americruise long hauls, and could use a freshening up. It's not driven much any more due to a new project (32 Mordoor), and a new child (11 months old today), but its sentimental value is priceless to me.
53 Ford 2 door hardtop, 292, auto. Dad gave it to me. He had put in the 292. This was in 64 after he got a 63 1/2. Yep still got it!
In 1967, just a little while before I turned 16, I got a '40 Ford coupe. It is now on its fourth motor, fourth interior, sixth paint job, and is awaiting a trans rebuild to get back to daily driver status.
1951 Mercury in 1961. Saved a set of aluminum heads and a 3x2 intake. Should have kept the whole thing. Pete
1971 442 with w30 package 455, 4 speed ermine white with tuxedo black stripes. by the time I finished it, it was a certified BADASS. spent 9 months and ALOT of money on it ( and I worked at a body shop at the time!) sadly, my friend and I got t-boned in it at 2:32 a.m. on january 3rd,1995 by a drunk driver in a geo storm wagon.we were sitting at a stop light and he ended up driving down the sidewalk area of a gas station. Two of his passengers died, 1 was paralyzed from the waist down, and the guy behind him was hurt pretty bad,too. He walked away with 3 stitches over one of his eyes, from the windshield coming apart when his buddy went through it. totaled my car. he was going 90 when he hit us, and my car barely moved. the impact punched a hole on the side of a mondello aluminum block from the early 70's. it also bent a lenco trans like a cigarette butt. I broke a collarbone, and my buddy (who was driving because I was shitfaced) almost lost the top 1/2 inch of his ear. I am convinced that if we weren't in a car with a roll cage and 5 point harnesses, we would both be dead. The Irony of the situation is this. in Canyon Texas, I27 runs through town north/south and doubles as "the other" first street. the "main drag" is first street that runs east/west. I lived at the corner of 7th and 11th (south and eas tof "first and first"), and was drunk at a party on 2nd and Orchard. (which is 3 blocks west from 27.) 14 blocks from home, and didn't want to drive because I was afraid I would wreck my car. I had to cross one ghost town street at 2:30 and all else was purely residential. (coulda limped it home,right?) my buddy comes over to drive my drunk ass home in my stupid expensive car, and we get clobbered by a shitbox being driven by a drunk.go figure.the way I look at it now, is if I had just decided to drive it myself, I probably would have fallen asleep in it about 10 seconds after sitting down and my car would live on.
Oooh. Don't be playa hatin', but pops had a 1956 Jaguar XK 140 SE- the SE was because it had dual exhaust, wire wheels with knockoffs, and the famous "E" type cylinder head. Told me "If you can make it run, you can drive it". I woulda make a booger run if I coulda driven it in high school. Took me dropping a chain around the front crossmember to the back of a buddy's Ranger PU- dragged it up to 20, dropped the clutch, and fell in love with the whine of Dual-overhead cams.....ahhh. I'm gonna build a rod with all-Jag mechanicals...should piss of the traditionalists on both sides....
Oh, and not to sund like an asshole, but I turned down the 59 (maybe 58?)Chevy for the Jag...pops had a bit of a collection of cars, it was a black coupe, had tripower, competition clutch, and three on the tree. What did I know, I was just a kid....give the left jewel to have either one of them now...
'55 Pontiac 2 door sedan (No it's not the one I have now, Dammit!). Had some good times in the first one. Pontiacs had great, drive-in back seats. Also, kicked ass on a '64 'Cuda at our local late night "drag strip", one late Friday night.
'64 El Camino. Dad had driven it for a few years, then it got parked while he drove a new car. We brought it back to life for me to drive at 16. New suspension up front and brakes...new floorboards, Mom made us put shoulder belts in it too! Got my first speeding ticket in a couple months....blew up the motor a few months after that. Replace it with a crate motor. I messed with it all through highschool, did bodywork (a LOT of bondo), fixed little things, made it less-un-cool, untill I got the Cutlass. A year or so after I'd been driving the Cutlass, we cut the Elky into pieces and threw most of it away.
A '53 Ford Mainline two door sedan, with a Merc Flathead/3 speed stick, when I was 11, for $500. Me 'n my dad had a terrible red paint job sprayed on it, but I thought it was sweet (I was in fifth grade), in HS I decided I wanted to customize it and did all kinds of shit to it. Still got it 14 years later and don't have any plans to sell it. If I could go back in time, to talk to myself when I was 11, I'd ask myself, "where the hell did you get $500?" I still don't know where I got the money from that, but it was 5 bills well spent.
A 1965 Plymouth Satellite with a 318 wide block and a 727. I was 15 at the time. Drove it through high school and my freshman year of college. I later traded it for a 440 engine. Funny thing is I still have the 65 Belvedere 1 2dr sedan that I bought to use as a parts car. Never took any parts off of it and now I am glad I didn't. Reece
My first car, bought in '62 when I was 16, was a '56 Chevy 4-door with no brakes, in primer. 6 cyl. 3-speed with a J.C. Whitney floor shifter installed backwards. It cost $15.00. I bought a set of four used tires for $20.00 at the j-yard, rebuilt the brakes and drove it for 3 years. I've always regretted that I never took any pics of it.
Started working on it in 1959 when I was 14. My ride at the time was a Cushman Eagle. My friend's grandmother gave him a 1941 Ford Sedan. He was building a Model A touring car, and needed money for an Olds engine. I bought the sedan for $30.00 and traded it for a 1946 Ford coupe. I got a running '53 Hemi out of a scrap yard for $10.00 and bought motor mounts and transmission adapter from Honest Charlies. Picked up a '39 gearbox and away we went.
The Jalopy Journal
