Granddaddy & His Cadillac, Augusta, Georgia, February 11th, 1956, photo © 2008 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
Do you have memories of the “family” car? Riding backwards with your brothers and sisters in the cargo seat of a 1967 Chevy wagon? The smell of the dirt-bottomed garage where your great, great uncle stored his vintage 1930’s black Pontiac? A Sunday ride in your dad’s Oldsmobile convertible? Taking a cross-country vacation in a flat nose 1962 Ford Econoline van?
October is a milestone month for the production of cars. After the internal combustion engine was invented, cars began to be mass produced in the 1920’s. Every American family wanted to own a car. October is the anniversary of Henry’s Ford’s first production “Model T.”
According to Old Car and Truck Pictures:
The first production Model T Ford was assembled at the Piquette Avenue Plant in Detroit on October 1, 1908. For the next 19 years, Ford would build 15,000,000 cars and trucks with the Model “T” engine. The only other car to exceed that number was the Volkswagen Beetle. Considering the years when Henry did it, 1908 to 1927, it is surely a record that will never be beaten. Henry Ford had succeeded in his dream of building a car for the masses.
In research through shoeboxes of old photographs, I discovered that many images were of family members proudly standing next to their cars. Remember the jingle, “See the USA in your Chevrolet…? ” One of my fathers was a Chevy man; he has always driven Chevrolets and still owns a Chevy truck to this day. Another drove Oldsmobiles and I remember his red Olds convertible with the white rag top. What kind of car did your father own?
Family Scrapbook — Fathers, Sons, Daughters, & Cars:
Mom & Uncle Jack, Augusta, Georgia, circa late 1930s, early 1940s, photo © 2008 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
Granddaddy In Pinstripes, along with Mom and Uncle Jack, Augusta, Georgia, circa early 1940’s, photo © 2008 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
My grandfather was a GM man. He owned a Cadillac. And the day his son Jack graduated from high school, he was presented with a 1954 Pontiac Star Chief (which oddly I remember looking more like this 1953 Chieftain Catalina). I remember the car well; Uncle Jack died unexpectedly a few months before I was born and my mother inherited the Pontiac. It would figure prominently in my early childhood memories. I loved the way that Pontiac looked and smelled. And through my child-eyes, the orange hood ornament of Chief Pontiac, and the ornate grille and tail chrome, added a certain respectability and regalness to the way the car moved down the road.
If you think about it, cars were the Internet of their day, changing the way people communicated, socialized, visited with family, and, eventually, after the Interstate infrastructure was built by Eisenhower in the 1950’s, the way we moved around the country, sometimes never to return home. Cars changed America. (And we have our wildly fluctuating gas prices and chronic dependence on fossil fuels to prove it.)
Uncle Jack & His Pontiac, Augusta, Georgia, circa 1954,
photo © 2008 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
What memories do you have of the “family” car? Did you live on a farm where trucks were more important than cars? Was your father a man who would only buy American-made cars? Or did he believe VW’s and Toyota’s were better made and would last longer. What kind of cars did your mother own? How did the cars your family owned influence those you would buy as an adult?
There are two steps to this week’s Writing Practice:
(1) Make a list of all the cars you have owned; make another list of the cars your family owned when you were growing up. Be as specific as possible about year, make, and model. If you need help, dig through old family photographs and chances are you’ll bump into your family history of automobiles.
(2) Do a 15 minute Writing Practice on one of these car-related Topics:
- How many cars have you owned? Make a list. After making your list, choose one and do a 15 minute Writing Practice about a memory connected to that car. Think about the way it smelled, the color, the way you felt when you drove it. Was it a stick, 5-speed, 4-on-the-floor, automatic, or 3-speed on the column? Write everything you know about that car. Start the Practice with — “The first time I drove my 19xx _________…”
- What was the first car you owned? Was it new or used? How old were you when you learned to drive? High school, junior high? Who taught you to drive? Do a Writing Practice on “My first car ________.” Be as detailed as possible. Include all the senses.
- Write a memory of one of your family cars. I have memories of traveling across the Savannah River to visit with my Grandmother Elise and her singing to me along the way. Write about a childhood memory associated with a car your family owned. Write down the make, model, year of the car. Then beside it, write “I Remember______” and see what comes out. You might be surprised how far 4 wheels and a full tank of gas can take you in your writing.
Granddaddy & Uncle Bill, Augusta, Georgia, circa early 1950’s,
photo © 2008 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
-posted on red Ravine, Sunday, October 12th, 2008
I have lots of stories about cars!! I chose to do Practice #2.
http://alotus-poetry.livejournal.com/26376.html
Thank you so much for this practice! While writing it, I rediscovered something I haven’t thought of before. Thank you!
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Great writing topic, QM! I have lots of memories of cars, too. What is it about cars that made/make them so prominent in our memories?
The photos of Granddaddy are great. I love his chin (the cleff or dimple). That first photo is especially lovely; it almost looks like his deep blue shirt is colorized.
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Great post. When Lynda Barry gives her writing workshops one of the things she does is have people list 10 cars they have owned, operated, ridden in or on and then pick one to write a piece on.
My three favorite cars that my family owned were a Hudson, Simca, and Ralp-Nader-dissed Chevrolet Corvair. Each has special stories attached to the memory.
The Hudson was shaped like a tear-drop so it moved through the air better (my dad said).
The Simca was a French car that ended up in St. Joseph, MO somehow. We drove it with a metal rod welded to the gear shift (the original gear shift had broken off) and we drove it until the rusted hole under the feet of the front seat driver got so bad that hitting a water puddle guaranteed that person a brief shower. I learned to drive on that car.
The Chevrolet Corvair with all of its safety problems was the car I drove in high school. I got it when the family had nothing to do. My friends and I spent many happy times in that car amidst the years of teenage angst.
Thanks for the topic.
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a~lotus, thanks for writing with us on red Ravine. I just read your practice and it reminded me of a couple of things about cars I’d forgotten. Like the way I used to drive and drive for miles when I was going through a tough time emotionally. It was kind of like a giant rocking chair and really soothed me.
I would create these routes of different mile lengths that circled back to the beginning. That way when I took them, I wouldn’t have to think about navigating; I knew the route by heart. I’d also usually choose routes that took uncrowded backroads or sometimes went out into the country. I had forgotten that cars were related to those memories.
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ybonesy, I don’t know what it is about cars but they sure do figure prominently in my childhood, too. My fathers and brothers all worked on their own cars. And my grandfather owned a repair shop; Daddy worked for him for a while when he and Mom first got married. I remember visiting the shop when I was a kid.
The cleft in my grandfather’s chin — yes, I had forgotten about it until I saw these photos again. He also had a big old crooked smile that my uncle still sports once in a while. So many memories come up from looking at photographs.
I do think that first photograph was colorized. I was asking Liz about it when I posted this. I remember learning about that old process in art school and trying it out with these special pigments on black & whites. Quite an art form.
Liz took a public art workshop at MCAD last Saturday and she said when she wandered up by the darkrooms there were tons of these huge digital printers now. It made me wonder if they still kept all the old b&w processes going and the old color processers we used to use for people like me who like to keep the old methods alive. So much has changed!
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Bob, those are quite unusual cars for the time – well, except for the Corvair. The Hudsons were pretty cool. I honestly don’t know what a Simca looks like. But a friend of mine in high school, her family had a Citron. I remember how strange it was in shape and style around all the big American cars of the time. And it had a kind of felt interior, a kind of spongy floor that sank when you put your feet on it. Wild.
I can relate to the rusted out floor. I had a Toyota Corolla that finally rusted out under the driver’s feet area. So I put a thick winter floor mat over it and drove it until I was able to afford a new car. I called it my BarneyRubbleMobile. But looking back, I guess it was’t so funny in these Northern climes.
A college friend of mine had a Ford Pinto she bought right after they released the exploding gas tank from rear-end collisions information. After that, we never got into that Pinto without thinking about that.
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A few years ago I wrote a story about “Cars I Have Loved”. Two cars stand out among the nineteen that have been in my life to date as cars I have truly loved. I felt special and pampered every time I got into these cars, and I would be happy to still be driving either one, for the rest of my life.
The first was the one I called The Butterfly Car, because its swooshy, sweepy appearance reminded me of a tiger swallowtail. It was a 1957 Ford Fairlane Galaxy. That car has the most elegant fins sweeping up and back, and a bronze strip that swooped down from the headlight to the midpoint, just behind the front door. The back window of the hardtop convertible had a chrome piece where the wing window generally would have been. Our car was strong lemony yellow with a white hood above the bronze. The interior was black with gold threads in the upholstery. To my everlasting regret, my father sold it before I was old enough to drive. He has assured me that it was a delightful to drive as I imagined it would be.
The other car I loved was the nail polish red 1965 Covair Corsa convertible we bought a few months before our first son was born. We were living in Boston at the time, and the Corsa replaced a huge old Chevy BelAir that looked like a bronze pterodactylish bird swooping along in preparation for take-off. That Chevy tended to stall in intersections and otherwise endanger life. In the Corsa, I felt like I was driving a Forumula race car. I could swoop in and out of traffic lanes and slide effortlessly into tight parking spots. Driving with the top down was more glamorous than anything I’d ever done. I even felt glamorous in that car when I was nine months pregnant!
Yes, I loved those cars, and my heart still goes pitter patter at the memory. No car since has come close to living up to the standard set by those two.
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Wow, the description of those cars makes me think that today’s cars are so boring by comparison. I mean, I drive a Subaru Outback. I love it, but nothing about it, not even the color, can sweep one off their feet.
My dad is and was a practical man. After the kids grew up and we didn’t need the big Caprice, he got a Valiant. I think that was what it was. I can’t remember now the maker (I’ll have to call him.) I called the Valiant “The Box.” It was so horridly ugly and dull, and of course, I was in high school, 9-10th grade, and so it was embarrassing to drive.
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My father has only had red cars in his life. He had a red GTO when I was 12. Then a red XKE Jaguar. He traded that for a red truck. Then he had a jeep that my brother rolled over a cliff where they hung upside down for awhile but survived. Now he has a red jeep and a candy apple (remember that color?) red electric wheelchair. He has never stayed under the speed limit in any of them.
Amazing, isn’t it, how something as simple as “car” prompts stuff?
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QM, what a fun post, and here’s a quick comment before I write a car-practice. While driving to work recently, the NPR news byte was about an automibile manufacturing company in India, called Ta Ta which is going to make a very cheap car called a Nano, (I think it is,) that everyone could afford. (on the order of the original German Volkswagon, I guess.) I laughed to myself, as I remembered that when we were kids, my brother and I called old cars “ta ta cars” imitating the noise they made as they rattled down the street.
Bob, my family had a Hudson when I was in Jr. High. I didn’t like it, as we were the only family I knew of that owned one, and was at the age when I wanted to conform. Same went for the Frazer my Dad bought. But later, he bought an Austin, not the cool sports model, but a boxy, green one; same shape as London taxis, which are black Austins, only smaller. I think he liked to be different!!
Thanks, QM for a great writing practice subject.
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Oliverowl, we had a Frazer too. We always had odd, used cars, never usual, new ones. We couldn’t afford new cars. The Hudson was a dream car with its aerodynamic styling long before aerodynamics in car design mattered. Comfy? Wow, was it comfortable and probably the most luxurious car we ever had.
ybonesy, I think the Valiant was a Ford. We had a white 1960-something one for awhile. They were indeed box-like.
I was never one of those kids who could identify cars on the street as a Ford Fairlane or Buick Regal and quote their stats like kids did then with cars and baseball players. I am really bad at dating cars when I see them. I wonder if kids still do that and can tell a 1994 Subaru Outback from a 2000 Subaru Outback.
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CARS!!
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Great idea, QM. I love all the family photos. Granddaddy looks like the strong, silent type.
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Cars have always been an important part of my life. I don’t know where to start. Let’s see: I was 15 when I learned to drive. 16 when I recieved my license. My father had a repair garage and he was separated from Mother when I was only nine. I would always go to the garage to get my allowance and see him. Then about once a month he would have a catfish stew and all his friends would show up and we would stop by the garage to get some. Of course I wasn’t allowed to hang out there! But I still have a lot of memories. I guess I have a knack for figuring out car problems because I was fascinated by them, and I wanted to be a mechanic like my Dad. But girls didn’t do that back then.
When I was married Dad gave my husband and I a rebuilt car , which my husband burned up the engine rushing to get his sister from a bus station before she left to go home. So we had it about a month. Back to the bus stop!!
I learned to drive at the Augusta fair grounds, of course when it was empty, lol!
I didn’t have my /our own car until my second marriage. It was a green chevy. I’ve always been partial to GM cars.
My next car was ,I think, a Buick my husband had. Then a LIncoln Continental,which often let me sit.
Then we graduated to a Buick 9 passenger station wagon, my family by then was 8. In between I received my brothers car , which QM posted on RR.
I actually bought my first car, another Buick wagon in the 7o’s. The car I liked best was an 89 silver Buick Grand Sport I bought after my Mother passed away,which I drove until 2002 or 3 when my brother gave me his 99 Mercedes SUV, which I now drive. Cars have always been my way of therapy. I’m like QM, when I’m upset I just drive and work things out. Sometimes ending up 100 miles from my home at a girlfriend’s home. At least I did until gas went sky high!!
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Wow! I’m so amazed. I guess I’m one of the younguns here as I barely know what several of the cars you are all talking about!! Nevertheless, all of your comments gave me a “history lesson” of how cars were like back then compared to the ones we have today. Cars have really evolved, but the memories haven’t!
It’s like Franny said (#9), who knew that a simple topic on cars can spark a train wreck of memories!!
I also forgot to note that I really enjoyed the photo-essay embedded in this entry, QM!
Again, it’s always a pleasure writing with red Ravine. And like you, QM, the piece I wrote reminded me of the things I’ve forgotten about cars!
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I’ll probably try this writing practice because my dad was a car nut!
The first car I can vaguely remember was a Fiat in the 1960’s. My mom said that car disappeared when my dad loaned it to a friend and took it to Chicago. We never saw it again.
The second car I can really remember is a 1964 Ford Custom. It was white with a flat blue dash board. I remember it had only one pedal on the floor so it must have been a automatic.
The third car I can remember was a used 1963 Lincoln Continental. It was black and I thought was WAY cool. Then my dad traded it for a used 1965 black Lincoln Continental. Though cool, not as cool (even when I was only about 9 years old at time). This is the car I first drove when I learned to drive. I have some hell stories of that 65 Lincoln. My mom still hates that car!
Our official second car was a 1950 Plymouth. My dad drove it to work. My brother drove through high school, then on through the University of Arizona in the mid 1970’s.
Ugggh! Then my dad started collecting cars; 1929 Ford Model A, 1940 Ford business coupe (featured in the latest Indiana Jones movie), 1932 LaSalle, 1948 Packard, 1953 Ford Crown Victoria (the Mellow Yellow), and many, many more!
Our first brand new car was a 1972 Ford LTD Country Squire station wagon. The type with the fake wood siding. It was a real cruiser with the 429 C.I.D. engine with the HUGE 4-barrel carburetor. It had an 8-track stereo so we played; Neil Diamond, Paul McCarney and Wings, and Jedthro Tull on our way from NM to AR.
After that it was a flurry of cars; 1974 Gremlin, 1974 F-100 4×4, and a 1978 Olds Cutlass. The Cutlass was the worse! My dad tried GM and it was sucky!
Anyway, I’ll give this practice a shot because cars were a big deal in my dad’s life…and because of that, they are a big deal in my life. Ugggh!
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BTW the first pic is not of a Pontiac but of a Cadillac…late 50’s vintage…probably 1957 or so.
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So great to come in and read all these memories and associations to cars. What fun!
ritergal, love the Butterfly car. The Ford Galaxy was a really popular car. I remember my grandmother had a Galaxy. And that lipstick or candy apple red Franny mentions. I still kind of like that shade of red.
Franny, wow, that would be a good story, hanging upside down over a cliff in jeep and living to tell about it. Your dad sounds very adventurous.
oliverowl, I don’t even know what a Frazer is? But I did own a used red ’62 or ’63 Austin Healey Sprite, my first car that my father and mother helped me to fix up. It wasn’t the most dependable car since it was almost 10 years old by the time I drove it. But I loved it!
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Christine, yes, my grandfather was indeed the strong silent type. I don’t remember him ever talking all that much. But I could tell he loved us. And he did smile and seemed happy to see us when we came to visit him when I was growing up. I used to love to visit at his house. I was close to one of my aunts. And he had a pool (so great for kid growing up in the hot South) and a pool and ping pong table.
Mom, so great to read your memories. I can see I don’t know my cars as well as I thought. I could have sworn we had Oldsmobiles. And there you see — I would have to do some research to get the models right in that chapter and can’t rely solely on memory! It’s interesting to read how women couldn’t be mechanics back then. It just wasn’t accepted as a social norm in the 1950’s. That’s why I have hope for other things to change along the way!
mimbresman, is that really a Caddy? I wasn’t sure of the make but thought when I blew the photo up, I saw the Chief Pontiac streamlined hood ornament that looked similar to the Pontiac my uncle owned. If you get a chance, can you provide a link to the Cadillac you think it might be? I’d love to see the whole car up close.
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Oh, and if anyone recognizes the other older cars in any of the photos, I’d love to know what they are, too. I can see I’ll have to do more research on family car history!
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QM, I just showed Jim the photo of the first car and asked what it was. “A Cadillac,” he said, “it’s got the Cadillac thing right in front.” I would not have known. I’m terrible with cars, but Jim’s a buff, too. He’s got an old Jeep Willies, 1940s, in the front yard.
Also, the car I was trying to remember was a 1974 Plymouth, and we think it was a Valiant. Just talked to my mom and dad. Their memories are fading.
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a~lotus, I wanted to come back and thank you for your kind comment (#15). It reminds me that the cars I might have driven as a kid are ancient to others out there who are much younger than me. And it makes me wonder — what will be your memories of cars when you get to be my age! I always look forward to you writing with us on red Ravine. It opens up doors to other ways of being, other generations.
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ybonesy, oh, good. Tell Jim thanks (does he know what the other older cars are?) I can look at Cadillac photos and maybe figure out the year based on mimbresman’s estimate. I’d better change the name of that photograph! I’ll go in and edit it. It’s helpful to know. I bet my Uncle Bill would probably have known, too. He was also a big car buff (like Mom) and I think I remember him saying he rebuilt or refurbished his first car in high school.
I have been surrounded by family who are great with cars and know a lot about them. I’ve picked some of it up but obviously not all the details of years. I can usually see a car and at least know what make it is. If it’s unusual, I look on the car to see the model. I’m kind of fascinated with cars.
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NOTE: Okay, I went in and changed the name of the lead photograph to Granddaddy & His Cadillac. And in the body of the piece, I changed — My grandfather was a Pontiac man to My grandfather was a GM man.
Since both Pontiacs and Cadillacs (and Chevys) are GM’s, it seemed like the right thing to do. It also explains some of Mom’s love for the GM cars.
So apparently — GM cars and trucks were produced globally under the following 12 brands: Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet, GM Daewoo, GMC, Holden, Hummer, Opel, Pontiac, Saab, Saturn and Vauxhall.
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Mom, if you come back to this post — do you remember if that Pontiac of Uncle Jack’s was a 1953 or a 1954? And remember the convertible that T. owned when you got married, the one with the white top? Was that a Buick or Olds or Caddy? Now I’m questioning my memory! 8)
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answer to #25. It was a 54 Pontiac. He graduated right before you were born. I’m not sure what T.’s convertable was.He traded it right away because of the family he had inherited. I used to know the years and makes of cars but my memory has dulled and gone on to more important things in my life. The one with Dad and Bill was a model T or A ,I forget. Bill still has it stored at his airport, I think. That was an interesting car to drive !! Maybe Jim can tell. Email T to find out what his car was. You could check with Bill also, do you have their email addresses?
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QM, J & I have been away at our camp, so what a delight to come home & read this post! I had never seen photos of Uncle Jack or Granddaddy before. I can’t wait to show this post to J! (He left to take Abbey to our vet. I am worried about the outcome.She had a bad day at camp yesterday & I fear something is going on with her hips. We hadn’t planned to leave there until tomorrow, however, she was obviously in pain yesterday & could barely get up.)
I imagine all of us have memories from childhood about cars. My Grandfather was big on Jeeps & I remember that as children, he would would load all of his grandchildren into the bed of his Jeep & drive us around on his 400 acre hunting land.
My all time favorite car of my Dads was a Turnpike Cruiser. I think it was a Mercury, but I’m not 100% sure. What was so cool about this car was that the rearview window would go up & down & I believe that was in the early 60’s. So it was way ahead of it’s time as it was electrical.
D
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MOM, yep, I can email them for the details. I thought that Pontiac was a 1954. I always applauded T. for going from 0 to 5 kids in the blink of an eye. That effort came from a place of love. I do think Bill still has the Model T or A stored at the airport. I remember Daddy knew what it was when we talked about it one day. I think I got that on tape. It might be there, too. I can find out.
diddy, wow, you guys are going over to the Susquehanna river place. That’s great. It can’t be easy to get over there. Sorry to hear about Abbey. Poor girl. Keep us posted. That Mercury sounds cool with the electric sliding rear window. Don’t think I’ve ever seen one of those!
Yes, do show the photos to J. I wonder if he remembers what Granddaddy looked like. He was pretty young when we moved. I plan to upload all of the photo scans I have into another program for the family so people can add their own memories. I’ll keep you posted on that!
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MOM, do you recognize where any of those photos were taken? Is the one of you and Jack near Aunt Cassie’s? And the white picket fence — is that your grandmother’s place, the one whose yard we visit each time we go back South? What about Granddaddy in the top photo? Do you recognize where he’s standing in front of? Just curious.
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QM, yes, J remembers Granddaddy very well. He recounted the swimming pool & said they always had sodas on hand, in the kind of cooler you would see at the local store. He also remembers some of the cars. What struck me most when I saw these photos was how much Uncle Bill resembles his father. Wow! I had to take a second glance!
One of the things I remember most about the cars when I was young was that most had the same color scheme. Seafoam green, salmon orange, pink, & black. Not a lot of variety then!
Oh, and Abbey, the vet says it’s arthritis. I guess that’s better than I thought, but she will have to take medicine daily for the rest of her life. She’s sleeping now due to a shot they gave her earlier…D
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The picture of Dad and the cad. was at his and Lillians in North Augusta, I think. Their first house. Jack and I were in front of BarBars on Telfair St., where the highway is now. Jack’s was at either Mother’s on Howard St. or Dad’s. Dad, Jack,and I were on Washington Rd. at our house.Bill and Dad I think were the same place as the Cad.
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MOM, thanks for the details! I remember you talking about the Telfair house that got torn down for the highway.
diddy, ah, so sad for Abbey. That’s got to be painful. Glad she was able to sleep last night. And yes, Bill does resemble his father, doesn’t he? Mom also has a strong family resemblance. I remember the Cokes, too, and putting peanuts into them (In a children’s book I recently read, the main character was from the South and was going the same thing — dropping peanuts into her Coke).
J. remembers more than I thought he might have. He was so young. I can see how the cars stuck out to him though. And the pool which also stuck out for me. It was so darned hot there in the summer. A pool was a blessing if you didn’t have AC. I had forgotten the cooler until you mentioned it. The kind with two knobbed lids that pull up on top? Those kind of coolers have a certain smell to them.
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This is a great writing practice. I just wrote it under my topics page in my journal that holds many of the miscellaneous thoughts I manage to capture in writing.
I’m thinking of the first car I bought. My husband (to-be, we weren’t yet married) pooled our meager resources, went to a used car lot, where I fell in love with a Mazda 626 – only because she was bright yellow and had a brown leather roof. (I have never been known for practicality.)
She was a pain to maintain and a terrible choice in all matters – except that I loved how handsome she was and I loved the freedom she gave me.
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[…] -related to Topic post: WRITING TOPIC — MEMORIES OF CARS […]
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Below is my list of cars I’ve owned. It feels like I’ve forgotten a few in there somewhere. But I don’t really think so. I did my first Memories of Cars Writing Practice on My First Car, the Austin-Healey Sprite (link in #34).
Cars are a rich Writing Topic for me, something that was passed down for a few generations. When I made this list, I immediately wanted to do a Writing Practice on each of these cars. They are packed with memories.
I am the kind of car owner that drives a car until the end, forms a relationship with the car, I usually even name them. So my ownership of each car usually spans quite a few years. And I’ve lived in different places so they are associated with different climates and terrain. I also love to drive.
More to come on this Topic in the future!
_____________________
List of Cars I’ve Owned
(not too sure on the exact years; they are approximate)
1) 1963 Austin-Healey Sprite, Mark II – 2 door convertible, soft-top, red with black racing stripe, roll bar, wooden dash board with flip switches (See #34)
2) 1965 Ford Econoline Van – original E Series, flat-nose, 3-door, 3-speed manual on the column, mag wheels, with engine between the front seats
3) 1968 VW Squareback wagon – powder blue, 4 on the floor, engine in the back, leather interior, 8-Track player bolted to the front floor
4) 1972 Datsun sedan – navy blue, 5-speed stick, later had it repainted to a flecked reddish-burgundy. Had an Alpine stereo and custom speakers installed. Would continue this tradition on through the last Camry. Music & Sound = Important.
5) 1980 Subaru 4-wheel drive wagon – bright red, 5-speed stick, black interior, also had a 4-wheel drive on the floor that you could put into gear when needed or leave off. This was around the time of the Subaru BRATs when Subs were sporty and cool looking.
6) 1985 Subaru sedan – 5-speed stick, all wheel drive, 2-door, yellow with beige interior, carried many a canoe on top luggage rack
7) 1988 Toyota Corolla Sedan – light blue, 5-speed stick, ran until almost 200,000 miles
8 ) 1995 Toyota Camry – dark green, beige interior, 5-speed stick (hard to find in a Camry), has taken me across the country and back (North, Northwest, South, Southwest, East, West, and Southwest) many times – seems to run forever!
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Bo, I definitely remember the Mazda 626. A good looking car. I also remember from those who owned them that they were a pain to maintain. Your Mazda sounds kind of like my Sprite – a labor of love. 8)
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[…] Dad tried to give me The Box when I graduated from high school, but I declined. He sold it to someone then used the money to buy me Larry’s 1971 Honda Civic. I was a spoiled brat. -related to Topic post: WRITING TOPIC — MEMORIES OF CARS […]
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Fun practice, QM. Here is the list of cars I remember, in chronological order (some my parents owned and some I owned):
1) 1966 Chevy Caprice, blue. (Dad and Mom had a 1962 American Motors station wagon, which Mom liked and Dad didn’t, which I don’t remember even though my earliest years were spent in it.)
2) 1971 Chevy 3/4-ton Pick-up, light green. I drove this one whenever my parents left town, before I had my drivers license. My sister Janet had taught me how to drive stick shift when I was young, like 13, on her yellow VW bug. I need to do a separate WP all about driving stick shift on a pick-up!
3) 1974 Plymouth Valiant, gold. “The Box”–this is the one I just wrote about (mostly).
4) 1978 Monte Carlo. This was the last car my parents bought while I still lived with them, but I think I was so outward oriented by then that I don’t remember a thing about it.
5) 1971 Honda Civic hatch-back, frosty blue. My first car, had been my brother’s.
6) 1984 Toyota Corolla, white. My parents have a tradition of giving their old cars to their different kids. I got this one when they graduated to a different Toyota. BTW, this Corolla started a long tradition, since broken, of all of us buying Toyotas.
7) 1992 Toyota SR5 pick-up, white. This was my first brand new car, and it had a lot of add-ons. It was really nice. Jim now drives it.
8) 1985 Toyota pick-up, tan. For some reason, Dad gave me his little pick-up, even though I had one. I think no one else wanted it, and we were living in a place that could use a working truck (mine was actually too nice to mess up—not any more, of course). We still have this. It is the quintessential “old lady” car—came to us in the mid-1990s or maybe even early 2000s, and it had only about 40K miles on it. We love it. Great gas mileage. I’ve been followed into a Smith’s grocery store by strangers and asked if I would sell the truck.
9) 2005 Subaru Outback, dark blue. I was very torn when it came time to get a new car. We needed a family car (Jim had bought a minivan somewhre between 1992 and 2005, and I really disliked it) but I didn’t like any of the Toyotas by then. So I bought this one…great safety ratings, the works. Jim got my ’92 Toyota truck.
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Mom and Dad called tonight to say they’d forgotten one of their cars. They only ever once had a “second” car, and that was a 1967 Camaro, which they had at the time they had the Caprice. One of my sisters had it one night, and I guess her boyfriend at the time wrecked it. It would have ended up being my brother’s.
I didn’t verify this, but as I recall it was a frosty green, light.
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My Honda Civic was also a hatchback & they kinda resembled a roller skate on big wheels. I currently drive a Honda Accord which I have had since 1995. What a trooper that car has been for me! I love it & my next car will also be a Honda. I once owned a Datsun B210 station wagon & it was very reliable. Over 300,000 miles when I traded it in. D
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ybonesy, I’ll have to come back and add my parent’s cars in a separate list later. My mother added quite a few of them in her comment (#14). I think I learned to drive on the green Buick sedan she mentions. I think it was automatic. I didn’t learn to drive the stick until the Austin-Healey.
diddy, you got 300,000 on that Datsun 210 wagon? Wow. I had a lot of miles on my Datsun sedan, too. Those things would run forever. I don’t think it ever broke down either. Very reliable.
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