Motoring Memories

Gift Keeps on Giving

IN 1949 on Christmas Eve, I was walking down Main Street in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, when I stopped to look in the window of Wertsch Motor Co. There in the showroom was my dream car, a yellow-and-black Plymouth Special Deluxe convertible coupe.

Well, the last-minute Christmas gift I had set out to find ended up being for me! The salesman said the new models would be out in January, so they’d give me a good deal. As a recent high school graduate in Omro, I had saved enough money from summer hay baling and a full-time job to buy the car for $2,000.

Since that old ragtop still sits in my garage 60 years later, it has turned out to be quite a value. I courted my wife, June, in that car, got married and began raising our three kids. The convertible was no longer practical as a family car, so I stored it in Aunt Frieda’s barn for a few years.

A few years stretched into many, and it was 1976 before I pulled my old car into the sunlight again. With a little paint, new tires and a lot of elbow grease, I had the ’49 back on the road. Not long ago, I added seatbelts for the grandkids’ sake. It has never been restored, just kept up and repaired as needed.

I keep the Plymouth in good shape with the hopes that my great-grandkids will put the top down, take her to the drive-in and say, “My great-grandpa bought this car new in ’49.”

— Richard Kleinschmidt, Oshkosh, Wisconsin

Braving the Wild West

IN A 1951 Studebaker Commander Starlight coupe I’d bought the previous year, I traveled out West in 1957. Back in those days, with no speed limits in some places, you went as fast as you could while still handling the car safely. You can bet that little Studebaker did some hot traveling.

A sign just out of Tucumcari, New Mexico, said “Last Chance Gas,” 15 cents a gallon. Man, that was expensive, so I turned around and went back into town, getting it at a Whiting Brothers station for 5 cents a gallon plus 3 cents tax.

It was 100 miles to the next place, a Chevron station called Cline’s Corners out in the middle of nowhere. If you didn’t make it before 9 p.m., you had to sit there until 9 the next morning. And if it was a weekend, the gas was 5 cents higher.

I got my very first speeding ticket while driving 25 mph in Kingman, Arizona, where the city speed limit was 15 mph. I spent the whole weekend in a cold jail in the courthouse basement. Fortunately, the judge let me go, warning me never to get caught speeding in his town again.

I eventually went through Victorville and Eagle Rock, California, stopping to see friends I had known since 1950—Roy Rogers, Dale Evans and their son, Dusty. I stayed at their home three days, getting my car washed and serviced there, too.

I ended up in Hollywood, where I worked at the YMCA until heading back to Missouri. It was a fun excursion, and the Studebaker was the best car I ever owned.

— Ray Pittam, Redding, California

Long Line of Elusive Fords

WHEN MY DAD returned from the Army Air Corps in 1945, we didn’t have a car. Since automakers had stopped producing civilian cars during World War II, the waiting list for new cars seemed endless.

Exploring every opportunity to buy a Ford, which he had before the war, Dad finally came home one day with a 1941 Pontiac sedan. That’s me on the right with Mom and my brother, Bob, in the 1948 photo.

I remember leaning over the seat to watch Dad teach Mom how to start the Pontiac. “I told you there’s no button to start this darn thing. You gotta mash that funny-looking thing on the floor next to the gas pedal,” Dad said. “It’s not a Ford, you know. Don’t forget, now, half choke. No! You pulled it too far. Now the darn thing is flooded.” I have deleted some of Dad’s spicy language here.

After the Pontiac bit the road dust, Dad bought Mom a 1947 Chrysler New Yorker, and later a 1954 Pack­ard Clipper and a salmon-colored Rambler wagon. (It looked pink to me.)

Each time, Dad said the very next car would be a Ford, but he never did manage to buy another one.

— Joe Caro, Huntington Beach, California