Saturday, November 09, 2013

Old Cars!

I love me some old American cars! Here are a few nice vintage photos for your motoring pleasure.

That happy lady in the fur coat is Helen, and she is mighty proud of her 1950 Buick Super 8 (in this photo from February 1952). Look at that chrome grille! It looks kind of frowny too, like it will run you down if you misbehave. The slide was labeled "Fon Du Lac", which is just south of Lake Winnebago in Wisconsin. I love Wisconsin!


If you go waaaaay back to the very first photo I ever posted on GDB, you will see this lady and her son in Disneyland. Obviously they are somewhere completely different is this photo... the Badlands? Just a guess. Anyway, they are posing next to their very cool 1957 DeSoto Fireflite.


This last picture may or may not be from somewhere near York, Pennsylvania, circa July 1961. Some beautiful old flivvers are on display for a few admirers. As ancient as these automobiles are, they were only 35 (or so) years old at the time. That would be like us looking at cars from the 1980's (why would anyone do that)... I would rather look at these!


6 comments:

Nanook said...

Yes, it was definitely a challenge trying to mount a front license plate on this series of Buicks. "...Brand new beauty of a Buick-!" That wonderfully alliterative line just popped back into my head, having been used somewhere back in the 'golden age' of advertising. And we love the fact that Helen, her high heels, fur coat AND Buick are all in lovely Fon Du Lac, the name so often cited in jokes.

Thanks, Major.

Anonymous said...

Helen looks great next to that Buick! Many years later her boyfriend, Joe Pellettieri, was inspired by the giant chrome grill to invent the Billy Bigmouth Singing Bass. It's not the holidays unless Grandpa makes Billy sing "Take me to the river" again and again. Thank you Buick.

Bill in Denver

Major Pepperidge said...

Nanook, I noticed that the plate was in an odd place, but it didn't occur to me that there was no good location for it! Funny. I used to have more pix of Helen and regret that I got rid of them in an effort to make space in my closet.

Bill, Helen always has a big smile, she looks like she must have been a fun person. Oh man, those BillyBass things, my dad got one as a joke and I wanted to jump up and down on it.

Adam said...

Love that gaggle of '20s/early '30s cars! Now I'm a diehard classic car fan and I used to feel the same way about '80s cars, but in recent years I've come to find something special about them, especially comparing them with cars now. Like how plush the interiors if luxury used to be in those days compared to know. A lot more chrome too!

Melissa said...

My Grandma always did a glamor girl pose next to a new car, like Helen, but she never quite had Helen's figure or wardrobe. But she usually had a snazzy little red convertible, which more than made up for it.

Dave said...

Funny, now that you mentioned the relative age of the vehicles on display, yeah, I just don't see my 36 year old Toyota P/U lined up at a car show. It's somewhat unique in that it has a full utility bed, and I get the occasional comments from our guests, but a lot of those are along the lines of "Can't believe that POS still runs", hey, it's Toyota.