know what you mean...fondest non-car memories include riding in Heisler cab at Mr. Rainier, WA, Shay cab in Cass, WV, and second-seat flying B-17 "Nine-O-Nine" (before FAA ban)...priceless...
I was born in 1966 and have three cars I would like to own some day; 1. 1968 Olds 442 2. 19691/2 Dodge Super Bee 3. 1956 Chevy Nomad I am very proud of my Buicks and would not trade the 72 for another car, but would add any one of those to the stable given the chance.
I was born in 55 my first love was my uncles 63 olds jet fire. It was black with white interior and boy did that car move. He had a lot of trouble with the turbo. They recalled them and took the turbo off. It wasn't the same so he traded it for a 67 GS 340. in 67 I was a Buick man from tha time on. I bought the car from him in 73 having had another 67 GS 400 a 70 stage 1. Today we have 2 87 GN's and a 70 non #'s matching stage 1. I guess you can say cars from the 60's all the was up to the mid 80's only because of the GN :TU:
Born in late 58...Who wants ANY car made then...Some of the UGLIEST body styles, coming after the tri-5 chevy's, early Ford T-birds, etc. My favorites are the 70-72 GM cars: fullsize B body, midsize A body, f-body (can't stand 1st gen),68-72 Nova Xbody Next favorites are the 83-87 Regal Limiteds; just something about their classy style, yet everybody availability.(Best of both worlds)
The '58 Bel air has some real potential. The '59 and '60 El Camino and Impala had a nice style ( worked better on the El Camino I think ).
Unless there's a 16 year old who just bought something pretty old...I think this kid wins it. I'm glad I'm not the winner of this one hahah. Which means I'm glad I'm not alone.
I had a 58 Chevy Del Ray that I liked. Then I had a 58 Chevy Sedan Delivery that I rolled and walked out through the windshield opening. The amazing thing is, I wasn't wearing seat belts (it didn't have any). The real bummer was that I had just repainted the car the week before. Did I mention that I drive a lot better now than when I was a teen?
Me, late 1952. My first Buick a brand new 1972 Skylark 350 Sun Coupe. My first car a 1961 Corvair. In between, a 1953 Dodge Coronet. Yeah I'm getting old. Still like the muscle cars that were from my high school days 1967 through 1971. Lots of memories of them. Protested about the Kent State shootings with a black arm band in front of the high school in 1971. Cops in the town nearby had an "unmarked" police car that was a 69 GTO Judge, orange with the stripes. They'd park on the side of the highway and could chase anybody down pretty quickly. The cars in the high school parking lot were awesome in hindsight. Even the yellow '63 Corvair Spyder convertible one guy had. It was all good back then, Ralph Nader be damned.
1958 was a part of the brief period when Chrysler took the styling lead with it's "Forward look." I think that the 1958 Plymouth Sport Fury was one of the best-styled American cars of the period. With the "Golden Commando "B" engine with dual quads - it had performance to match it's good looks. At the time, the Torqueflite automatic was the best in the industry. I'm a GM guy, but if I could ever afford one of those Sport Furys...
By better do you mean safer or faster? I can't imagine your reflexes and boldness are enter than you were in your teens to hit the brakes later into a turn! Kidding hahaha
I have a 1957 Buick Roadmaster Coupe and I'm 57 too! Here's a bit of few flashbacks: Can remember when out driving around as a kid at night in the late 60's. In 1968 the cars started to come out with side reflectors near the front headlights. Well as kids we had our cars and they sure as hell were not new cars. So, whenever you saw a parked car with it's parking lights on up the road a ways you could almost bet it was the fuzz and sure enough it usually was parked and waiting for a speeder etc. Saved a lot of speeding tickets with that bit of awareness. In the summer of 1972 I was 18 years old. Dreamt of taking a neat long road trip, so planned it out, then all by my little old self, jumped into my 2 door hardtop 1964 dark brown Belvedere with a 361, stock rare factory 4-speed & posi-rear and bench seat interior with 8 track stereo under the dash and hit the road. My tapes were only a few but can remember ones like Santana's Abraxas and Grand Funk that got me through the many no AM radio zones I encountered along the way. Back then AM radio had a lot of good rock programing. I headed west from South Dakota to San Franfracisco/Berkeley, stayed there a month or so then on up to Seattle for a couple of months and then back to So Dak. In town fuels were around 25 cents a gallon while Interstate truck stops were around 35- 45 cents a gallon. Back then the Interstate system on I-80 was not completed through the mountain states so you would have to detour back into the little towns and then back out onto the Interstate. That way the little towns could die a slower economic death from the eventual lack of traffic much like the demise of route 66 did to those connecting towns. All in all I have had a lot of cars and still like the 50's cars the best as those are the ones that I grew up with I suppose. By the mid sixties the cars were getting square and look-a-like shoe boxes, though they were much lighter and faster than the 50 cars.
I was exactly in the same place. Got my driver's license in 1969. The side lights and parking lights with the headlights on came out in 1967. You knew if there were no parking lights on with the headlights at night behind you it wasn't a cop. Cops could be devious though and you needed to do your homework. In the next town over one of their unmarked cars was an orange 1969 GTO Judge with stripes. Good camoflague. Summer of 1972 I was 19 and we were listening to the same stuff. I was driving a 1953 Dodge Coronet at the time, and in college at Northern Illinois University. My dad had a 66GS Riviera and my mother's family car was a 69 Electra 225. When I was younger, my parents had a 1957 white/white top/red interior Buick Roadmaster. The trans crapped out (I think my older brother was pulling hole shots or something up a steep hill near our home.) My father traded it in on a new 1961 Corvair. Big mistake. At about the same time they also had a 1958 Oldsmobile 88 four door sedan. It was a monster and my mother kept running into things with it like the garage door frame, parked cars, etc. Not that she was a bad driver but it was tough to get a car like that into tight spaces. They got the 58 Olds after my brother wrecked the 54 Olds when in High School. After that altercation my father bought him a war surplus Willys jeep so he wouldn't wreck the family car anymore. It was an amphibious model with the tailpipe coming out and going up to the level of the top. He promptly drove it into a lake to see how deep it could go and a dead engine quickly ensued with an oil slick covering the beach. Fortunately, once pulled back out it fired right up and no damage done. The army jeeps weren't at all comfortable to ride in but they were built to take just about anything you could throw at them. I remember riding in the back of that 1957 Roadmaster convert with the top down at about eight years old and being on top of the world. I think it's moments like that that are what inspired us to be car guys. Mike
Two Buicks in the Garage. The 40 Street Rod (5 window coupe) is the same age as I. It was contaminated with a Chevy 454 before I got it, but runs good. Also a 70 GS Stage 1 thats 30 years younger than I am.
I was born in early 78 and I tend to gravitate to cars of the 60's and 70's. I first came to be aware of cars in the early 80's when there were still a good many cars from that era in our neighborhood. My dad had a Mustang II when I was born, and sold it around the time I was 5 or 6. My first slot car track had corvettes from the 70's as the cars, and I remember being so disappointed when I got a new one later on that had 80's corvettes instead. My dad is more of a Ford guy, but likes all cars and I'm kind of the same way, although I prefer Buicks most, and Mopar's second. I got my Buick Skylark in 98 the day before I turned 20. I had been looking for a car from the 60s-70s for about 3 years at the time, and had actually gone out to a farm to look at an early 60's Galaxie in the fall of 97 when I spotted the Skylark in the garage there. Took another 6-7 months of work to get the car in my hands.
What gets me is my son Matt who was born in 1993 races my 72 SunCoupe that was made over 20 yrs before he was born. I couldn't possibly imagine driving much less racing a car made 20 yrs before I was. That would be a car from the early 30s!!! (I was born in 1953). My son's daily driver is a 1989......that would be like me driving a 1949 car at his age....no way.
