Two for the Street!

Roadster versus coupe—the never-ending battle. It’s an internal fight, external fight and one that never will have a winner. The arguments spread the gamut; Coupes are for chickens. Roadsters hang you out to dry. Coupes are too heavy. Roadsters are (nowadays) too expensive. You get the picture. This isn’t supposed to be a battleground for this argument, but rather an examination of a pair of street-going examples from our hobby’s Golden Age. The year is 1953.

Today’s roadster was built by Buck Davis of Sacramento, California. Starting with a ’31 Model A body and a Deuce frame, Buck used a Deuce hood and grille shell to shroud the full-race Mercury flathead. Other highlights included filled rear fenderwells, unique shock mounts and football-helmet-esque nerf bars. Records show the roadster took home the Class C title from the Valley Timing Association the previous year. This car had looks and performance in a lightweight package.

And now for the coupe. Greg Kees built his chopped ’32 Ford for his whole family to enjoy. Much like Davis’ roadster, the full fendered three-window ran a Merc flathead beneath the hood. The car has the quintessential post-war street coupe look with its wide whites, heavy bumpers and cowl-mounted antenna. Maybe there’s even a spare tire covered in naugahyde out back? Either way, the car was capable of 90mph in the quarter—not bad.

So we have full-fendered versus fenderless, coupe versus roadster. Today I’m going with the coupe for its oh-so-’50s street accouterments. How about you?

—Joey Ukrop