Confessions of a Car Brochure Hoarder…

The other day my 8 year old son asked me, “What did you and Grandpa Jerry like do together when you were my age?” I think that was a pretty insightful question for my boy to ask, and after reflecting how business-driven and un-kid-friendly my father was at that point in his life, it dawned on me how much time that we ended up spending together hanging at Kansas City car dealerships when I would come visit him. Dad was an independent auto wholesaler, so his mission was to buy the cream puff trade-ins off their back lot, and my mission was to consume all the free hot chocolate and stale popcorn on hand, while grabbing cool car brochures. Those Dealers used to let me take whatever I wanted, knowing that the factory would just send them more. These days it’s pretty much all digital of course, but in my youth (and in my eyes), those car brochures were better than comics… Just a different kind of fantasy, you could say. Of course by the late 70s and early 80s when I was collecting this literature, most new cars were pretty much garbage. Rather than burn your retinas with an ’82 IROC Camaro gatefold or ’79 Buick Electra Park Avenue spread, I’ll share some of the best brochures to ever come out of Detroit in the 1950s… And among all those, Pontiac and Oldsmobile probably did it best: Brilliantly illustrated with descriptions that elevated the automobile to place of awe and wonder manifested on the open road. That’s when they were selling a dream that a kid could really get excited about!