Unstable Anglia

I am still going through Dad’s old car photos, and lucked out with two images of his Ford Anglia Gasser from the late 60s. This car has a bit of a sordid past, and although some details are fuzzy, I’ll share with you what I know of it.

My dad bought the Anglia gasser already assembled, running and painted with “U.S. Mail” on the side (notice that Jerry added his name to the door in the later photo). She was equipped with a factory Z28 Camaro 4 bolt main motor, backed with the heavy duty Muncie 4 speed transmission. When Pops took her to the drag strip for the first trial run, he quickly discovered the handling was less than optimum. In fact, steering it down the quarter was downright white-knuckle scary, and the run ended with the car rolling over upon deceleration.

After pounding out portions of the roof, he asked a buddy with high speed film to join him and shoot the car going through the traps at full tilt, just to confirm what was already suspected: The four wheels never touched the ground at the same time… All the way down the strip! The extremely short wheelbase combined with some weight distribution issues made the U.S Mail extremely twitchy.

Being a family man with a wife and children, he decided it was time to give up the crazy gasser and drag racing all together, moving his focus back to customs and collector cars. And the U.S. Mail? I think the guy that bought it from my dad ended up flipping it over as well, but not getting out of it alive. My dad has never confirmed that with me, but I think that’s what happened.

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