so i stopped over at the grandparents house today and gramps was asking about my "new" old car, when was built, what it was, etc etc, i was telling him about it and he got all excited, next thing you know he was telling stories about his old cars. turns out he had a 26 Chevy fordor and a 36 ford and an auburn, he loved telling me about it, he bought the 26 from his neighbor for 25 bucks in 1940 when he was 15, had the car for a few years and drove it to San Diego when he enlisted in the army, not long after he moved to San Francisco and sold the car and bought this 36 ford from the owner of the Texaco station he worked at (full service back then he says) had motor issues and he rebuilt it and drove it back to Minneapolis to get my grandma and drove back to San Fran, he says that old car made it out and back 4 more times before they settled here and he went to driving a "brand new" 60 or 61 international semi truck hauling gas in an old single axle tanker. he went on and on for about 3 hours telling me how when Henry Ford started building cars you could have any color you wanted as long as it was black. was just a good all around day for me as hes in his late 80's and starting to lose his mind a bit so i know times like this are not going to last and soon the memories will be fading away. just wanted to share that with all of you, sit and talk to the old dogs that lived when these cars were modern of the day. anybody else sit and just talk with the old bucks?
my grandfather passed away 25 years ago, but i loved to hear his stories. i always enjoy stories from the "elders".
That's really neat, Taco. Your car inspired him. So cool to listen to the old guys tell stories of times past. My Grandpa was an old leadfoot...Mom told me...lol. I remember as a kid, him telling me that the old Ts could really scoot when modified. He said, "You'd be surprised." Told me how he and his buddy would drive a Model T out on the frozen lake, pull up the floorboard, and go ice fishing while sittin' in the car...lol. The neighbors two farms down the road...91 years old Lee and Norma passed a while back. Used to talk with them a lot. They knew I like the old cars. One day, I asked them to tell me some old terms for cars...especially modified. We went through "hot rod", "jalopy", "soup-job", "strip-down", etc. Then Lee said, "Jitney". (old term for a taxi) Cool! And then Norma added............."Gas buggy". Norma wins.
My granpa died when my mom was just a teenager. He built Brown Bros. Cadillac. He was best friends with Harry Hyde who was best friends with Smokey Yunick. Wish I could hear those stories. I do remember one that was told. Not sure which one it was. One got pulled over for speeding. As they got in an argument with the cop. They came to terms as "I tell you what I'll go back where I was and pass by here again. If I was speeding then you can give me a ticket." As the cop took his place the driver got to his starting point and never came back. High tailed the other way never to be seen.
My grandpa was born in 1891 and died at age 96. My earliest recollection of any car was his black 53 Pontiac Chieftain 4 door. He was from Italy and although spoke english; he was pretty tough to understand at times (as a child). As I got older it was easier to understand him. It was about 1972 or so when he had developed cataracts and could no longer drive. They actually had to sell his car on him so he wouldn't get behind the wheel and hurt someone or himself. I remember as a boy sitting on his lap as he was teaching me Italian and he started telling me stories about the first car he had when he came to this country. It was an early model T ford. He went on about how the tires used to blow out all the time and how he had to drive it up hill in reverse when it was running out of gas to get fuel. But I think the funniest one was when he first got it; he didn't know how to get it in reverse so four guy's would just pick it up and turn it around. I really miss those days. Enjoy them while you have them. My Mom is loosing her memory so I treasure every moment I have left with her. So much so that she is coming to live with me (mostly for safety reasons).
My Grandaddy came from east Texas to Houston In 1942 driving a 1910 Model T Ford chassis that was the only thing he could afford for $2. Granny told me how she was riding around with her boyfriend before the war around the town square of Groveton TX. She went to throw a package of firecrackers out of the Model A coupe they were riding in at some kids. She said she held onto the lit fuse to long and the firecrackers started going off in the car. The car burnt down right in front of the courthouse. Man I used to love their stories. I 1952 Grandaddy overturned his Pepsi 18 wheeler over on the Greens Bayou trestle bridge on Market street east of Houston. He laughed about getting fired, but he had time to stand on the overturned truck and pose with pride. Tons of Pespi bottles feel into the bayou below.
I would love to have been able to talk to my dad's dad I remember him as a child but he was gone when I was grown. He had a body shop and my father used to tell me about how he hated the Dodge fenders because they were so thick and hard to straighten. My dad pinstriped my first bike using my grandpa's brushes.... that was 60 years ago. My other grandpa never drove. I will become a grandpa next year and I realize I will never live long enough to be able to pass on my disease.
My gramps was in the army in france during world war one. He drove a team of mules to the front in the evening full of ammunition and dead soldiers and prisioners back before first light. All under the cover of darkness. A muleskinner couldnt stop his wagon because it would hold up the whole convoy so they had roll their cigarettes with one hand, the other holding the reins .... and then light the smoke with the same one-hand techniques. When I was a 15 year old kid ( 1965) he taught me those tricks ..... I was a pretty popular guy during the summer of love.!!! .... but my dad's stories of how they used to trash '32 roadsters ("... because they were cheap, had no heater and flimsey plastic windows.") just kills me. All good stories.
My Dad died when I was about 11 and my Grandpap died when I was about 16. I wish to God I had been smart enough before they died to sit down and ask them all about their lives and to hear their stories. Today I would love to have those memories. I guess the lesson here is, take the time now to open a cold one with your Parents and Grandparents and just shoot the breeze. Some of the lives our elders have lived are simply amazing. Don
i really got to missing my granddads after reading these.my moms dad was a professonal gambler who stayed more busted than flush.but he did drive some cool old cars like his 51 chevy 2dr that hed run from dyerburg tn to chicago for a card game and be back before monday after leavin on a friday. said he run that thing up to around 80 and it would leave the road. told of many others but time has takin my memeory also. my dads dad was a old hotrodder from way back. hed run them model a as hard as they would run. by what he could afford to by to make them fly...he would talk for hrs about his days and seemed to get lost in his own words.he loved cars,fast cars...and he had a few. now i know how he must have felt. talkin about the old days,wantin to relive them so bad.because now im in his shoes..my grandkids wont be able to remember what i tell them. they are only 6 and 8 .i wont be here to tell them the things that we did.but my wife will be so maybe she can tell them how grandpa loved his old cars. i am leavin my grandkids a car each that if thier parents keep them going for them should help some with the memories.
The old guy who lived next door when I was a youngster used to tell us how when he was teenager all the Texas girls were so prim and proper....but there was a 'Spanish' girl who was always ready and willing to climb up in the hay wagon with him......I never even thought to ask him about any cars.
"Grampy" loved his Packards! His '48 sedan was the one car that would get his eyes sparkly. My mom's '62 Rambler American developed a skip, one cylinder wasn't operating. He drove 60 miles with his tool box, pulled the head, replaced the head gasket, polished all the surfaces that he could, bolted it back together and all 6 were firiing agan. He was my hero. He also loved to drive from Medford MA to Detroit whenever it was time to buy a new car. He said Detroit was the place to get the best car prices. He did know how to "squeeze a nickle!" He's been gone 40 years, I still miss him.
Get a video camera or a digital audio recorder and save the memories! I wish I had recorded all of my dads stories. In time I will probably forget most of them.
all great stories guys keep them coming i enjoy reading them all, brings back some great memories, my girls will never get to talk to gramps like this as they are 5 and 7 and to them "great gramps" isnt very fun, if they only knew him like know him. he went on and on today again on how gramma couldn't drive that old 26 Chevy to "save her ass" lol oh boy did we have a good laugh about that one, he told another story about getting caught on the railroad tracks outside of St Paul MN and got nailed with a tanker full of fuel oil, he said he was lucky his ass wasn't toast lol. he talked about the roads back in the day out west and thru the mountains in Nevada on hwy 2 at the time was a "steep winding bitch" and that taking a full fuel tanker out there was like playing Russian roulette he said you never know if youd make it thru the hills or not, he had such good trucking stories back when truckin was truckin, i got my share of miles in a big truck hauling freight but cant imagine an old Gasser engine with full spring ride, rigid cabs and 2 stick transmissions and 2/55 air conditioning lol.
Yes record his voice cos when he passes it's gone,I'm sorry I did not record my folks {both Gone} Dad died in his sleep and mum had early dementia.
The Jalopy Journal
