Got a sad phone call today, David Lares/Whiteys Auto Parts Passed away....He was a neat guy with lots of cool stories !!!!!!!!!!! RIP Whitey...see ya again some day......
Was David the son who runs the steering box rebuilding shop in Cambridge? It was on the southeast corner of 65 and Bunker Lake Road. Copart bought out the property and the rights to have a junkyard there. I live just 1/4 mile from there. I sure wish it was still there and accessible. I know the old man rarely let people into the yard, but a couple of times his son opened it up for people to tour/buy. I was able to tour the "Hallowed grounds" twice. I was just a kid the first time. I was also able to tour it right before it closed for the last time. I got a bunch of pictures that day. There was still a ton of great stuff in there. If I'm not mistaken 396skips place "French Lake Auto Parts" bought a bunch of it at auction. Last time I was at FLAP I recalled seeing a car with a Whiteys license plate frame. I believe I also saw the 34 Pierce Arrow sedan that had been in there out at FLAP too.
i bought parts for my 63 plymouth from him at his salvage yard in the early 80's. i quickly found out he did not seem to like teenagers very well but then again when you were a teenager it seems as if a lot of people did not like you anyhow. he did pull the parts i needed for my car and the parts were always correct and in usable condition. other salvage yards were constantly giving me the wrong parts or damaged parts. thinking back Whitey was a good business man. after all i went to his salvage yard to buy car parts and not to socialize.
That is too bad. I remember riding past that place as a kid every week or so...never made it in there, and it was closed by the time I got my drivers license. Good old yards are hard to find in the upper midwest.
Sorry to hear about Davids passing. I didn't Know David but I did buy parts from his dad in the 60's. I remember a story about Whitey not wanting to collect sales tax, he said it wasn't right to charge tax on used parts. A man way ahead of his time! Got him in trouble with the state, but he stuck to his guns.
Met David a few times at the yard after it closed and often on the New London-New Brighton run.Sorry to hear the news.Good man.
David was the Dad "Whitey"...Paul is his only child, and Pauls owns Lares Corp in Cambridge( the steering gear rebuilder )....Whitey owned # 11 Tucker car until about 20 years ago..........I do lots of business with Paul,over the years I've gotten to know them very well and they are GREAT people!!!!!! I will miss Whitey....nice guy....
I bought a bunch of rambler parts from him before he started scrapping the yard, friend of mine had that tucker to a car show before that movie came out, he sold it before the movie came out, prices went up after that.
That Tucker was sold to a guy in the mid 80s & ended up on a rotating platform in a casino out in LasVegas ! I used to work for Dave & his son Paul back in the late 70s early 80s & was the only yard guy for the time I worked for them ! That Tucker sold for 30,000 some thousand dollars Paul told me way back then witch I thought was a little cheap but I think Dave kind of really didn't know what a lot of old cars he had in those sheds were really worth but then again 30,000 back in the 80,s wasn't chump change ! I also did see that his old house was still standing a couple of years ago & I bet most didn't know this but he had a Duisenberg car inside of that house in mint condition ! I didn't know this for many years until one morning Paul had sent me over to Dave's house with a check to give to him & Dave let me in & showed it too me because I asked him about it ! I had learned from the other counter person witch was a good friend of both of them he told me about it so I had to ask him so Dave showed me it ! He basically built that house around that car many years earlier when he had his station and auto repair shop all going back in the early 50s back when HWY 65 was still a gravel road from the pictures he showed me ! I also worked for another guy before I worked for Whitey who knew Whitey! Bruce Morris Kubo the president of the Hudson motor car club in MN he had also passed away a couple years before Whitey had gottin run over by a car on Viking BLVD witch used to be called county road 22 back then crossing the road to get his mail ! He had a very special Hudson Hornet called Satan of Morrimar & it had sold to a guy for over a 100.000 dollars & is on display in a museum in Illinois I believe ! If you look up Satan of Morrimar on the net there is the story of the car a well as some photos of it ! Bruce used to race it up Pikes Peak hill climbs back in the late 50s & 60s & won quite a bit with it against newer smaller cars such as Camaros & mustangs turning in quicker times with it I used to work on it & detail it for car shows for him back then & he also showed me pictures of him in it racing it back then in his garages ! don't know if anyone will see this old post but I had to give some info on this subject because not very many people new both of these guys as well as me other than family or what was left of them!
Paul Lares is a good friend of mine and I forwarded your post to him. This was his response; I can tell you a few things. First, I have no idea who this guy is. Second, in regard to my father, he has virtually every fact wrong. I knew Bruce Mori-Kubu, but not well. I went to his house a number of times and met his wife Evie. I can't speak about all the facts about Bruce other than his Hudson was named Satan and he raced it. It had the special block, I think it was called "X". It bugs me about the bull crap that people spread. You are right, Dad never had a Duesenburg. He had a choice between it and the black Cord. His comment was that the Duesenberg was a "truck" and if you know the frame and drive train, it's hard to disagree.
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