I like it. Dad used to race a 37 Chevy coupe on dirt in the 60s/70s. Always searching for a body to do a replica for the street.
Too many laws{Not good ones} of sticking nose into others yards,plus clean up campains, hulled off n crushed,what as a kid in the 50s an 60s was my parts to hunt up.
W.W.II and the scrap metal salvage drives, as well as jalopy racing after the war. Let's not forget all the salvage yards that have crushed out in the last 40 years too. I'm surprised there is anything left. -Dave
The original folks still whine about what we do/did to the old cars. I still have folks give me the "Sure would have been nice if you restored that" but if it hadn't been for the hot rod guys before and after WW11 there probably wouldn't be any deuce coupes left to talk about.
...and some have been sold overseas because no one wanted that bondo bucket for that ton of cash , hahahahaha
Circle tracks and drag racers got a lot of the coupes and tudors. The four doors got parted out. The odd ball cars got scraped out. I've stood on top of post war four doors in junk yards looking for the good stuff. There's still a bunch of A models out there. They just happen to be inside garages, barns, or sheds where you can't see them. I may be the reason you had to beat the roof out on your '47 Chevy sedan.
Over here a little asshole with a dumb mustache confiscated just about every car and pushbike between 1939 and 1945.
I remember seeing lots of old tin in junk yards in the 60s. They never crushed them out, just let them sit. Then along came Lady Bird Johnson and her clean up America campaign. What couldn't be hidden by a tall wall and a moat was crushed and shredded in the name of beautification. But I thought the old junk yards were beautiful and nobody asked me my opinion.
The oval track racers did the same thing as the hot rodders. These cars were sitting behind garages or in junk yards waiting to be crushed. Just instead of chopping, channeling and building engines, the oval track crowd gutted, built cages and engines. Further, stock cars provided low cost entertainment to thousands nation wide. The hot rods appealed to a more limited audience.
i remember as a kid riding my bike by an old coupe stock car. it was number 44, white with red numbers. it sat up on an old semi truck trailer. i always dreamed of putting it back on the track......
Visions like these are what got me into old cars and are forever burned into my brain. They ran the coupes at the dirt track in our town up until I was about 10 years old, then they converted to the "late models". Sadly, the track is now gone due to poor management. Fortunately the memories and the pictures still live on. Gene
I bet more cars were simply scrapped than got used up by racers or rodders. But I am amazed at the number of pre war cars that still survive. I would even go as far as saying there are more out there than all of us can build.
Art Atkinson, #10. Considered to be one of the finest jalopy drivers in the history of the California Jalopy Association of Los Angeles. Later became promoter of stock car races at Orange Show Speedway.
When I was a kid the bodys weren't much if anything for scrap and the scrappers would drag cars up to the dump, roll the body off and set it on fire to burn it out to salvage the copper from the wiring before shoving it over the side into the canyon. The frame and engine they hauled for scrap. I'd ride my bike up there and snoop around when I was in my early teens. A lot of other bodies around this area were dumped in the sage brush in the hills and my neighbor has a lot of those that he and his dad drug in over the years. The WWII scrap drives did take huge numbers of them though. People pulled the bumpers of their drivers and turned them in for scrap then. Somewhere I have been there used to be a fence made of the rails of Model T frames in the 70's. I'm thinking around Waco Tx. Circle track took a lot of early cars but it took a lot more tri 5 chevies in the 60's and 70;s in Central Texas as that was the frame of choice for dirt track cars there.
More pre-war cars than all of us can build? I don't know...they're still out there, but it seems to me like we're gettin' close to the bottom of the barrel these days for raw material. I see a lot of junk for too much money. Don't wanna sound like a whiner, though...a defeatest. I'm not that. Just gotta look a little more and have cash on hand for when you find your gem-in-the-rough.
I used to be able to find a lot of that tin but most yard owners are old and when they die the crusher comes in and it's gone. I did what I could in one yard but a lot of good stuff got pressed.
I didn't say there were enough 32 Fords for everyone. And I didn't say cherry bodies. I am saying all pre war cars/trucks. Fords, Chevys, Mopars and others of all years pre '41 and all body styles. I'd hazard a guess that every HAMBer who actually does any building of stuff from that era already has a minimum of 3 projects....some of us way, way more than that. And how many can each of us realistically build in their remaining lifetime? I just don't see any shortage of vintage tin. Actually I see the contrary. In the next 10-15 years as more of the older generation pass on I predict a surplus of pre-war stuff becoming available. Granted, 32 Fords will still be desireable. But that 38 Plymouth 4 door is gonna be a real hard sell.
Around here, cars were used up on the roads, then some were cut down into trucks and others made into doodlebug tractors and farm trailers. Trucks were used in the woods until the bodies fell off of them. Cars that were parked were robbed for parts to keep others going. Appalachia has always been poorer than many areas of the country, so there were fewer cars to start with. My paternal Grandparents never owned a vehicle, or even learned to drive! So, the few that did survive were mostly from the towns and cities where some people had more money that those in the rural areas, but still had to make them last because they didn't have the option of buying new ones every so often. There were exceptions to this of course, bankers, doctors, etc. Lots of those parted out vehicles remained until the last few years when scrap prices went through the roof. I personally saved a 38 Chrysler Royal coupe from a scrapper, but was too late to save a 57 Chevy 4 door hardtop. There are still some "barn" vehicles found every once in a while where some farmer parked them years ago, but are getting fewer and farther between. Many family members won't sell, "That was Aunt Tilly's car", yet they will let it rot to the ground. Walking up on a discarded 20's or 30's vehicle is almost unheard of around here, really, you don't even see 50's or 60's stuff anymore. can't remember the last time I saw even an 80's vehicle parked in somebody's back yard. The scrappers pounce on anything that doesn't move under it's own power.
In 1960 people were looking for prewar 30s stuff today there is plenty of 1990 stuff Hamb friendly stuff is a least 54 years old
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