What Ever Happened To..........? number 154. 1955 Chevy Owner: Jim Allen Milford, Ohio This week's car is one that I had very little luck finding information on. Sightings of the car proved to be pretty scarce. It was also confusing at times due to the fact that it looks very close to the Jim Seaton Barris built '55 Chevy. The cars were both white with red scallops, similar side trim and general appearance. Jim took his Chevy to the 1993 Leadsled Spectacular in Springfield, Ohio. The car was on Video Bob's DVD quite a few times, both sitting at the show as well as cruising around the fairgrounds. Like I mentioned above, this got confusing at times because Curt McCormick was at the Spectacular that year with the Seaton '55 that he owned at that time. The one thing that made it much easier to tell the two apart at a quick glance is the fact that Jim's '55 was a sedan, and the Seaton Chevy was a hardtop. 1993 was the only Leadsled video that I found the car on. Rod and Custom had some great coverage of the '93 Spectacular in their January '94 issue. There was a shot of Mr. Allen's '55 on page 44. I was lucky to find that picture as this was the only snapshot I was able to find of the car. Another lucky stroke was that it listed the owner as being Jim Allen from Ohio. Hate to sound like a broken record lately, but unfortunately another lone black and white photo. It's a real shame that someone didn't get Mr. Allen's '55 together with Curt McCormick's Seaton '55 to do a photo shoot together and do a story on the cars since both were in attendance back in '93. That would have made for great reading with some historical significance. You can see how much Mr. Allen's Chevy mirrored Seaton's in a lot of ways. Sorry the information on this one is so lean. I just couldn't come up with much on it. I've had the information (what little I found) on Mr. Allen's Chevy for a while, but I was on the fence about posting it. I have nothing against the Seaton '55--it's an absolutely beautiful car built by one of the great kustom masters of all time, Mr. Barris and his skilled crew. I just didn't want this post to be all about the Seaton '55 as we all know quite a bit about it already. This thread was started so we could all learn about "little guys" that aren't famous and do a majority of the work on their cars at home in their garage. Pool that together with an owner's friends, family or car club and we can all appreciate a great home built effort. With all that being said, it would seem that the Allen '55 was built in close style to one of the great customs that Mr. Barris created back during the golden age of kustoms. I guess we could almost call it a tribute to Mr. Barris, Mr. Seaton or even Mr. McCormick. Let's see what else turns up on Mr. Allen's neat Chevy! I hope everyone finds themselves well on this first Tuesday in February, 2019. Until next time, stay cool! E
here is the Kustomrama page on that car. I think I may have seen it for sale on ebay within the last year or so https://kustomrama.com/wiki/John_McLaughlin's_1955_Chevrolet
As for Jim Allen - ALLEN James H., beloved husband of Linda K. Ruffley Allen, loving father of Jason Sean Allen, brother of Gary Allen. Passed away Friday, July 30, 2010, age 59 years, after a courageous battle with colon cancer.
Believe it or not E I knew Mike Shelley in my younger days, man the stories I could tell you(ya had to be there for some of it). The only two cars I remember he had were a ‘36 Ford coupe and a ‘55 F-100 panel truck. Sent from my iPhone using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
Interesting... So Allen's 55 was supposedly originally built by Barris Kustoms only to be many years & owners later be repainted as a style/tribute to a different Barris 55 build?
Great post Mark! All the information about the Allen '55 and its long history. The car did have the look of a custom built a long time ago. Cool to see it survived for many years and many owners! E Thanks for the information John! ****sigh*****Another of the custom elders gone. Rest in peace Mr. Allen........E Neat that you have a link to Mike, chryslerfan. Sounds like he was one of the custom wild men that used to frequent the KKOA shows in the early days! Sadly, many of those custom crazies are no longer with us. His photo page on Rikster's site has a ton of great pictures. I look at it a lot. Cool that he built his cars and cruised them. E All news to me. The Kustomrama page @Moriarity posted was a gold mine of information on this car. Makes you wonder where it ended up. I have to mention it again now that all this information came up. The photo shoot of both '55s should have been put together at the Spectacular in 1993. Maybe it can happen some time in the future if both cars ever end up at the same show again. I haven't seen any recent pictures of it at the CCR or any other prominent custom show. Real shame if it's just sitting in a garage or showroom somewhere and not being shown, driven and enjoyed. E
You’re right E, he did, he and his wife went to Paso Robles for the WCK show as well as the KKOA shows Whichita and Salina once in a while. And yes, he did get a little nutty at times (don’t get me started). Sent from my iPhone using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
Does Jerry Kear still own it? This is from the Kustomrama link but I don't know if it's still current.... "Jerry has decided to sell the car, and it is currently up for sale. It needs some work but runs and drive pretty good. Jerry is asking $20,000 for the old custom, and he can be reached at [email protected] if you are interested in becoming the new caretaker of the car."
I really dig that story. How John McLaughlin supposedly sent the car on a train from Oklahoma to California to have it restyled by the famous Barris Brothers. It would have been great to get that story from John!
That's because it has been used as a common scam for so many years. The Nigeria scam of the hot rod and custom world. As of now, what we have is the word of the son of the second owner. Barris Kustoms restyled hundreds of cars, maybe more then 1000 if you count in all the insurance work they did, so I find it very possible that Barris did some work on it. I'm working on another story these days, about a 1932 Ford that John Manok supposedly chopped at Barris Kustoms when they had a shop in Bell. It is an unknown build, but I have a photo and the word of the original owner, who also was a friend of Jesse Lopez, so I find it trustworthy
The Barris shop did a lot of work. The one thing I question is if they did do the paint where are the Barris crests? They had a great reputation for their custom paint work and a lot of customs and rods went there just for paint and finish work but when they left usually they wore the Barris crests!!!
What is with the red car in the background, looks like an extended hood on a Plymouth or Chrysler product?
At least some of the famous ones had. Mine did not receive crests, but I still have the original paperwork from Barris as proof on the work. It is an interesting subject, and I will try to put some time aside to get an overview on this, as it would have been interesting to get an idea about how many of the customs that rolled out of Barris that were dressed up with crests....below are even a couple of famous ones that didn't receive crests as far as I can see:
Mandy's Merc had the crest down on the quarter scoop between the two spears. Lyle's buick had it on the rear window pillar. You are right not all cars got them. The crests appeared around the end of 1952. My thoughts are at the time the George probably only had a limited amount of them made and reserved them for the top car coming the shop. As fame and fortune came he had a lot more made and anything that passed through the shop got a set. Just fun stuff to think about!!!
Haha, yeah, you're right about that! I'll have to look closer next time Your theory sounds very reasonable!
Back to Jim Allen. @Cincinnati Slim pointed out to me that I had a picture of Jim Allen's 56 Chevy. Taken at the KKOA Leadsled Spectacular. Mr Allen bought the car from Jim Glymph
I didn’t know Jim when he had the ‘55, but knew him when he had the ‘56 and then later on I have mentioned in the past that Cincinnati is more a Hot Rod town than custom. So Jim and I talked a lot about customs. I still have an aluminum ‘59 Chevy tube grille he sold me that I didn’t have the heart to cut up to fit my ‘60 after he passed. One of his final customs he bought was a gold ‘60 Pontiac hardtop. I remember it had louvers in the quarters and was in R&C or Custom Rodder? Sadly I didn’t take many pictures during those days. Sent from my iPhone using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
It has been laying on my bench for over a week. But since Slim mentioned a 60 Pontiac, I thought I`d post this, shows Larry`s 60 Pontiac.
What Ever Happened To..........? number 155. 1960 Pontiac Owner: Larry Simonutti Chester, New Jersey This week's W.E.H.T. has some firsts for a few reasons. The first being that this is the first time we've featured one person that owned two different cars in the thread. The other is that for once, there was so much information on this car that keeping it all straight has proven to be a challenge. Usually there is little to nothing to go on and that makes it a slow process. Also, since this cool Pontiac keeps popping up in all of our favorite custom threads from time to time here on the HAMB, I thought it was time to add it to our growing WE.H.T. thread. I think I have the timeline fairly correct, but if I mix it up, please fill us in so we get the facts right. Larry Simonutti rolled onto the scene in the mid 80s. He made his first appearance at the Leadsled Spectacular in Springfield, Ohio in 1985. His California Bellflower style custom had everyone talking! Two tone fade paint, hydraulics and Supremes. Not very many people other than lowriders were running Supremes at that time. Then to pull it all off on a '60 Pontiac instead of a Chevy or Ford was different. Special thanks to @chopolds who posted this picture of the Pontiac in it's first version. After the '85 Spectacular I didn't find video of the car at the Spectacular again until 1988 at Holland, Michigan. The car still looked the same as in '85. In between 1985 and 1988, Larry was a regular at the KKOA's Sled Scene East. He was there in 1986 and 1987 and seen quite a bit on the videos. Now this is where the history of the Poncho starts to get going a little bit. Larry went to the Spectacular in 1989, but this time it was in his "new" '59 Impala lovingly known as the "Airmobile". This was our What Ever Happened To..........? number 130. After this point, Larry drove the Chevy to the KKOA shows for many years, including the Leadsled Spectacular in 1991 and 1993, as well as Sled Scene East from '91-'93. Funny thing is that during a lot of these shows, his Pontiac was there as well, most likely with the new owner. In the May '97 issue of Custom Rodder's Lead East coverage on page 55, it shows that it had been sold to Dr. Burt Zwibel of Fairfax, Virginia. If you look closely in the following picture, you can see Larry's '59 in the background next to the Pontiac. Now, before I get ahead of myself, I have to say that sometime between 1989 and 1993 that the car was changed up a little bit. The Supremes were taken off in favor of smoothies, the red fade was removed and the bottom of the car was painted white and gold scallops were added to the car. Unfortunately I wasn't able to find a picture of this version on the web or in a magazine. I did however see this version on video. Sometime after the 1993 show season, the car was completely changed up again. This time the white was changed to gold and the car received orange scallops. As best as I can gather, it made it's debut in the gold/orange version at Sled Scene East in 1994. Again, before I get ahead of myself, I have to make sure we all know what years this car was at KKOA shows. Now, hang on, this gets very confusing. I gathered this information watching video and through magazine research. There may be more years that Larry and Burt had the car at the shows, but these are the years I have evidence of. Larry had the Pontiac at the Spectacular in 1985, and 1988. He also took it to Sled Scene East in 1986 and 1987. Burt had the Pontiac at the Spectacular in 1991, 1993, 1994 and 1995, and he took the Pontiac to Sled Scene East in 1992 and 1994. The early to mid 90s were very busy for Mr. Zwibel! Here are a few pictures of the Pontiac taken at car shows. This first one was taken by our own @KustomLincolnLady and was found on Rikster's site. This next picture was posted by @Sancho right here on the HAMB. The car was featured in the August '97 issue of Rod & Custom on pages 100, 102 and 103. It was in the gold with orange scallops version. I went ahead and scanned the article for all to read. The funny thing about the write up is that there was no mention of Larry and what the car once was. In fact, the article makes it sound like Mr. Zwibel built the car. Burt re-did the car, but it was already a custom. I was a little disappointed that none of this was ever mentioned. One other thing, there is no mention of the car still having hydraulics. You will also note the engine pictures seem like they are somewhat "zoomed in". On a number of my videos, there is extensive footage of the engine compartment. The Pontiac had louvered stainless or chromed panels surrounding the engine with lots of pinstriping and murals of the Pontiac and a few other sleds on them. In the pictures that Jim (@stanlow69) posted of Larry's Chevy right before this one, it shows murals under the hood of the Chevy. The art on the Pontiac was very similar. After the Rod & Custom feature and the picture of it in Custom Rodder at Lead East '96, the car seemed to go into hiding. I found no more on it. But, a few posts back @Cincinnati Slim mentioned that Jim Allen ('55 Chevy W.E.H.T. #154) purchased the car and owned it for a while before he passed away. Did he buy it from Burt Zwibel? Maybe Slim can fill us in more to get an idea of the time frame. That seems to be where the trail on this car ends. Has anyone seen it? I'm sure it still has to be out there.......... Wow, after all that my mind is fried. Are you all as confused as I am? This week's car was a challenge and I hope that I got the facts close. After that I'm ready for a cold drink and a snack. You guys be cool! See you next week! E
I’m not sure whom he bought it from and I don’t think he had it long. He got sick not long after getting it. I know someone who was much closer to him than me. Let’s see what I can find out. Sent from my iPhone using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
Well, in searching for this one I found Ron Box's Pontiac. @Moriarity's favorite: http://findclassicars.com/pontiac/2...-custom-hydraulic-car-showcar-no-reserve.html
Never seen this version before Sancho. I liked it much better in white with blue scallops. I see in the link you posted that the car was in Texas at the time of this ad. I guess Mr. Box sold the car somewhere along the line. Gotta admit the skirts still look great, even with the modern paint. E
that poor car... should a picture of a car with those awful square headlights really be posted in the "traditional custom" section of the Hamb???
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