History Return of a Mechanix Special

Wow. What a find Joey. Thanks for sharing.

Thanks,

jim

 

NICE!

 

Great post! That's what's cool about MSRA's Back to the Fifties: you never know what you're going to run across. You look right at home behind the wheel. Glad you had the chance to get there and experience it in person - enjoy your weekend!

 

I remember reading about this in MI. Great story.

 

Cool. I have that issue of MI.

 

KevKo : Could you tell us year & month &/or issue number?

 

I've got that issue as well. If I remember it correctly in the article they used a 32 sedan.

 

Joey, Did he say how long he had owned the car? HRP

 

@drtrcrV-8 I want to say its November 1951.

 

that's just way to cool. would like to hear more about it.. thanks for sharing it !

 

Thanks for sharing the information and photos.

 

I noticed the decal below the Wisconsin plate. Not a totally uncommon item in the Illinois, Wisconsin area.

 

That is cool to see two of these especially the one from the article. My grandfather used to subscribe to MI, always had the old issues at the family summer cottage. As a kid I dreamt of building many of the things they showed.

 

See what I mean??

 

Gotta love the doorknobs.

 

Gotta love the OSHKOSH badge in the steering wheel of the pink original car, plus the gearshift remote linkage and the MOPAR truck speaker on the dashboard!
The original and the silver car, are very cool and in this day and age, in my opinion, are very collectible!
They resemble a bit of the Fitzpatrick custom, the low slung British Invicta, and some of the features of the LOTUS Super 7's, and Allard's as well!
But the cool thing is, they are a totally unique creation, from an interesting time period, when a magazine publication, with plans, could inspire an individual to construct their own cool, kick ass car, that was a blast to drive and own!

 

Cool, around 1959/60 my family rented a house on Bainbridge Island that had a stack of Mechanix illustrated magazines in a little hall closet, I was about 13 and read every one of them a dozen times. That issue was in the stack. The Tom McCahill road tests were a favorite of mine and one of the magazines had his going to Granatelli's garage to put speed parts on a new shoebox Ford.
Those build your own sports car for cheap were what a young teenage car freaks dreams were made of though. You could find a lot of old cars for 25 to 50 bucks that actually ran in those days and I checked out more than one on my bike rides but couldn't talk my folks into letting me get one to build my own version out of.
That has to be a bit of a thrill to see two of them at the same event.

 

There are a lot of things I have a hard time forgiving my Father for; forbidding me to buy a Model A to turn into a hot rod when I was 12 is but one. I well remember those articles in Mechanix Illustrated and Popular Mechanics and credit them and Hot Rod for sparking a fire that still burns. Good piece, Joey.

 

I'm thinking that the "donor car" that I was wanting at the time was a 46/48 Ford Sedan that didn't have a straight fender on it. Back in those days Bainbridge Island was still pretty much working class along with having a lot of strawberry fields there were huge patches of brushy ground that some of the older guys would race cheap beaters through and bump off trees and brush in the process. If memory serves right one of those guys was going in the service and offered me the car for about 30 bucks running and driving. I think my step father didn't want it taking up space in his shop that he used in his construction work and mom didn't want me killing myself in it. I almost did that a mile from here on my 19th birthday when I ran my 54 Buick Brush buggy through a barb wire fence and had to have 13 stitches in my neck and 12 in my leg.

 

Joey Ukrop -

While reading your TJJ Blog this morning, I was reminded of a post I had read on the website a few years ago ... wondering if it was the same silver car you saw at the "Back to the Fifties" event.

This afternoon, I found that 1951 Mechanix Illustrated Special Garage Find! article ... and realized right away that it was a different car:

​

 

Here's the entire November 1951 MECHANIX ILLUSTRATED article:

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https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/very-ugly-but-kind-of-cool.1100048/

@J.Ukrop , You should add those to this thread......with a link to this one...I sometimes think when Hotrods were getting a bad name that these were presented as a way of making a racy runabout without the bad press... mind you they were somewhat a mix of Sportscar and Jalopy from crude to polished...thanks for sharing those...​

 

Shit it’s Friday!

good post, that’s far out that you then happened by the cover car!

 

Studebakerjoe : Thanks!

 

I love those old homebrews.
I'm not entirely convinced that the pink car is the original from the article. While extremely similar, there are many differences once you start looking. Hood comes right to the nose, headlights mounted in different spots, grilles have different curves, fenders are quite different, being completely closed in, longer, with more style, different windshield frame, etc. Its possible it was updated over the years, but it starts to be lot.

 

According to my handy dandy inflation calculator, today’s cost would be $5621! And that number is probably low given the current inflation rate.

 

You can see were the Lotus 7 gained much influence from these " sportsters"! Leroi " Tex" Smith must have had love for these, in an earlier Hot Rod Mechanic issue, they described cutting up a Stude Lark to create a phaeton/ sportster!