History Help me find some old photos of this Cedar Rapids Iowa 1940 Ford Coupe

I chose olds over hemi for mine because I couldn't bear to cut into those virgin 75 yr old inner fender panels. Yours are already cut AND you have a hemi, WHATS STOPPING YOU??!!

 

This has been a long wait. Check this out. I just got this in a text from Jon who bought the car at auction.

First pics that I have seen of the car from its early years as a hot rod.

 

It was a 392, Joe Hunt Magneto, 4 inline carbs....., I can't quite tell what the hub-caps are.

 

Cool! Now you're just have to convince him to carefully take the pictures out of the frame and scan them separately!

 

So cool! You have the blueprint in those photos, now you have to follow it

 

Didn't know those cars came with floors! Guess I 've got to find cars outside of Wisconsin to see that!

 

Whoh! man, that is TASTY! I'd be all over cloning that! The wheelcovers are aftermarket, and they are available re-pop.

http://www.mooneyesusa.com/product-p/mc051.htm

 

I'm thinking about running down there to do just that. It's a 4 1/2 hour one way drive, and I need to see the details.

 

Not that this has anything to do with your car, but I knew of a similar vehicle. About twenty years ago the NSRA had the Midwest Mini-Nats in Cedar Rapids and I remember looking at a '40 Ford pickup with a Hemi with speed equipment on it. It was an older hot rod and was a dark green color. I remember chatting with the owner, who said he was from Cedar Rapids.

Probably later that year or the next I saw the same fella selling an old Stewart Warner tach at the C.R. swap, and asked him if it came out of the pickup. He told me it did, and that he was removing the Hemi to modernize the truck. I was also able to buy the tach drive and bracketry that bolted to the front of the Hemi. Later I found out it bolted directly to my flathead by filing two holes a 1/16th inch.

So, it must have been a trend to put Hemis in '40 Fords in Cedar Rapids. Too bad they got removed.

 

If he won't part with the photos, ask to take them to get scanned and reprinted so you can have a copy of them, many places can do this for you at minimal cost.

 

What the heck does he need to keep them for ?? A Playboy magazine is ruined after the first sticky page, glad those pictures are under glass I guess. Is he telling everyone that's his old car .... that he didn't build ? That's a shame. The car needs its baby pictures, he can keep the scans. Prepping cat barf, and mastiff poop for John care package. Can even contribute yesterday's soiled undies.

 

^oh no, kid is getting all riled up again, lookout!

 

ha ... bravery behind a keyboard maybe ... I wouldna' kept the pics', especially now. Probably get a six pack of Grainbelt beer out of that good deed too. On another note ... that car was damned cool wasn't it ? (No answer needed, I already know your physic powers)

 

Its never gonna get any better than that. PERFECT.

If you end up getting these scanned, you gotta send me this shot full size. I need to have this hanging on my shop wall.

 

Jon sent me a more clear image. I called him out of the blue, so I need to build his trust. He explained he wanted to keep his copy, and would lone it to me so I can respect that.

I'm arranging a visit to meet up with Jacks daughter, and Jon, and maybe some others depending on time.

I really want to study these in more detail.

 

Love them caps!

 

I like those too. There are so many great wheelcovers that were popular on hot rods especially circa 1955 to around 1963 when five spokes started to take over.

 

Be sure to take the time, or work with professionals, to get high quality, high resolution images.

 

Cool car and the story is even better! The car was parked next to me at Des Moines GG and I knew it had to have some cool history, You probably need a 75th anniversary panel and shirt. LOL

 

looks like a weiand intake

 

That's a great eye!

 

you need to get him to pull the pics out and have them scanned, im sure he will do it if you tell him what your doing! took a little talking but i got some pics of my 36 3 window pulled out of frames and scanned

the cragar had a little lower profile, this seems higher, weiand im sure, also you can see the red hellings and stellings stickers on the air cleaners, neat stuff!

once you get the better scans youll be able to identify the fuel block too, you know it has to have a hemi back in it.

in some of the pics you said there was a lasalle trans with an adaptor, the adaptor is to SBC the trans looks like a stock early chevy, like 59 chevy non-syncro type, junk behind that hemi.

 

magneto looks oldsmobile to me

sbc to early ford adaptor, then early for chevy adaptor, chevy trans, stock tailshaft

on the right is a modified tailshaft to adapt to early ford closed drive, the ears hangine out on the sides are a rear mount of a 40 ish ford trans, and the bottom two earls hanging out are where the torque tube bell bolts on. see the 5 bolt pattern is the same as the trans above.


so my thoughts are maybe that he had replaced the stock ford tranny after blowing it up with a chevy 3 speed, maybe he had a hemi to early ford adaptor and just stacked the early ford to chevy adaptor on that to get the chevy trans in there and then put the closed drive on the back of the chevy trans, not sure on measurments but it should technically mabbe bolt right in place of that ford tranny, the funny thing is that those chevy trannys werent much better than the ford!

 

I don't get it either?... The guy gets a car that's been untouched since the 50s , he's at the auction with all the parts to basically put the car back together just like in those photographs ,....

So heDoesn't give a shit , no respect for what the car was... Cuts the frame and puts all the late-model garbage on it , but won't part with the pictures of the very thing he made not exist anymore?

It's like drawing a mustache on the Mona Lisa , and throwing the painting away... Then framing the picture of the painting you had before you drew the mustache ?... Crazy!??

 

Let's just know that it will thankfully be cool and historically pleasing again.

 

Yesterday I had a quick trip down to Cedar Rapids. I met Jon who bought the car at auction and Renee (Jack S) Daughter was nice enough to meet up there. Turns out I did not need the collage as Renee entrusted me with some slides

My friend Karl has a slide to digital converter. I spent a good portion of the day converting the images.

One thing I really wanted was the original title. The car was previously owned by Girard Christopher in Minneapolis. I wonder if it was hot rodded then?

There's a lot more to come.

 

Here are a few pics that are not from slides.
You can see the dual bumper guards, twin spotlights, lake pipe exhaust cutouts, full disc caps, and the 4-2 carbs.




Looks like the ladder was for an overhead photo shoot.

 

I think these two pictures are early pics of the car. I suspect the hemi was not in the car at this time as the front end is a little higher, tires appear to be the same size front and back, there are not lake pipe exhaust cut-outs and the steering wheel is different. By the way what is that wheel?
Gotta love the old Kodak Ektachrome. I think this was a rainy day.

 

OK, Now for some outside shots of the car. The plate is 1957, but the tag is 1962. The quality of the car really astounds me. I think Jack had a pretty good eye for details, and going after the right look. So here it is with big and little tires, red wheels, accessory hubcaps, dual spot lights, accessory bumper guards front and rear. The Edelbrock Equipped decal is in the window........just a little tip off to the hemi under the hood.


My favorite view as well. A little high in the back, lake plugs sneaking out from under the front fender, and pencil tip exhaust out the rear.


Here's another cool shot.


....and another that is a nice shot. The photography is really nice.


A nice side profile that shows the accessory hubcaps really nice.


This is a neat shot from a drug store parking lot car show. The primered 40 coupe in the back ground is running without a hood. The white one looks pretty cool as well. We need some Cedar Rapids guys to chime in on who owned the other cars......and where are they at today!


Here is one last side profile shot.

 

In these later pictures you can see a new deep dish steering wheel that is two toned white and black. Some body speak up on what it is. Pickup?
Notice the diamond sewn into the carpet, the gauge insert on the bottom of the dash (I need to find one.) All the inside mouldings are chrome plated.


You can see the inside of the firewall was covered in white vinyl. The material is more like an Oyster shell. I'd like to find some.






And a driver side view. Pretty cool looking stuff!


This is a cool photo showing a little more of the outside of the car.


Trick shot. Must have had the camera blocked up on the rear package tray. You can see the dual spot lights coming through.