Art & Inspiration How do you Spread the Traditional Hot Rod Gospel?

While being relatively new to hot rods and not having a car of my own, there isn't to much I can do. However , I do work as a greeter / weekend receptionist at a local museum and people often see me doing hot rod/ car club research on the computer during slow periods. In fact, that's where I am right now.

I love that you include your daughters. Kudos to your 8 year old. I only learned to weld when I was 18 as part of a sculpture class and only did the required welding because my professor's comments about incorrect usage and exploding oxygen tanks scared me away from welding on my free projects.
While he was not much of a car guy, my dad used to let me help with some of his household building projects. When I was 23, I took two carpentry (house building) classes, and there is nothing more confidence boosting than being the only girl and the smallest in the class, working with power tools and accomplishing more than anyone else.

 

I've read the posts here several times and I'm still not really clear on what the question was! Southern California high schools in the fifties were a breeding ground for car guys. $75.00 running Model A's and auto shop went a long way to establishing the hot rod culture. Moving on, the culture reflected the muscle car era and in the early seventies we had the first gas shortage and the popularity of imports.

My take on the hot rod culture is predicated on my experiences going back 60 years. I just drove the '29 CCPU down to the golf club and parked it by the Beemers, Porsches and high dollar SUV's. While my car will get more thumbs up than the other cars there, I didn't accomplish a damn thing as far as spreading the gospel!

 

Diggin the blog picture. But don't want to be that guy when BS'n about cars

 

Sounds like, for the most part, the consensus has been the "Preach the gospel at all times, and when necessary use words" approach.

 

Not every parishioner is a priest or pastor. Some of the more spiritually devout among us could understand it by assessing how their particular brand of faith means something to them personally. I only used this form of reference since the board's "Preaching the gospel..." thing is sort of front row. A lot of my stuff means something more to me than it ever could to someone else. I have an old body hammer with layers of black tape on the handle. I've had it since I was 18 and told my dear ol Dad it was my favorite body hammer. "Here, it's yours, and you better take care of it." The genuine spirit of what most here simply like can never be "taught", and I don't give a shit if you're "Big Daddy" Roth or "Big Daddy" Garlits. To recognize and respect the true individuality of the past that we do is that thing that you either get or you don't. To some it's all about a Deuce Hiboy with steelies and a flatty. Sorry to all you Deuce lovers, but there's no bigger yawn fest to me than another fuckin black hiboy roadster. Might as well be another red Camaro at a bracket race to me. Yet at the same time I applaud the personal desire you had to get one for yourself and get it on the road. Walking that walk is like running at your hardest and fastest on a train rail and never missing it with your feet.

 

Back when it started it was all about NOT following the rules, now we're all about following them. You gotta admit it's kinda funny.

Question: What are you rebelling against Johnny?
Answer: What have you got?
(yes I know I probably messed up that quote, but you get what I mean)

For me the "rules" are the spirit in which you build not necessarily the physical parts. YMMV

 

When someone else is telling me how I should have done it, I ask "where is your car so I can see it for myself, so I see what I should have done.". They usually admit they no longer have one or don't have one---period. Then I politely say "right".

 

The gospel part for an old Southern boy, who was raised by beatniks, reeks of hellfire and brimstone rather than strawberry fields. I came by my own fever and delirium righteously from a young age when I could see cars that were build to go fast and out-run the law because they were decoys for others that were hauling contraband, and found the magazine rack in the drug store as a place where those who were crazy for cars of another stripe didn't mind exposing their particular mania in loving detail with pictures and how-to. Such a time and place will never exist for the youth of today, nor will it resonate with the same outlaw wail it did 'back when'. However, if this hobby we love so much is to survive we need to attract the younger generations by whatever means necessary; because it takes young people with a zest to take up the cause for it to continue. Greybeards die off. And, if what we hate about Rat Rods is analyzed the aesthetic they have adopted is much like the world created without adult supervision in Lord of the Flies. Their rules (if indeed they can be so-called) border on anarchy and the rides they build draw the wrong kind of attention to old cars because many of them are death-traps they are so unsafe. And, the sad part is that they don't know any better, and don't care. Thus a need not only to educate those who want to follow what we do, but re-educate those who need it by pointing out why tradition matters. Which is not to say all the old cars that were around when I was coming up were safe; it was just that no one knew any better. What we need to do, honestly, is to create a kind of 'Traditional Hot Rod Safari' that will hit cities with cars that wow those who show up for a free seminar in 'what it's all about', and people to actually stand up in front of an audience and talk about what we're doing and why, and to show and tell. Otherwise, it's not contagious enough to simply pass this fever on from one person to another. We'll all die off and it will like the Shakers, amazing stuff will be left, and no one to continue.

 

Shit. That was poetic. And eloquent. And to the point. Well done 'Bama boy, well done!

 

This post is dangerously close to infringing on rule # 2 of the HAMB

 

You're putting too much thought into the question. Whether you realize it or not, getting out in the streets is what spreads the "gospel". The "gospel" is that these cars we love, build and drive, are not just for shows or holiday parades through downtown. I wish I had a $1 for every person that's said, "I didn't know you could drive these on the streets." or my favorite, "Is it street legal?", usually said while standing in front of the license plate.

So, take it to the club. Use it to run errands. Go for a drive, every chance you get. Because NOTHING spreads the "gospel", like a hot rod or custom cresting a hill or slowly pulling into a parking lot full of SUV's. NOTHING.

 

Spreading the gospel on the way to the yard waste/brush recycle center.

 

I hate to catch myself prosilitizing but its happened. Once I here myself rambling past someone's initial inquiry I notice they are either impressed by the drive to take on something so full of conviction or they look at me like I'm a religious nut job.
As far as "interpretation of the gospel" we all seem to tweak our understanding of "it" to suit are own moral guidelines and desired outcome, i.e. heaven or hell. Like myself choosing not to go with the flathead in barn and use a 331 Windsor roller out of my previous drag mustang. So the wife harps on me for ever about hating fast black cars swears she's gonna die because of one, nightmare stuff. I get to answering the itch in my man region and decide to take it back past musclecars and dragsters, my roots, and build a traditional rod. Well I'm a horsepower nut, years of racing does that to ya bad, I just can't bring myself to roll around with 180hp anymore not yet. I work out the vision of early fifties southern bootleggers 32 pickup and trick myself into believing the conceptual possibility of a repower in the mid sixties with the dirt track stock car influence trickling down in to my engine, just make it look as period as possible and the brotherhood can't crucify, Amen. Oh, and the wife doesn't need to know that old hill truck weighs bout 1000lbs less than previous black nightmare. Now I don't need to go to confession cause I believe in my heart I haven't sinned

 

I don't always preach hotrod gospel, but when I do, it's traditional.

Stay thirsty my friends....

 

Replying to an old thread, but here goes...

Money is the biggest factor when it comes to tinkering. Coming up with a grand just to buy a 2-door from the 1950's (that didn't hardly run!) was my biggest obstacle. Junkyards are teeming with Honda parts, and you can get a beater shitbox in similar shape to the classic I picked up for only a couple hundred.

I can see why young folks gravitate towards the imports.

I have always loved the 1950's GM vehicles. To me, their style is second to none. That being said, I was unable to find one that I could afford. I ended up opting for a 1959 Ford, even though I'd never been too hot on them. Without a welder or knowledge of body work, but with a strong innate mechanical aptitude and good amount of determination, I was able to turn a mild-mannered looking car into something I really wanted to drive and show off.

It's rusty. It's crusty. It's crude. Fits my personality to a T.

I won't knock someone for their Honda; I get it. I opted to save my money so I could get into something more along the lines of what I truly wanted.

 

I probably shouldn't even reply to this either, but here I go:

My efforts to "spread the gospel"(?) is, first and foremost, by driving mine as much and as varied locales/places as I can, as that's not only why have my cars, but it also inevitably seems to lead to more contact with common folk not often exposed to vintage cars or hot rods.
I truly enjoy casual roadside conversations with and often more interesting (unusual ?) questions I receive about my rides from "common folk" of all ages and genders.
Providing good answers to some, especially those from little kids or elderly ladies, etc can often be more interesting/intriguing than just "yeah, it's mine" or "yeah, its' a Hemi".

Sitting around all day at a designated event or show with a beer in one hand next to a car, that may or may not have actually been even driven there, mostly exposes it to those already initiated and more often than not tend to appear (at least to me) as a "gathering of pier-to-pier posers".
Sorry guys, just not my scene.