When Detroit Was Still Building 'em

I was really getting into cars on the 69-70 era of my life. Cars that are "classics" TODAY, were fairly cheap back then, and you could by good transportaion for $200.00, fix it up a little later and sell it for $300.00 and buy something that caught your interest a little MORE.

The Studebaker was a butt-ugly automobile, but was very well built! To this day, Studebaker is STILL the oldest in existence, although they went out of business in 1966. The Five Studebaker Brothers started building covered wagons, farm wagons and such----in 1852, then started building cars in the early 20th century.

In 1970, I bought a '49 Studebaker, with a very faded tan paint job, for $100.00..........ran fine, though. Using spraycans, I painted it white. Not satisfied with THAT, I got a "wild hair" one weekend (and a 6-pack of beer), and decided to "customize' it a bit..........

I took a big piece of cardboard, cut a four-inch square hole in the middle, then...........using it as a stencil, I got some BLACK spraypaint, and proceeded to paint the car in a perfect checkerboard pattern. The whole car looked like a rolling checkerboard on four wheels! I have maintained an album all these years with photos of EVERY car I've ever owned.............all 63 of 'em! And I'd be glad to show that 'checkered Stude' to anyone who might want to see it!

Anyway, Chuck Flowers, (a guy I worked with at St. Regis), and I, used to drive up to San Francisco on an occasional Friday night in that old car, head it down 3rd & Townsend, commonly called "skid row" Drunks and wino's wandering in and out of dives, some of them holding onto bottles in paper bags.............

Chuck and I would cruise slowly down the street in that "checkerboard-painted" Studebaker, blow the horn and wave at those old guys as we went by! We'd be busting UP watching the reactions! As years have gone by, I've often wondered if we'd "cured" anybody!

One of the BEST cars, (if not THE best) I've ever owned, was a 1959 Oldsmobile "88", that I'd bought at a used car lot in downtown San Francisco for $315.00, a 4-door hardtop.

Back then, Generals Motors wasn't just sticking a "350" in everything----------every Division made its own engines. The Olds V-8 was called the "ROCKET" and HAD been since 1949. The valve and head set-up was a little hotter-performing than anything the other GM cars were building. By 1959 they were using the big 371's in the 88........or if you bought a Super-88 or 98, you got the BIGGER 394.

Those old big blocks had much larger valves than today's cars, they weren't hampered by smog-control crap and there was 102 to 106 octane to run them on. MY Olds had the "smaller" 371 with a Rochester 2-barrel carburetor, but it still ran like the "ROCKET" that was stamped on the valve covers!

I've never rode in, or driven a car SINCE, that rode as nicely, and it had a very unique speedometer. It had a long "tape" that stretched from left to right across the instrument cluster. It was a bright green up until about 35. Then it turned yellow until you reached 55-60............now it turned red and stayed red until you hit 110, and from that point on, it went gray.

The 50's cars were rolling sculpture. They were just beautiful. Style, chrome, fins. 2-tone and even 3-tone paint if you wanted it........fender skirts...........lotsa room and lotsa power. If you could afford a CADILLAC, the whole WORLD knew it when you came down the street. The 59 & 60 Caddys were at LEAST 21 feet long and had TAILFINS that seemed to reach into the next county! About 5,000 lbs on the hoof, and 12 miles per gallon...............maybe..........but who cared? If you could afford a Cadillac, you could afford the 30 cents a gallon to feed it!

I LOVED that Olds, but had the opportunity to do a little "horse-trading" for a '59 Corvette............so I traded my 57 Bel Air and sold the Olds at the same time, and got the 'Vette.

I was in the state of "limbo" with the Bel Air. The coming of the new "Z-28 Camaro" put a lot of US out of the running at the dragstrip. And by now, my Bel Air was built TOO hot to be fuel efficient for "cruising." Corvettes were supposed to be "chick-magnets"

And they ARE. And it WAS. And all you can do at the drive-in movie lot............is sit in your cramped bucket seats and watch the movie!

Anyway, I continued to "wheel and deal" until I finally got tired of working "dead-end" jobs, and elected to go back into the service, but THIS time it would be in a branch where I might actually learn some trade that I could use in the CIVILIAN world in my later years.

I was working in a lumber mill in Medford, Oregon, when I really got to thinking about that. Before I'd left the Bay Area, I'd run into one of my old classmates from Galileo High. He was in the Air Force now, and just happened to be home on leave.

"What are you doing now?"

"Working in a paper factory."

"What did you do in the Marines?"

"Shot a Bazooka."

"Ain't much call for that out HERE!"

"Nope"

"Why don't you go back in the service?"

"Are you NUTS? I almost didn't get back!"

"Join the Air Force! It's a good life, heck I just RE-ENLISTED!"

"I don't wanna be some AIRMAN..........."

"Better than gettin' SHOT at!"

Well, I couldn't argue with that, but I'd still have to give it some thought. By August of 1971, I'd "thought" about it enough.

MSgt Cromer.........the SECOND time I'd dealt with a recruiter, but it was a different experience. The Air Force wasn't so desperate for people that they had to entice you with anything............no high-pressure sales. He didn't act like he had any "quotas" to make. I liked that, and we talked.

My short-time at Barstow as a supplyman fit right in with what Cromer had available. They'd send me straight to supply school at Lowry AFB, Colorado. There wouldn't be any "Basic Training" at Lackland, either.........no need. To this day, I don't know what the training down there consists of, but Cromer said it would be a waste of MY time and THEIRS.

So I signed up, sold the '62 Impala I was driving at the time, and got ready to go active duty again. The only things I left behind were my first guitar and my pistol. I left those with Mom & Dad until I got back from school. I'd be going to McChord AFB as my first assignment, so I'd just swing by and pick up the guitar and the gun on my way back.

Life was gonna change once again.