The Don't Make 'em Like They
Used To
When someone
says to me, "Boy, these new cars are sure ugly. When are they going to
make cars like they used to?" my first inclination is to say, "From an
engineering standpoint, I hope never."
Take my 1939
Ford 4 door convertible that I had in 1949. It was just like the one
that Franklin D. Roosevelt rode in to his inauguration. It had horsehide
seats. We didn't know what Corinthian leather was. We never had a saddle
on a Cornthia. Ford just advertised it plain and simple, "It's
horsehide."
In order to get
that car up to the acceptable styling standards of the day, I had to
make a few
modifications.
First thing I
bought was a "suicide knob". It was a steering knob that clamped to the
steering wheel so that you could slide around sharp corners on those
country gravel roads with that power steering-less car, with one hand.
Or while cruising downtown, you let your bent left arm hang out the
window to showcase your bicep. As you cruised along you could see your
reflection, bicep and all, in the plate glass windows of the store
fronts.
After the
steering knob, you had to have fender skirts. It gave your car that
sleek and speedy look. It was great styling.
As to styling, I
have always been against the baby shoes, foam dice or garters hanging
from the rear view mirror. That's plain white-trash tacky. Same goes for
the fox-tail, or anybody's underwear flying half-mast from the radio
antennae.
A functional
spark plug mounted four inches from the end of the tail pipe is a must.
You will never be without one once you see that blue flame leap from the
tail pipe when cruising after dark.
I didn't want my
AM radio to have big loud speakers. They might drown out the sweet,
rich, mellow tones of the gutted mufflers that was to die for.
In the heyday of
my 1939 Ford 4 door convertible, heaven was idling down main street at
five mile per hour, at dusk, and listening to those gutted mufflers "blurpty
blurpting" back at me from the very buildings whose plate glass
reflected the total image of driver and car.
Of course, the
final touch, of which no car of the late forties would be complete
without, was the ever popular "Wolf Whistle". The guy that could operate
that vacuum marvel to perfection had his pick of female companions. And
why not? What girl wasn't just dying to hop in the car with a strange
guy that had that delicate touch to extract a raucous "Whoooee Wheeeoo"
from a vacuum driven mechanical horn?
What more need a
girl know about a guy? This was the kind of stuff from which Hollywood
love stories were made.
Oh my! |
