Fred Windish Posted April 7, 2013 Share Posted April 7, 2013 Hello, all! I think it's time to lighten up and "bond" a little bit. This started on the G7 thread, and I think it can be a welcome, stand alone discussion. My offering there was this: _____ Michael, My first car was a green, four door '61 Rambler. It was 8 years old and cost me $125. Gee, how I loved that push-button transmission! It took me to drum corps practice, not in style, but I still got there! As a bit of a respite, Michael, what was your first car? I'll guess a '49 DeSoto. Anyone else care to reveal their own first car experience? _____ Let's hear from you, too! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimF-LowBari Posted April 7, 2013 Share Posted April 7, 2013 (edited) LOL first car (late 73) was a convertible 66 Impala my dad talked the salesmen into taking $200 off the $750 asking price with the words "Who has to clean the snow off the top... looks like a lot of snow coming". Reply was "OK $550 but you take it off the lot tonight....". Yeah anything over 1 inch of snow the beat top would rip... more.... Corps related I had to drive thru a less than nice part of the city to get to drill rehearsal and had to part on City Island where we drilled. Yeah real island in the Susquehanna where the AA Harrisburg Seantors now play. Island was "green haze" party central on one side for a year or so and we were on the other side. My dad gave me advice about the car as follows: "Don't lock it, if they want in bad enough they'll cut the top to get in. And you don't have #### in it anyway." Oh yeah... leaked so bad I had mushrooms (not THAT kind) growing in the carpet by the back seats. And winter time I would have frost on BOTH sides of the windshield and back window. And no sense trying to scrape the back window (real glass). If you would put any wieght on it you could hear the stitching rip. Edited April 7, 2013 by JimF-LowBari Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slingerland Posted April 7, 2013 Share Posted April 7, 2013 'nuff said. Real 17 year old boys live dangerously. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimF-LowBari Posted April 7, 2013 Share Posted April 7, 2013 'nuff said. Real 17 year old boys live dangerously. Ex (thank goodness) girlfriend had a Maverick. My garage mechanic dads take on that was. "If you get hit from behind.... GET THE HELL OUT and check the car later". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fred Windish Posted April 7, 2013 Author Share Posted April 7, 2013 Slingerland . . . YIKES! And it's brown, too. Then again, I think you are a drummer, so it makes sense. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slingerland Posted April 7, 2013 Share Posted April 7, 2013 Slingerland . . . YIKES! And it's brown, too. Then again, I think you are a drummer, so it makes sense. At the time, Pinto drivers thought "well, at least it's not a Chevy Vega." 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimF-LowBari Posted April 7, 2013 Share Posted April 7, 2013 (edited) At the time, Pinto drivers thought "well, at least it's not a Chevy Vega." Or a Nova.... supposedly Spanish for "No Go".... And supposedly guess what name Chevy sold it under in South America.... Friend who was a music major/trumpet minor (now owns a music store) owned an ca 1970 Opel that was a wierd shade of green. We were kidding him about it after our brass ensemble played at out church. He heard a voice ask "What do you call that color" and he (too) quick answered "Chicken #### green". Then he realized it was the ministers voice. Edited April 7, 2013 by JimF-LowBari Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fred Windish Posted April 7, 2013 Author Share Posted April 7, 2013 Early in our marriage, we had a Vega wagon. I really liked it, and truth be told, it was also brown. Bought it in Hamburg, PA. Hamburg hosted MANY top drum corps in its King Frost parade. Not talking Hamburg, NY, home of the Kingsmen, but Hamburg, PA, just a few miles south of Schuylkill Haven, PA Belvederes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Boo Posted April 7, 2013 Share Posted April 7, 2013 As I mentioned in the other thread, my first car was a used 1971 Chrysler Newport that looked like this. My parents got if for me when I was a senior in college. Mom wanted a car she thought was big enough to be safe in Chicago. The thing was a tank...there was 12 inches of dead space between the grill and the radiator, just to make the hood longer. It's primary feature was its uncanny ability to catch fire in unique and creative ways while driving, and to shove the radiator fan through the radiator at will. (The gas filter, made of metal, would rust and then drip gasoline right atop the hot manifold.) I drove it to Cavaliers rehearsals in 1977 and more than once, fellow corps members helped me get it running so I could get home. When I drove it to the 1979 DCI World Championships in Birmingham, I had to drive with the windows down because the air conditioning was causing overheating that sent the radiator fan through the radiator as I described above, which delayed me in southern Indiana for several hours. I remember looking over at the passenger side and being shocked at what I saw. The seats were black naugahyde, didn't breath at all, and were hotter than blazes in the summer sun. I saw heat waves radiating up from the passenger seat. It was a long trip to and from Birmingham. During lunch and dinner breaks at all-day rehearsals, I was able to fit five passengers for a meal run with lots of room to spare. I could have taken more if there were more than six seat belts. Here's what I remember about the drummers' cars. Their steering wheels were beat to shreds from drumming on them during stops. And their passenger dashboards were mutilated because they typically had other drummers in the car with them. Drummers and dashboards are a bad combination. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
garfield Posted April 8, 2013 Share Posted April 8, 2013 At the time, Pinto drivers thought "well, at least it's not a Chevy Vega." That's funny. My first car was a Vega. Loved that car. But I had already been marching a couple of years by then. Was driven to camps in a '67 Chevy Impala wagon. Classic. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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