The Great (?) American Dream
Ten Years Later
by C. Alan Byrd (C) 1982
I started to drive in May 1971. If I recall that was a very traumatic experience for everyone around me.
I found a 1960 Volvo PV544 for $50.00, and had it towed to Arlington where I could work on it until I became 18 years old (needed to be 18 th get a license back then). It was painted “Road Runner” Green, a bright green. I painted “ouch” on its rear fender where it had been hit so everyone would know. Once it was running it kept breaking the flywheel bolts so I had a guy we called “Rummy” ( because he drank alot of rum) arc weld the flywheel to the crankshaft (heaven help anyone who might have wanted to work on the engine after that). The same day we welded the crankshaft my tags were stolen. (That should have given me a hint of things to come).
I drove the car up to Massachusetts and lived with friends until it threw a rod and Steve's accident (my brother) brought me back to Virginia.
I drove Steve's 1965 Pontiac for awhile and then bought a white 2-door 1963 Pontiac. I drove it for a while and was having problems with the distributor and so I sold it. I needed something to make it look good before the guy who wanted to buy it got to my house so I applied a coating of brake fluid over it. Of course, three days later the paint powdered itself (evidently the brake fluid decomposed the paint). (note to self.. don't use brake fluid on things I want to keep).
Then I purchased a yellow 1968 Opel “Rally” Kadet 1.9 for $50.00 it was an exceptional car. It had chrome wheels, which was very rare. Only one minor problem, it was totaled. The whole left side from the rear of the door back was flat and the frame was ever so slightly bent. I spent quite a few nights banging out the side to look half way presentable, I then replaced the left rear window, the windshield, and polished the bumpy dent. Then I tore the transmission out of it (because of the frame) and no sooner did the transmission get installed the clutch went out in Woodbridge, Virginia, and Steve and I replaced it on the side of the road (that night).
After that I decided I should sell the car. I sold it to a manager of a 7-11 store who saw it every night when I stopped for coffee. At first I told him I needed $1000.00, but he could have it for $750.00. Then he found his bank wouldn't loan him but $500.00, so I told him I'd take his Mercury Comet (1965) in trade and $500.00. We traded cars in a bank parking lot on a Sunday, as he was headed for North Carolina and with the condition of the car, I have to admit I was glad he didn't stay in the area.
The following day I took the Merc over to a used car lot and traded it for a 1965 Barracuda. I forgot to mention that the Merc had snow tires on the front wheels and a cracked windshield for which I got an inspection ticket.
Back to the Barracuda, I gave the dealer (Lee O'Niel) the Merc and $350.00. I then proceeded to drive the car into the ground. I was working at a GMC dealer during the night at “Ralph's ‘Car City' Used Cars”. Insert #2
I then purchased a 1967 Mustang for another 7-11 manager which he took out that night and beat up two policemen after sideswiping several cars and taking a minor girl out and getting her drunk. Of course my Insurance Company cancelled me afterwards for “Poor Judgment”. Well, after I got him out of jail he felt so bad he gave me a 1960 MGA he had owned for years and I took it. I grabbed it and towed it to Colonial Beach. I left it there until I could get it running. The gas line had rotted out, so I left it until later.
I then heard about a deal in Fredericksburg. A blue 2-door 1955 Dodge with a hemi-engine that I could pick up for $150.00. It was in terrific shape and had been stored for years and had just been painted deep blue. It had been nosed and decked and was lookin' good…it was a 20-year beauty with a big chrome handle on the dashboard for the automatic transmission. That car was almost indestructible. I went through several road barriers once without as much as scarring the paint. (But that was in Massachusetts).
Well one night Teddy Follin Jr ( a local tow truck driver)., tore the left fender off the car. Well that created problems. Teddy didn't have the money to pay me off for the repair and neither did I. Well, I sent it off to the body shop figuring I would find a way to pay for it. Well at this time I managed to trade my Barracuda even (plus $100.00 back wages) for a 1965 Pontiac Lemans Convertible. It was dark blue with a white top, of course when you tried to put the top down it took 10 minutes cuz' the relays kept overheating. I got this great “deal” at 3:00 AM one morning on a pair of chrome reversed wheels with new tires at a gas station from some guys travelling of course they “might possibly” have been “hot”. Well they didn't quite fit perfect so I drilled out the lug nut holes and one day my rear wheel fell off in a parking lot and I had to buy some replacement wheels and throw away my “deal wheels”.
I went to Massachusetts in that car too, in the winter. I had my first paid vacation ever. I worked a full shift (3:00 PM to 1:00 AM) then drove until dawn. Well I met up with a guy in a 1969 Mustang Mach I going to Boston, so I followed him. We got stopped in New York City cuz' they thought I was running illegal cigarettes. But all I had in the trunk was 12 gallons of ice cream. That freaked out the cops to say the least.
After that we both were stopped in Connecticut for doing 122-MPH in a 65-MPH zone. The cop didn't want us to return to the state so he gave us a warning – “Never return to Connecticut.” We made Boston in about six hours (it's normally a 9 – 10 hour drive).
I also took that car to New York City for a New Year's Eve at “Times Square” with Steve Cook, and a car in the parking garage we parked at was stripped on the level below us. Luckily mine wasn't touched.
#1. I got the MGA running and brought it up to Fairfax where I was living and drove it for a while through the Hurricane in 1972 I drove it along the Beltway coming home in a foot of water with no windows. After that I decided to park it until I could repair it completely. (End insert)
#2. That Barracuda was quite a machine. The trunk lid had a mind of it's own, it was always falling off at the most untimely times. I spent a lot of hours searching for that lid! Once I was heading up 95N one night (headed for a dope deal) and two carloads of North Carolina Rednecks tried to run me off the road. I left one of them spinning round and round in front of the truck scales and I lost the other one, but luckily the State Police found him and not me. I drive real good when someone points a gun at me. (End insert)
Well I noticed I had destroyed the Pontiac to the point of no return (the engine had a slight knock), I traded it even with a guy I worked with who had bought a car traded in at work for his wife which she didn't like. It was a 1964 Chrysler New Yorker station wagon with a 413-wedge engine and a square steering wheel. It is probably the fastest w/w I ever saw or drove and boy did I ever drive it. When I sold it, it was leaking and burning oil I don't know which consumed more, the air or the ground. I managed quite a swap. Remember the 1955 Dodge in the Body Shop? Well it was still there. I worked it out so Billy Ballard (the guy I was now working for driving a dump truck for part-time during the day) traded me his 1966 Nova 4-door (that the paint was coming off) and $100.00 for my 1964 Dodge Wagon. I then immediately went to the body shop and traded the owner my 1966 Nova for the $250.00 due for the body work since he hadn't finished the work and what was done was shabby so he was glad for the offer. So I had my dodge back (great luck, huh?) Now I took my MGA down to Orange, Virginia, to store it and I found out about a 1959 MGA left deserted on the highway near Fredericksburg and I bribed the service station owner $25.00 to let me steal it from him since he had had it for 60 days and nobody came looking for it (of course the owner had removed the tags when he left it) nor did we think anybody would. He just wanted his money for the tow off the highway.
So I had it towed by a friend down with the other one so I could make one good car. A few years later they were given away by the guy that was holding them for me. (I never got down to work on them).
But before that happened I had found a 1953 “Austin” quite a nice racecar that had been abandoned in Fairfax. So one night I went by at 2:00 AM, after work and scavenged the 6-cylinder engine out of it. It took me almost 4 hours to remove it. Thank goodness someone came ahead of me and conveniently acquired the transmission – saving me the trouble of disconnecting it. Well, everything comes back to ya cuz' I took the engine to work to steamclean and rebuild the motor, well someone stole the engine block from me, of course they couldn't use it cuz' I still had the cylinder head, and the chance of finding enough pieces to put it together was very unlikely.
Let's see where was I? Oh yeah! Well I took all the money I could find and went to Massachusetts in my Dodge. I decided to live up there awhile. I lived with Jim Anderson and we went into business together. But that is another story not related to my cars. Well when everything was looking very depressing, Jimmy (my father) offered to send me to school, well I grabbed at the chance so I came back to Virginia to get my belonging and my 1955 Dodge blew the engine in Stafford. That blew my mind so I came up to Arlington and bought the bow-wow of the year – a 1964 Ford Galaxy white 4-door 6-cylinder stick shift. A very boring car for $150.00. Well I went back to Massachusetts on temporary tags (I couldn't afford the tag transfer). Well needless to say, Jimmy turned on me and did not plan on paying for my school and a month into the first semester asked me where I was going to live because they were moving to Texas (they never did move). So I dropped out of school and returned to Washington. I timed it so I would arrive after dark cuz' my tags were dead, my inspection was dead, and do I have to tell you about my county sticker? Well, I didn't time it too correctly, I had to wait in Maryland for three hours until dark before I could come home, well since I had lost my transfer papers on the car title I couldn't title it so I abandoned it in a parking lot. (I can't tell you how glad I was to get rid of that paperweight of a car).
I then went back to Tommy's Lot and bought a 1967 Lincoln 2-door for $150.00. (That $150.00 amount sure does turn up a lot). Tommy thought it had a burned valve so he sold it to me cheap. Well, just like I thought it just had a couple of bad spark plug wires. I replaced the two rear mufflers with straight pipes; (it became very mean sounding). Well the same week I finished the bodywork on it (all minor) a real jerk of a kid pulled out in front of me and I bent his car into a “permanent left turn” he did manage to pull away and pull me around and left the scene. Well it would have cost a lot more to repair my car than it was worth so I drove it for quite a while with my bent fender. That Lincoln was the most option filled car I had ever seen. It even had an electric headrest for the passenger, unbelievable. If it hadn't been for a kid in Colonial Beach going for the Guinness World Record for number of cars totaled in first year driving I would probably still be driving that car.
I remember I owned it during the gas crisis of 1973, I used to haul 2 – 2-½ gallon cans of gas in the trunk and was forever running out of gas.
Well the car would cost more to repair than it was worth so I decided to sell it. (It was still driveable). I tentatively sold it to an employee at National Airport for $200.00 so I went car hunting – back to Tommy's Lot I went. He had a 1964 Triumph TR4A with no battery and no distributor, I gave him $500.00 for it (my nose for deals is just phenomenal). It didn't run and probably shouldn't have. I can't tell you how much Tommy was growing to love me. (I ended up with all of his mistakes). I even took a loan to buy this car!
Well while I was working to get this thing running on the car lot a fellow came up to me (thinking I worked there) and asked about my Lincoln, I told him the story and he said he'd give me $250.00 for it. Well I asked if he had cash and the deal was made. I later called the guy at national Airport and told him I totaled the car. (So I lied!)
Well Lynn (my soon to be wife) couldn't drive the TR4, she almost tore out the (new) clutch I just put in trying to learn. So I sold the car to Steve Cook on payments since he didn't have enough cash and he proceeded to use the Byrd School of Driving and gave it a good funeral later on. Only after I had made several emergency trips to Maryland at various hours of the day and night trying to keep it alive and running. (I'm still unsure if I should have gone).
Well back to Tommy's Lot we go…and we find a 1966 dark blue Pontiac 4-door with no air conditioner belt. For $225.00 we drove that car for quite a while then the valves went bad. Well I went to Richmond and bought the 1963 T-Bird from Brother Steve and drove it for a while. Nice car, everybody owned it I think. Brother David borrowed it from my stepfather long enough to tear the brakes out of it, and it sat for two years after. Then Steve bought it, lost his insurance and it sat for a year. Then I bought it and it sat for another year. That car would do anything to stay off the highway. I had installed a mobile phone in it. I still miss that phone; I heard some of the strangest conversations. Can you imagine a party line in the Nation's Capitol?
Insert #3
Now at this time my stepfather and my mother split, I took my mother's side and my brother David took my stepfather's. I think Jerry (my stepfather) was sorry for a long time that he taught me how to survive. We managed to sell both of the cars. I think that needs to be told even though they didn't belong to me.
First was a 1969 4-door green Cadillac. Not much of a car, but you do what you can. Well it seems when the car bought Jerry never bothered to title the car. He had just gotten transfer papers in JoAnn's (my mother) name. Well selling that car first required getting a title. Considering the papers were over three years old, I had to tell some kind of excuse to the Division of Motor Vehicles. I batted my blue eyes real innocent and told the middle aged lady at the DMV that my mother had purchased the car three years ago and she was involved in a car accident that left her a paraplegic, the car was stored and no title was ever gotten and now she wants to give it to my little brother (which I don't have one) for graduation what must I do?! And she was so nice and didn't doubt me for a moment. She proceeded to get a title. We immediately traded the Cadillac for a 1970 4-door blue Pontiac Lemans.
Now we had to deal with a 1970 4-door Lincoln. It seems Jerry had bought it promising to give the bank the title (they loaned him money). Well he didn't so we got new transfer papers because the old ones were unreadable. Well, we sold it at a consignment car lot because Jerry would have seen an ad in the paper. And a cash sale is what was needed. (Money was tight). Once that was gotten rid of, Jerry found I had disposed of both cars he threatened to send me to jail. Of course he could never prove anything and all the paperwork was legal (now). I think that left him a tad upset with me.
Now back to my cars. The T-bird required an engine replacement and the 1966 Pontiac's valve job didn't take so we traded the Pontiac for a 1972 2-door Lemans Sport. That was a nice car till just before the end…and we kept it a long time. Then the transmission fell out and was never quite right. Then the exhaust system self-destructed and I had this bright idea that side-pipes would be less expensive and fulfill a dream I had to own a car that looked and sounded fast. Of course after that Lynn refused to drive it cuz' it was so noisy. (She never did understand about grown men and their macho fantasies).
#3: Lynn and I moved to Fairfax and needed two cars so I bought a 1969 Lincoln 4-door. It wasn't as nice as the 1967 Lincoln, but I did pay more to make up for it. That car I also took a loan on for $1000.00. I bought it from a black golf hustler in Washington, DC, (I should have known better by now).
I poured a lot of money into that deluxe gas container. Luckily I was able to find someone who was happy to give me all the money I had sunk into that dog. It's good to know there is still an 8 th grade educated public out there with more money than sense. Well at that time I had the T-bird running and things went well for a while. (End insert)
I now bought a 1969 Chrysler New Yorker 4 –door with a police package drive train and all the options necessary for my comfort (like an electric trunk release which life would be unbearable without).
Well the engine was too powerful and after bending two sets of pushrods I dropped it off at Tommy's Lot for him to try to sell but it just got “lost” in the confusion at his lot.
Back to the T-bird, well the second engine was now dying, so I went to see a “friend” at Koons Ford (Ralph had tried for a long time to get me to work for him) and I told him I had no money and a paperweight trade-in but I wanted to be “spotted” in a new car. (How's that for guts?) Oh by the way the term spotted means finance and close the deal with the customer driving away. Well that's what I did; I did have to give $100.00 on my American Express card.
That's how I got a new 1979 black mustang with a V-8 engine and manual overdrive transmission. It's the only new car I ever or will ever own, but it was a fun car.
I got a hold of ‘such a deal' on a 1960 650cc Triumph Pre-unit Motorcycle. I think Brother Steve had as much invested in that Bike as I did. We spent a lot of money for the privilege of walking and taking it home in the trunk of my car. Well Lynn gave that away when we broke up, nuff said.
Well I got the 1972 Pontiac and she got the mustang. The Pontiac started its post senility stage and with my great intelligence I tried to sell it as a “sporty” hot car.
Never for a moment did I think anyone would be crazy enough to buy that semi-assembled wonder, but in a moment of insanity I put it in the paper anyway. I had totally forgotten teen-age boys still existed and well, as you've guessed, one came by and took it, hook, line & sinker. Thank heavens for mothers with money and a breaking point!
After that I bought a 1974 Yamaha Tx500 motorcycle, probably to be remembered as the Edsall of motorcycles. You see it was designed for high speed, it's a shame it wasn't capable of any.
Then I got the Mustang from Lynn – she couldn't keep up the payments. So I defaulted on the loan for her. (Ford got to get it back in due course).
Now we're getting close to the present! (Finally!) I bought another Lincoln a 1969 2-door with all the goodies. (You'd think I would have learned by now).
Just think I had looked at a hand painted gold 1953 Studabaker (I should have said finger-painted).
Well I still own it and hope one day to find a well-educated consumer to give me an amount worth its pseudo-great shape. (I'll probably tell them it has buried treasure in a secret passage).
Well one more great deal. I sold the 1974 Yamaha to some kid with a summer job here at the complex. I didn't lose too much money on it. Of course just by getting rid of it was not losing. You see Brother Steve had one too (yes there is more than one born with my expertise). He listens to my advice (ha!) Well we actually sold his, but first took all the good parts off of his and sold what was left. I then bought a 1977 Yamaha SX750 (I'll never learn) and that is all to date 1981, 10 years of autos and bikes.
Only two footnotes. During the past 6 years, I'm not sure when I had two more events.
#1: Brother David who spent his entire life trying to remain an only child made a fatal error by asking my help in buying a car. Well I owed Tommy one for selling my Lincoln on his lot so I put David in a 1967 Cougar with 100,000 miles for twice what it was worth. (It seems Tommy owed one to the Cougar's owner). So I did David in, Tommy loves me again, and he's out of heat.
#2. I found a trail bike in Gaithersburg, a 120cc Kawasaki that didn't seem to belong to anyone. I acquired it. I did manage to put it in several gullies and trees before I sold it at a very good profit.
Well I'm sure this will continue unless I receive an education or a lobotomy or something else just as wonderful.
post note... I am sure the statute of limitations must be past... or I will swear all of this is a lie..... :)