1968 Chrysler Imperial, circa 1968
(note: click on the photos to enlarge them)A couple of days ago, my friend showed up to the bar wearing a Garage Monkey T-shirt.
He talked about his love for his truck and his corvette, both nice rides, and I began to recall my own fascination with cars, trucks and motorcycles. My own history is fairly flush with examples of that very American-style obsession with wheeled vehicles and so I thought I'd make a list. Since I was a kid I worked hard at making things that rolled, with Dad's help and with other kids in the 'hood, we tore apart lawnmowers, wheelbarrows, garden carts....anything with a rubber tire on it, to make something we could sit, stand or lay on and fly around faster than our feet would take us.
We made floats to enter in the local parade and they had to be mobile.
Man powered-Charlie is holding the sign, I'm behind the steering yoke.
My brother Tim used to let me sit in his lap when I was five or so and steer his VW Bus around town.
Later, he conscripted me to washing his Beetle, which I did not enjoy.
We built lots of weird things that rolled, using old lawnmowers and garden carts, things that were quite dangerous, falling apart on the inaugural trip down 'the steep hill'. I learned how to keep wheels on the metal rods (axles) by drilling them out with Dad's smallest metal bits and inserting cotter pins.
Go Cart underneath, If you look hard,you can see my face inside that bubble
Bent over nails held the axles to the 2x4 steering board and we often had to build 3 wheeled things because of the lack of materials. Those were the worst because you couldn't steer them. You just hung on and bailed out right before you collided with a rockery or a neighbor's Buick.
Yeah....it's an Airplane
I'm bent over here, trying to figure out how to put rubber on that rim
I graduated to motors by the time I was 11. This was my first ride,
A full-on go-cart that came originally with an 11 horse engine. It was radical and would routinely blow the Comet clutches to bits when you got on the gas. So we bumped down the horsepower to a 3.5 Briggs and Stratton and it ran fine...until the chain flew off....every day.
I used to ride this thing all over the neighborhood, sometimes being chased by cops, who would follow me home and then glare at me through the windshield before driving off.
I needed more speed, so I graduated to Motorcycles by the time I was 12 and Dad purchased a Honda Mini-Trail 50.
Dad test driving it...he wheelied and almost dumped it. No kidding!
It was fun, but too small for me. So I saved up my money and saw the bike below at the Kawasaki dealership in Burien in 1971.
It was the mechanics personal bike and he built the engine to produce an ungodly 33 hp, as registered on their shop dyno. It had Akront rims, Expansion Chamber and exhaust brake, A Baja tank..It really wound out and once you got it ‘on the pipe’ it would wheelie at 60 miles an hour. Dangerous…but amazingly fun.
Then when I burned the motor up I sold it and turned back to four wheeled conveyances for a while.
My first real car was this 1928 Ford Model A and Dad and I would work on it in the shop every night after dinner.
Dad paid $450 buck for it in this condition and we never really improved it much. Just put a Quail cap on the radiator and an Aaoogah horn on the fender. I drove the wheels off of this thing, rain, snow or shine.
I got a job as a janitor cleaning up the back shop at the White Center news, and eventually graduated to the positions of ‘copy runner’ and Circulation manager. I got to drive the company truck then and used it to get to my girlfriends house.
One day I jammed this truck into the back of 61 Cadillac and banged up my knee. While the truck was in the shop, my sister Carla helped me buy this, a 1965 Impala.
It had a three speed, Hurst shifter, 283 with glass packs and Corvette wheels.
Pretty nice for $550 bucks, and it had that chevy smell. You know what I mean.
I gave this one to my roomates in Alaska (long story) and when I came back to Seattle I bought one of these: 1965 Mustang Convertible. $750.
I saw this one at the golf course and had my photo taken with it because it's very close to what mine looked like, aside from the red interior. Mine was painted black. Sold for $750 too.
Keep in mind that I owned all of the vehicles above before I was 19 years old, but I wanted a nicer car and luckily, Mom did too. By my 20th birthday, she sold me her 1974 Mustang II for $3000 bucks. I had to get a loan from the bank but it was worth it. It had a great sound system in it and when you opened the rear hatch you could really blow out the jams.
I sold that car to my friend Doug in order to buy another motorcycle. It was summertime and it seemed like a good idea.
1973 Honda CB750
I flipped this bike on Highway 99, but was not injured and I sold it when the the weather got cold.
I bought this heap from a guy I met at a party.
But, $75 bucks was burning a hole in my wallet and I drove it home.
Later, I traded it for this heap;
1956 F250 Flatbed
Girls did not like riding it though so I sold the flatbed and bought this unit,
a 1963 GMC 3/4 pickup with a 235 6 cylinder and three on the tree. I promptly cut the top off (it was Summer again!) and drove it everywhere. (That's shag carpet on the door and my dog 'Bigdog' laying on the roof inside the bed. I began to have political opinions about this time too.
Summer ran out and I was in a band by this time. My friend John the Hippie (the flute player) sold me this, a 1963 VW Bus (I like the year 1963 for some reason)
The engine was blown so I hocked my Fender Rhodes piano to get the money to rebuild it. Did it myself in the garage using that famous book by John Muir.
It was fun too, but I tired of being the designated roadie (thanks John!) and when my brother Ken offered to sell me his 68 VW Bug, jumped on it.
I blew this one up on the freeway and sold the carcass off and bought this machine:
Yeah, it was summertime again and I had to have it. A Kawasaki 650 SR.
But I was making money by this time and was also able to afford this thing:
This was fun when if it was nice enough weather, and my bass guitar fit perfectly inside the roll bars in back!
My other brother, Mike, had this 1968 Volvo 122 for sale and he let me make payments on it.
The sad day that I traded it to Dale Harms for a Bass Guitar
I was about 24 by this time and was tiring of dating, I bought this truck and a few months later met my future wife.
Now I was set for winter but I still loved motorcycles, so here's a few that I owned throughout this period, 22 to 27 years old:
1982 Yamaha XT400, it was just a bike. Not that fun really.
Kawasaki LTD1000
My new wife understood my obsession with motors and wheels and endured a period when I really liked old cop cars:
I found this 1980 Dodge St. Regis for $800 bucks and had to have it. An Ex-State Patrol car, it had a 360 in it and would do close to 130 mph. (that's my brother's boat).
I started to tire of the cop car thing and moved on to this:
A 1982 F150 4x4 with Detroit Locker in the rear and a 12000 lb. winch on the front. Nice truck! That's my Shep Mix, Jetto posing in front.
This started a truck phase, and it even infected my wife when she decided she liked this thing:
She traded in her cute 86 Camaro for it, and it was fun with the dog, cruising the beach and mountains.
I needed a car with better mileage to haul my carpentry tools around, so I bought this:
1978 Volvo Wagon. Tranny went out after about 6 months. I had it repaired and sold it.
About this time, I went through a Ford Truck phase again, and when I saw an ad at Jet Chevrolet for a 1989 F250, I convinced the wife that my F150 was on it's last legs.
It had a problem right out of the dealership with injectors. Tom Turner fixed it for $800 bucks and I drove this to work for about a year. Then, for some reason I decided to sell it and buy this one:
Another 1989...this one was in nicer condition. Paid 10K for it. The wife drove this to work as her vehicle in the winter while I went out and bought this thing:
Vans offered the utility of lots of dry, secure storage and this one was really smooth and got good mileage with the inline 300 6 cyl. Auto. I sold it when I got a job offer at a Dot.com in seattle.
Wouldn't fit in the parking garage, so I bought this:
I bought it online, from OneGoodCar.Com, and they delivered it while I was at work, took our old 91 Exploder away in trade. This was not as nice a car as I was hoping and it had tinny-sounding motor and the doors and body panels were thin and cheap feeling. After I got laid off at the dot.com, I sold it for 12,000 and bought this:
Good old American Iron again....(actually, most of it was made in Canada, but what the hay, it was a great van. I outfitted it with tool racks and used it for carpentry until it started getting tired, then I upgraded a little to this:
But I still had a few other side rides, like this:
1994 Honda XR650L with aftermarket everything. What a fun bike...would go anywhere!
I also restored this:
Such a pretty bike, it deserves two photos. It was wickedly fast and I had to sell it before I killed myself.
I was getting too creaky in terms of keeping a bike upright, at least on the pavement, so I sold the Fazer and bought this, my first real sports car (sorry Mustang):
What a neat little car. 5 speed, T-Tops, I drove it around for two years, then traded it in for this:
The dogs guilted me into buying this SUV. It was nice, was quite fast, went like a goat in the snow, as usual, I put new wheels and tires on it to make it cool. But it started getting hinky in the tranmission after four years and I sold and bought this:
The timeline on these is a little convoluted, since she drove this truck to work for a while and we used it to tow our travel trailer. It was a beauty, and I had fun putting the fender flares and cattle guard on it. It got about 10 mpg, however so it was sold during a gas crunch to an Alaskan guy fresh off a fishing boat. He was happy.
I still needed to tow the trailer, but wanted more room to haul dogs, so I bought this:
a K&N airfilter and I think its got Borla exhaust. It's really loud, which I dislike, but it goes like stink.
Almost forgot to include this:
A 1976 F250 Factory Highboy. Jack gave me the truck in exchange for some tile work I did and I restored over three years. It now looks like this:
It's under the carport and I use it to haul wood and boats and stuff. I love it and have no plans to sell it.
SAR
