Hemmings Classic Car January 2024

Here we are, 70 years since Ernest Hemmings first published a four-page pamphlet in Quincy, Illinois and mailed it to 100 fellow automotive enthusiasts. As the original, collector-car community, it has been our passion to grow with, and serve, this generations-old fellowship. It’s the daily interactions we have with you that remind us, “The Driver,” is the most important part of this industry. It’s why we do business the way we do – with transparency, friendliness, and a warm welcome for all who are interested. Our promise to you has never wavered. We remain steadfastly committed to uplifting and growing the collector car community, now more than ever. We will continue to share what we know, listen to what you’ve learned, and provide trusted services for buyers, sellers, and beyond…

“Known surviving Voyagers – as you’ll read – can be counted on a single hand as of this writing.” BACK IN THE summer of 2018, I purchased a station wagon and proudly posted it on my social media page. It was a roller in desperate need of a new home, devoid of an engine, transmission, and interior. Heck, it didn’t even come with windows or floorpans. That was hardly a concern to me, since it was a 1954 Buick Century Estate Wagon that wore the remains of factory green paint–even on the trim and bumpers. In the post, I joked that it “ran when parked.” In truth, the price was right (only $5), and the Tootsie Toy was small enough to carry around in my hand. Today, the shelf-worn Century…

YOU WOULDN’T THINK screwing together a primitive Model T gow job (“hot rod” from before the term was coined—let alone considered non-pejorative, see HCC #223, April 2023, for details [https://www.hemmings.com/stories/gow-jobs-revealed/]) like David Mazza’s wouldn’t be such an unusual thing. Yet he recently took an informal inventory of cars that exist at least on the internet and even encompassing ones that have been in a perpetual state of construction for a decade, unrestored survivors not yet revived from barn-find status, and those that only exist very quietly in quasi-private collections, there just aren’t many black-radiator Ford Model T’s that exist in a period-modified form. There are, however, a lot of 1920s and early ‘30s Ford castoffs that can be assembled into one. David’s project, slowly but determinedly coming together in a…

I GREW UP IN A working-class town near New Orleans, Louisiana. As an adolescent, I could count on one hand how many families I knew who could afford to buy their children a car. Mine wasn’t one of them; however, it didn’t quell my teenage fantasy of buying my own. A few months after I turned 16, I got a job at a fast-food restaurant earning minimum wage ($3.35 per hour). Eight months later, a high-school classmate said his parents were allowing him to sell the car that he drove to school: A two-tone 1973 Chevrolet Nova with faded gold paint and even more faded white paint on the roof. It had some minor rust issues, but it was all original, mechanically sound, and had 44,000 miles on the odometer.…

I TRULY ENJOYED THE ARTICLE “Behind the Barn Finds” by Scotty Lachenauer in the October issue. The photo on page 39 showing the Ford F-600 stock car hauler is my old truck that I drove on Long Island, and in Stephentown, New York, where Tim ultimately purchased it. He did not use the Ford in the late ’90s, as I still owned it then; Tim purchased it in 2007. Let me describe the Ford. The front bumper was from a Mack truck, the front axle came from a Ford F-800, and the engine was a 361-cu.in. Ford that was bored .030 over and had a 20/20 crankshaft. Behind the engine was a Clark five-speed transmission, and a two-speed rear axle. The clutch actuator rod was brazed together by me and…

Most enthusiasts understand the idea that some cars are easier to restore than others, but Dave Long is seemingly a glutton for punishment when it comes to the concept. Dave got a taste for unusual cars when he restored his 1975 AMC Pacer, but apparently that wasn’t a big enough challenge. Enter the 1958 Mercury Voyager two-door station wagon seen here, which emphasized the issues associated with oddball restorations–a distinct lack of reproduction parts, rarely seen NOS parts, and very little in the way of a parts-car pipeline. But before diving into how Dave got the project done, let’s explain how he acquired one of the rarest classic station wagons you’re apt to see. “I had plugged ‘unusual cars,’ or something to that effect, in a search engine one night…