Hemmings Classic Car August 2024

“Other themes might raise an eyebrow. Detroit’s Diesel Disasters, Eastern Bloc Sensations of the Seventies, and Egregious Styling Exercises come to mind…” MONTHLY “theme issues,” designed to celebrate makes, models, or market segments of the vast vintage vehicle landscape, have been a staple of our family of Hemmings magazines for around two decades. A considerable amount of planning goes into each—whether we’re honoring Cadillacs, Chryslers, pickups, or pony cars—to provide a wide variety of the topic at hand. Some themes have been pillars of popularity in this title, such as Classic Fords, Classic Chevys, and Vintage Trucks. More recently, your Hemmings Classic Car team has scanned the hobby’s horizon and added exciting new themes to the glossy pages of this automotive buffet, including station wagons and America’s SUVs, as well…

A FREQUENT ASPECT of the vintage vehicle scene is completing the restoration of a cherished ride. It’s no small feat, especially when the end goal is to replicate–or surpass–the factory’s as-built presentation. It consumes time, patience, persistence, and money. Which means there’s a well-deserved element of pride when it comes to showing off the effort at events across the country. Owners often want to keep the restoration looking fresh as long as possible, while the desire to drive the vehicle tugs at heartstrings. In a perfect world, the solution to this preserve-versus-drive conundrum is to have two similar vintage steeds: One for show; one for go. A case study is this 1957 Ford Thunderbird, recently completed by Hill’s Automotive, of Racine, Ohio, for one of its clients. At first blush,…

GROWING UP in Pittsburgh, my twin brother Robert and I had an early attachment to and love for cars. Added to the mix was a certain work ethic, allowing us both to start our working life at 12 when we ran a 150-customer paper route that serviced a major apartment complex near our home. We quickly moved on and by 15 years old, we were working at a major supermarket chain after school. Our goal was to buy our own car at the age of 16, which was accomplished while juniors in high school when we bought a 1954 Mercury hardtop painted Seafoam Green. It was equipped with flared skirts and Oldsmobile spinner wheel covers on the front wheels. This would be the first of many exciting cars in my…

I HAD TO RESPOND to Jim Richardson’s article, “Thwarting Thieves.” In the spring of my freshman year (1970) at Oklahoma State, my 1968 two-door Malibu (with a 275-hp, 327-cu.in. V-8 and a Muncie four-speed) was stolen. It was found a couple of weeks later in a farmer’s field and had been backed into a tree to pop open the trunk. The Muncie transmission was missing, but the car was otherwise intact. After a couple of months in the body shop, I got the car back with a new transmission and a repaired differential (which had been damaged, too). Which brings me to creative methods to prevent theft. My spark plug wires were solid Delco Packard wires, not the resistor stuff, with typical boots on at each end. I obtained a short…

Introduced in 1939, the Mercury brand wasn’t on the road very long before civilian production was halted for the duration of World War II. A month after V-J Day—August 15, 1945—though, Ford merged Mercury with Lincoln to form a separate marketing division, with a distinct dealer network. Ford of Canada followed suit and even added a Mercury truck line that wasn’t offered in the United States. With Canada’s vastly lower population density, the move was a boon to that nation’s dealers and customers, as it spread Ford’s reach farther across the often-wide distances between towns, particularly in the sparsely populated Western region. In fact, that’s one of the reasons Mercury Trucks were introduced, as many rural communities didn’t, or couldn’t, support separate Ford and Mercury dealerships. For those with only…

“I think American Motors made a big mistake when they used the smaller Hudson 202-cubicinch six as the 1955 Wasp’s standard engine.” YOU HAVE TO PITY the poor 1955 Hudson. Overlooked or avoided when new, even today they’re disparaged by many otherwise diehard Hudson aficionados. This disdain is often reflected in their selling prices, which are generally much lower than those of the “real” 1950-1954 Hudsons. Some of this I can understand. My regard for American Motors’ 1958 Ambassador lineup is far less strong than my feelings for the lovely 1952-’57 Nash Ambassadors. The fact that the styling of the ’58 “Ambassador by Rambler” was originally intended for the same-year Hudson Hornet is an added irritation to Ambassador fans like me. I’m aware that the overall performance of the 1955…