Seeing a Volvo 245, c1977, in this condition still on the streets usually means one of two things: you’re in Vermont, or you’re in the Pacific Northwest. Okay, or maybe you’re in Sweden. This Berkshire Green wagon was spotted a couple of years ago in Seattle, Washingtonby RealRidescontributor (and my eldest offspring) Katie. Looking through some old brochures, for the second time
Perhaps if they’d remained in the mainstream vehicle business, the manufacturers of this 1967 International Travelallmight be selling fleets of large, black 2020-model SUVs for the ferrying of government officials from photo op to photo op. Remember when all pols were chauffered around in luxury sedans? At some point somebody decided a mean-looking black Chevy Suburban (below) or something o
The brochure for the 1973 Chrysler Town & Countrypretty much said it all: “Chrysler makes only one station wagon. It’s enough.”If it wasn’t enough, perhaps a station wagon wasn’t what you really needed. Maybe you should have been shopping the Kenworth dealers. The T&C had enough floor space to load a 4’ x 8’ sheet of plywood… with the tailga
From the School of Go-Big-Or-Stay-Home Design comes this 1948 Buick Super Estate Wagon. Buick told us it was “For white-tie occasions or country living, the car that changes from playboy to workhorse.”The Super was one of two Estate Wagons offered that year. Just 2,018 of them were produced, compared to only 350 of the even larger, more expensive Roadmaster model. Saw this one last sum
Today we’re heading right back to Olcottand last years annual Olcott Beach Car Show, where we saw this 1965 Ford Falcontwice — once in the visitor’s parking area, and again as it was leaving. From the back this could have been a 1964 model, especially seeing that it’s wearing 1964 hubcaps. But the side trim and the grille are from a 1965. It’s also wearing a NYS deale
If you’re gonna get a photo of the back end of a 1959 Chevy Parkwood, I guess you’d call this the money shot. It was all about the fins back in the late 1950s, and the ’59 Chevy and ’59 Cadillac were just about as finny as they came. The Parkwood was one of four Chevy wagon nameplates for 1959. In ascending order, you had your choice of a Brookwood, Parkwood, Kingswood, or
We saw this Morris Minor 1000 Travellerlast year while visiting the Bermuda Transport Museum in Somerset Villagenear the Royal Naval Dockyard. The first Morris Minors were built in 1948; the Traveller was introduced for MY 1953; and the 1000 series debuted in 1956. This one is no older than a 1963 according to the wipers’ parallel position to each other, along with some other period-relevant
Back in the 1980s, when you could still buy a large American station wagon, they were still pretty much square boxes, like this 1988 Chevrolet Caprice Estate. This one’s wearing a dealer tag from Mernan Chevrolet. As most WNYers know, Mernan was located along one of the city’s car dealer rows — a.k.a. Bailey Avenue. This nicely preserved RealRidewas spotted over the weekend, just
The poverty hubcaps are deceiving on this 1964 Pontiac Parisienne Safari, making it (at a glance) look like it might be on of the lower-cost wagons (Laurentian or Strato Chief), but the trim — not to mention the Parisienne badge on the rear quarter panel — says otherwise. Pontiac Canada called the Parisienne Safari “the most luxurious load toter of them all.”They also menti
Wow. Seems hard to believe only four months ago we were on a cruise ship, going from NYC to Bermuda. How the times have changed! While docked in Somersetwe stopped in to the Bermuda Transport Museum(this is their Facebook link), where we snapped these photos of a c1983 Vauxhall Astra GL 1600 S Mk. 1. The “S” represents a higher tune version of the 1600cc engine. The Astra Mk 1 was prod