Brochure copywriters told us that “If the average motorist were asked to name the one most luxurious and distinguished motor car in the world, the odds are that he would think first of the Cadillac Seventy-Five.”Well, I think that might depend on where Mr. Average Motorist called home. And it’s pretty presumptuous (these days) to assume that the average motorist is a “he.&r
We came across this 1948 Packard Super Eightconvertible back in 1976 at the AACA Car Show at the Main-Transit Fire Hall in Williamsville. In their advertising, Packard called it “The convertible of convertibles… a dream car come true!”Its features included a Prest-O-justmentfront seat… sleek new RoboTop… power window controls for front and rear side windows…
Some people have blue moods, but the day we photographed this 1957 Oldsmobile Ninety-Eight Holiday Coupéwe were feeling rather sepia. Lol... Actually, this is another digitalconversion from a slidetaken at a 1976 car show at the Main-Transit Fire Hall in Williamsville. (Turns out, from looking recently at another slide, this may have been an Antique Car Club of America event.) This one didn
Some car wags insist the personal luxury coupe genre was instigated with the advent of Buick’s Riviera for MY 1963. Others point to the all-new Pontiac Grand Prix of 1969. Somehow they seem to forget Dearborn’s mid-century decade-closing lineup — from whence this 1960 Ford Thunderbirdsprung. The ’58 model was the first of the “square Birds” which featured all-ne
When we ran into the owner of this 1979 Chrysler Cordobalast July at the Clutch Artists Summeramain Williamsville, he told us he’s had the car since it was new. (If you’re reading this too early in the day to be bothered with doing the math, that’s 40 years!)In their promotional literature, Chrysler called it “The personal car with the luxury touch.”From our experienc
Lookee here, it’s another transparency conversion from the summer of 1976 car show at the Williamsville Fire Hall on Main near Transit in Williamsville. This one’s a 1957 Mercury Turnpike Cruiser, which Merc called the “Most distinguished of the 1957 Mercurys.”It certainly was eye-catching, with its retractable “Breezeway” rear windscreen, crazy concave rear qua
What to do back in the day when all of your friends were driving Triumphs and MGs? The 1972 Lotus Elan Sprintdefinitely cost more (with an MSRP of over six grand while a new MGB could be had for around $2,700), but it was much rarer, with only about 1,353 being built from 1970-73. Some years ago, the editors of the late Sports Car Internationalmagazine named the Elan number six on its list of top
Let me explain this 1958 Edsel Pacerconvertible photograph. It was taken back in the late 1970s, as a slide. I came across it last year while going through the archives (also known as cleaning up some stuff that’d been lying around untouched for decades). Wanting to digitize these slides, I bought… ta-da! — a slide digitizer! Unfortunately, it totally reverses the color spectrum
The brochure told us this 1964 Cadillacwas a member of “The Youthful Sixty-TwoSeries.”I’m not sure what made the Sixty-Two more youthful than say, “The Brilliant DeVille Series,”or “The Impeccable Fleetwood Series,”but hey, what do I know? We’re only guessing that this coupe, seen last summer at the WNY Cadillac & LaSalle owners club show at Keys
Spotted this nifty 1959 Land Roverover the summer at Euro Car Dayat The Angry Buffalo/Rose Garden Restaurant in Williamsville, sponsored by the British Car Club of WNY. Well, at least the registration sticker says it’s a 1959, but the car’s styling would seem to suggest something newer, especially at the front end with the fender-mounted headlights (all 1959 L-Rs I could find had the h