My Seventh Car - Just befor I left for Japan

This was my seventh car...1959 Buick Electra Four Door Hard Top...back when fins were in...hehe.
This was the biggest boat I ever owned...it was a great car though...the long wheel base made it ride like a dream but the faster you got the lighter the car got due to the wings up front and in the rear...one of the dangers of owning one of these. I only owned it for a few months. I found out I was going to be moved from Forbes Air Force Base in Kansas to Japan...had to sell it and get my affairs ready for a what they called "non specif amount of time" deployment to Japan..keep in mind what happened in 1967??...it was an event that made the world news...........I will tell you what the connection was to me going to Japan in my next post. Yall have a good day now ya heah....God Bless.

My Sixth Car and second one after high school

This is my 1963 Ford Fairlane I purchased after selling my '56. Right after I bought this car I was transferred from Turner Air Force Base in Georgia to Forbes Air Force Base in Topeka Kansas...yep I was on my way to see the world but the middle of Kansas was not exactly the world I had in mind...........at any rate I drove this car there without incident... enjoyed Topeka very much. My favorite hang out was a place called SASNAKS. That is Kansas spelled backward if you did not notice....learned to play pool there and became very good at it.............oh those were the good old days as they say, but have since learned that those days were just the tip of the iceberg....my seeing the world was about to begin........and man what a trip....any guesses on what happened next after Kansas??  Anyone?...yall have a good day now ya heah..God Bless 

My Fifth car and my First after High School

This is a photo of a 1956 Ford. Other than mine being solid white it is identical.

I purchased this car in Albany Georgia from the Ford dealership where my father worked. Can't remeber the exact price but $500.00 sticks in my mind for some reason. It was then 1966.

I had joined the Air Force six months before I graduated on what they called the delayed enlistment program at that time. You could join and did not have to actually enter the Air Force until you graduated high school.

So just two short days after graduation I was on a bus to Atlanta Georgia to be inducted into the Air Force.

After getting my physical I was given a date to report to Amarillo, Texas for basic training. It lasted only six weeks. Because of the Viet Nam War they were pushing people through pretty fast.

I joined the Air Force to see the world. So when I finished basic I was sent to Cheanute Air Force Base in Illinois for Jet Engine Tech School. Was there 21 weeks and received my first permanent base asignment. Of all placec they sent me right back to south Georgia.

Since my high school graduation my parents had moved to Albany Georgia, the same town I was assigned to. I reported to Turner Air Force Base in Albany Georgia and my parents lived less than a mile from the front gate. Well so much for seeing the world I thought. I lived off base in my parents house. Hmm, it was like going to work at a regular job every day and still living at home. I was not happy that I was not traveling the world. Little did I know what was in store for me the next couple of years. This was all took place in 1966.

I will give more details in my coming post. Yall have a good day now ...yeah heah...and God Bless

My Fourth and final car of my High School Years

This 1949 Plymouth Coupe was my fourth and final car of my High School Years. It was a flathead straight six with three speed on the column. A good dependable car. Had no problems with this car at all and it got me any where I wanted to go. It was not the coolest car anyone had but hey...I was not the coolest guy either so no problem.

I did not use this car for my senior prom though. I and my brother took his car. Now is was cool. It was a 1960 Skyliner Ford Convertible. The only draw back was that I had to take my dates brother along with us. Apparently her father either did not trust her daughter with me or was it he did not trust me. I will let you guess which way it was . Haha.

Just wanted to share this old car with you. Fond memories of it and one I used as passage to adult hood. Well at least I thought I was an adult back then. Really do not know what happened to it after I graduated and went off to the Air Force. I was too busy learning the facts of life at that time I guess.

Yall have a good day now...yah heah!! And God Bless you and God Bless America.

My Third Car

This is the third car I had during high school.  Yes third...the reason I had so many cars to drive while I was in high school was that my dad was a Ford mechanic and was always buying and selling cars for extra money. This old '58 was purchased from Wight Motor Company in Buena Vista Georgia where my dad worked.

This was a good durable car. The only problem it had was its driver. I was cruzin' around one day and had three buddies with me. Stopped at a stop sign and being the kewl guy I thought I was then I put the car in neutral, it was an automatic, raced the motor and slammed it into gear thinking I was going to do a burnout and have something to brag about. As soon as I slammed it into gear the car lurched about one foot, no tire spin...hmmm........

I let off of the gas and no matter what gear I put it in the car would not move. Naturally I had to get a ride to where my dad was and when he got off of work that day we pulled it home...about 10 miles.

He said "Well son you broke it now fix it....uh oh....now what was I going to do. I knew something about cars but nothing about automatic trannys...I jacked it up and started to take the tranny out. As soon as I took the dust cover off the flywheel I discovered what I had done.

The tires got so much grip that as soon as I put all that torque on the flywheel it broke it right around the bolts pattern. I was lucky that I did not damage the tranny. But I did have to take the bolts out of the tranny and slide it back in order to remove and replace the flywheel. And by the way, it was in the middle of the summer in south Georgia and I was laying on my back under the car in the good old Georgia sand sweating my butt off.

Anyway I got it done and needless to say as soon as I did my dad sold it..now what was I going to do for a ride.

That will be answered in my next blog....Yall have a good day now...yah heah

My second car - 1957 Vauxhall

This is a photo of the second car I ever owned. I called it "The Green Grunt." Why I came up with that name escapes me at the moment but it was a cool car back in its day. My father picked it up somewhere in Columbus Georgia. He was a Ford mechanic forever and was always picking up cars that had a different flavor. It being a car from England it was probably pretty cheap back then. I was 16 years old when he purchased it. It was four doors, four cylinder, two one barrell carbs and four speed on the column but was a left hand drive made for the U.S.

It took a very tough car to stay under me back in those days. I took it to the lake one summer Sunday afternoon that was about 50 miles from home and the bolts in the radiator worked loose and the radiator got into the fan blade and you can imagine what damage that did. It ran hot and I stopped and look under the hood and discovered that the radiator was beyond any simple on the road repair. Since the bolts had came out and were lost I simply took the radiator out and threw it in the trunk. Then I proceeded the drive it home. Yes folks, the whole 50 miles. It stayed together until I got it home but as soon as I switched it off the engine locked up immediately as you can imagine.

My dad was not a happy camper to say the least but he did say that at least I made it home safely.

To correct the problem we had to take the engine apart. We wound up having to drive the pistons out with a huge hammer and big round bar. Luckily the engine was equipped with piston sleeves. We mic'd the bore and did some research. The sleeves and pistons were the same size as a four cylinder Ford 8N tractor. What luck. We put it back together and it ran even stronger than before.

What a great car and was diffent than anything that any of my friends had. I think of it a lot today and you never here anything about  these much at all anymore.

Tons of fun. Yall have a good day now---yah heah...