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Brads Love of Cars
    My Love of Cars 
    This is my dad with one of  his many convertibles.  This one is a Mercury.  According to my mom, dad would get a new car every 3 years.  The new car was always a convertible, and usually an Oldsmobile.  The picture on the right is my mom.  She is with one of the Oldsmobile convertibles my dad owned.  The one pictured here met with a bad fate.  My dad never took the keys out of his car when the car was home.  One night the Oldsmobile disappeared from the drive way and was smashed (my parents weren't even aware it had left).  The police showed up in the morning to arrest my dad for smashing the car and abandoning it.  Well after talking to my mom and dad and confirming my dad's key habit with neighbors the police were able to surmise the car was taken on a joy ride and smashed.  The problems didn't end there though.  The car was totaled by the insurance, but a garage was able to convince the adjuster they could fix the car for less than the cost of a replacement.  Well they fixed the car but it "wandered" down the road, leaked water from several places during a rain and developed squeaks and moans.  My dad tried to trade the car in, but when dealers test drove the car they were able to figure out it had been in a large accident and not put back together correctly.  This was very bad for the trade in value of the car.  My dad happened across a Nash dealership (Lipman) that was now selling something called a Rambler.  This dealer was offering a good trade for the Olds.  My dad wasn't in love with the 59 Rambler (hey Rambler didn't even have a convertible) but bought it based on his trade allowance.  As time went on my dad grew to love that car.  It was the most dependable he ever owned and great on gas.  It had push buttons to start the car and choose reverse and forward gears.  He even convinced my grandfather (a real Ford man) that Rambler was the way to go!  My granddad ended up with a 62 Ambassador with all the options including air.  My grandfather loved the car also and ended up with Ramblers buying Ramblers and AMC products the rest of his life.
    If the push buttons were not pushed in the correct order on my dad's 59 the whole button assembly would fall to the floor making the car inoperative.  I believe this phenomenon was unique to my dads car.  He never bothered having it fixed and considered it to be a anti theft device allowing him to once again leave his keys in the ignition.  As a child I remember at least two times my dad loaned the car to a friend to use forgetting to inform them of the proper starting sequence.  The friends would show up at the door looking rather embarrassed with push buttons in hand.
    I remember going with my dad to have the 59 Rambler serviced at the dealership in 62 or 63.  It was about time for a new car and my dad was looking at a station wagon on the show room floor.  My dad was ready to buy it and went home to get my mom so she could check it out.  I thought this was great!!!!  All my friends parents had wagons.  Being the only child in the family my parents didn't really need a station wagon but I was very pleased things were heading that way.  Well my mom didn't like the wagon and that was the end of that.  In 65 Rambler introduced 3 convertibles.  My dad had his eye on the Rambler Classic 770 but somehow moved up to the Rambler Ambassador 990.  This car was pretty cool and even had spinner hub caps with the Rambler trademark in the middle.  It's pictured above left.  It came with white walls originally but they were replaced with the black walls.  This was my first experience with a convertible, and I loved it!!!!!   I was also becoming a fan of Rambler and American Motors, which I continued to be into the early 70's.  Click on the  to see my AMC page.  Well time went on and my dad passed away in 69.  My mom wanted a car with power steering and something a little smaller than the Ambassador.  I was really lobbying for a 70 Javelin. Well my mom wanted a convertible and the Javelin didn't come in convertible form.  We ended up with a 70 Cougar, pictured above on the right.  This was also a cool car and was the one that was around when I turned 16.  So this is the first car I ever drove legally. My dad once let me drive the Rambler to Friendly's with my friends aboard when I was about 10. This was not sitting on his lap but really driving with him next to me.  Talk about COOL!!!!!!!!
    My first car was a $300 66 Pontiac Lemans convertible with a GTO grill. I fixed it up the best I could with the funds I had available.  This meant a new roof, carpeting and brakes. The engine was sound.  Not bad for 300 bucks!  Well about a year latter I saw a 70 Cougar Eliminator with a 351 Cleveland sitting on a used car lot.  It was bright yellow with black stripes and $1200.  I sold the Pontiac for $600 added $300 I had saved and my mom kicked in the rest.  The Cougar was mine and I was in heaven!!!  This is when I discovered racing on the Berlin Turnpike.  It was the thing to do on weekends in the early 70's.  That is until my mom saw the Cougar on a special report on racing on TV.  Nope wasn't any other car around like that one!  Must be her sons.  Well my mom took her Cougar and my Cougar and traded them in on a couple of  74 Dodge Chargers, both with 318s and both very, very slow.   Mine was a base model, red and white, my moms a gold Charger SE with a white vinal roof in SE trim.
    My moms car is pictured above.  My Charger was really a lemon and I was able to talk mom into a Trans-Am Firebird in 75 (above right).  I also latter picked up a 69 Cougar convertible.  I had these two cars until I went to collage in Phoenix Arizona.  I drove the Cougar out to Phoenix and brought the T/A out at Christmas break.  I arrived in Phoenix in the fall and the lack of the cars air conditioning was not really a big deal.   I stayed for the summer semester to make up some credits and really had to do something about the heat.  I traded both cars and $1000 for a gold 78 T/A with air.  As it tuns out the car I bought was stolen and the police came looking for it (and took it) about a year latter.  Luckily I purchased the T/A  from a dealer. The dealer had to refund every cent of the purchase price on the stolen vehicle and provide a loaner till I found a new ride. Not bad free use of a car for a year!
    Well the replacement car was the above 78 T/A with T-Tops, air, velour interior and the T/A 400 for the same price that had just been refunded by the dealer.  The 78 T/A  had only 10,000 miles on it when I picked it up.  Well I brought the T/A back home to CT and held onto it till I traded it for an 84 BMW 318i.  Nice car,  nothing spectacular.  In 88  I ordered a Mustang Convertible 5.0 (above) with every option I could check off.  I got engaged to a woman with a Subura wagon.  Finally my wagon!!!  But that was not to be.  The car was rear ended and totaled in 1990 before we got married. My wife replaced the wagon with a 90 Toyota Camary.  I still have the Mustang 5.0 (40,000 original miles) along with my wife's Camary (now my winter car) and a 97 Ford Taurus Wagon.  Bliss!!  A Wagon and convertible, at last.
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