BackgroundSAAC Presents:
The First-Ever Summer Solstice
Vintage Ford Pinto Gathering in Colchester, CT, Wednesday
evening, June 21, 2006
(This page created 7/5/2006; latest
updates as of 7/20, 8/20/2006)
Quick Navigational Links for this page: Background | Overall Views | Some Selected Closeup Views | Selected Pinto Powerplant Images | A Very Special Related Internet Link
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Talk about memorable...there were no less than SEVEN Antique Ford Pintos mustered at the Colchester Cruise Night on what turned out to be none other than this year's Summer Solstice! The date was Wednesday, June 21, 2006, and the event was the once-a-month evening cruise organized by the Good Times Motoring Club of Colchester. The location was the Colchester Town Green, and the event literally FILLS the entire space!
The genesis of this special Pinto Gathering can be traced to our old-VW friends Greg Mattesen and Bill Silvestri having run into a two-Pinto couple, Bill and Connie from Glastonbury, with their tan '77 hot rod turbo Pinto Sedan and fancy two-tone (orange body with white top) '78 glass-hatch Pinto, respectively, at a cruise night in Glastonbury. When Greg circulated pictures of the Pintos, we realized that the Glastonbury Pinto couple were "regulars" at the FordPinto.com forums and what do you know, it was very easy to get in touch with them thru the internet!
Connie proposed the idea of a Pinto mini-gathering as part of the then-upcoming 6/21 Colchester Cruise. It looked good for our family's schedule, especially since our kids would be finishing up their school year the day before, and Diane's '73 Pinto Squire station wagon certainly was "itching" to get out for some exercise.
We next tried writing to the two Pinto guys from New London we had the good fortune to meet last year, Glen and George, to see if they might be able to make it-and hearing back from them a short time later, they were!--and would try to bring from two to four of their own fantastic Pintos!
Meanwhile, the Colchester gathering got "talked up" as much as possible at the FordPinto.com forums by Connie and other interested Pinto folks--I don't know how long FordPinto.com maintains it's forum threads (so this link may or may not be operable at the time you're reading this), but this is the URL for the forum thread "Calling All Connecticut Pintos" that Connie originated: http://www.fordpinto.com/smf/index.php?topic=4879.0 (it is interesting to note that not everyone who responded to that thread was able to show up in Colchester on June 21st, so we can only imagine what some future Gathering Connecticut Pintos might potentially encompass...). And then we also placed a prominent blurb on our own Connecticut Pinto Registry page - http://members.aol.com/cgearannex/CPR.html - to hopefully catch the attention of any other internet Pinto browsers.
And "The
Rest," as they say, "Is History!"
The weather that evening was absolutely perfect--sunny skies, low humidity, and not too hot. As we had to gather our troops and buzz out of the house relatively early so we could get to the Cruise at a reasonable time, we brought some money to spend at the nearby legendary "Harry's" Drive-In, which Greg Mattesen had recommended to us, and where we figured we could stop afterwards for a late dinner (which we did end up doing, and it was just as great "as advertised"--thanks for the heads up, Greg!).
Bill and Connie brought their two, we brought Diane's white with woodgrain '73 Squire, and Glen and George ended up having some friends help them, to successfully bring a total of FOUR of their Pintos, which included: a green '72 Runabout, a yellow with woodgrain '76 Runabout Squire with factory V6, a bright red custom '78 Cruising Wagon, and a light blue custom V8-powered '77 Sedan. In all, it was a great evening to meet all our fellow Pinto enthusiasts "in person," and also ogle all the beautiful Pintos--not to mention enjoying the fantastic overall event (where we ran into other old car friends like Jack Larson and rat-rodder Ian Targonsky), and also hand out Time Machines 2006 and Jazz Festival flyers.
Special Thanks go to early-arriver Glastonbury Bill for "staking out" the spot at the west side of the Green (and also asking his Mustang friend to temporarily move his car so we could get our '73 Squire over into the Pinto lineup), where all the other Pintos were able to eventually arrive and park together, to form the unique "visual spectacle" that is the basis for the "Overall Views" section of this page, and of course to the Good Times Motoring Club for organizing this fantastic gathering in the first place. And once again, Special Tips Of The Hat go to Glastonbury Connie for coming up with the idea of this special Pinto Gathering, and working so hard to promote it--with an accompanying Tip Of The Hat to FordPinto.com for providing the fantastic and far-reaching means of communicating with all our fellow Pinto Fanatics!
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BELOW: Once we managed to get all the Pintos parked together in a line, it made for quite a sight!
BELOW: The choices of "period" color and striping--not to mention Glen & George's fantastic job shoehorning the 302 Ford V8 into their '77 Sedan, were fantastic, and really made for a "factory-looking" ride in every way--Very Cool!
BELOW: The late afternoon sunlight coming from the west did a nice job of illuminating the Pintos, which were parked in a line along the western edge of the Colchester Green.
BELOW: And looking approximately south this time at the lineup of Pintos, that's Diane's original '73 Pinto Squire station wagon in the foreground. As you can also see, this Colchester Green cruise night is a very active, "happening" scene!
BELOW: The super-original '72 Sedan of Glen & George from New London provided a wonderful "reference" for how original Pintos were "in the early days," as their fine light metallic green specimen was in such pristine original condition. Glastonbury Bill's hot tan '77 Turbo-Pinto is just beyond it, repesenting the "outer limits" of stealth Pinto performance!
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BELOW: Glastonbury Connie's glass-hatch '78 surely was a hit with the spectators (the unknown spectator next to the car is not Connie)--the flashy orange & white color scheme, with color-keyed rally wheels & white-letter tires, all really stood out!
BELOW: "Team Pinto from New London" (Glen & George) brought out their super-rare yellow '76 Runabout Squire, with factory V6 power--awesome! It is interesting to note how the Runabout Squire trim (chrome) differed from the Squire wagon's trim (blonde woodgrain).
BELOW: I didn't realize I had a good overall picture of George Metcalf's (of "Team Pinto from New London") very fine '72 Runabout, until I went back and scanned my shots--I found that by cropping down one of them, I was able to get a very good view of the car. I am adding this image in honor and in memory of George, who we recently were very saddened to find out had passed away a short time after the Colchester Pintos Gathering. I've posted his published obituary and some comments from his daughter Maria on our News Highlights Page: http://members.aol.com/saacregion/NewsHighlightsPage.html (this section was added as of 8/20/2006)
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Selected Pinto Powerplant Images
BELOW: Might as well start with 4 cylinders and work up from there... Feast your eyes on Glen & George's red '78 Cruising Wagon's mildly customized and detailed-to-the-max 4-cylinder engine. Looks like this car has A/C as well.
BELOW: Glastonbury Bill's '77 Sedan is a real sleeper--witness what lurks under the hood--a Thunderbird Turbo Coupe engine, meticulously "massaged to fit" by the owner. Don't challenge this car on the roadways! Say, where's the battery?!
BELOW: Moving on up now to 6 cylinders--it's the beautiful factory V6 powerplant installation from Glen & George's '76 Runabout Squire!
BELOW: And finally, if you didn't know, you'd be hard-pressed to believe that this V8 engine in Glen & George's '77 Sedan wasn't a factory installation--very slick!
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A Very Special Related Internet Link...
Here is Noted Auto Historian Kit Foster's Related Pinto Feature that was posted July 13, 2006 - Kit has long been interested in Pintos, and when the June 2006 Colchester event happened, he got his materials together and published a most interesting historical perspective on the car--nice job Mr. Foster!: http://www.kitfoster.com/2006/07/midsummer-nights-dream.html (this link added 7/20/2006)
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