My dad told me an excellent and most uncharacteristic story about my grandfather while reminiscing about the ’65 Ford Fairlane featured in yesterday’s post.
I couldn’t fit it in yesterday so I’m giving it its own post today.
This is my dad, now, talking about how my grandfather broke in his new car:
He was stopped going up the Taconic Parkway on the way to Troy going 80 mph in a 55 mph zone when [the car] was brand new.
In a ploy VERY unusual for Drawing Boy, he talked his way out of a ticket by saying his owner’s manual said he should give it occasional “high-speed spurts” to break it in.
The officer let him go if he promised not to spurt any more in his area!
This sounds like the plot of “Hot Rod Lincoln” in reverse, except the papa didn’t have to call the son to throw his bail.
If any of you try the “spurt excuse,” let me know if it still works.
And while we’re at it, here’s the only picture I could find of the ’65 Fairlane. Not particularly good, I’m afraid.
My grandparents bought a 1966 Ford Galaxie 500 new and took it to Alaska for its shakedown cruise. It looks a lot like the Fairlane, and it’s still sitting in the machine shed back on the farm, and probably hasn’t been driven since the mid 80s. There was a time when my father talked about restoring it (the folks have a ’51 Chevrolet and belong to an antique car club), but it’s been years, and I don’t think he’ll do it now. And since I have no aptitude for that kind of thing, I won’t either.
Some car buff would probably pay handsomely for a chance at restoring that.
And Wisconsin to Alaska is a serious road trip — I imagine that took a long, long time.
My other grandparents had relatives in Detroit, whom I believe were eligible for an employee discount at GM. Every few years my grandparents would drive to Detroit from Connecticut and return with a new car, stopping in Rochester to see us on the way back.
That’s hilarious! The only thing close to that I’ve ever heard is that occasionally you should take a car out on very long road trips. Somehow, puny little trips to work and the store do bad things to your car. I don’t have any idea if this is true, but the person who told me said it with such confidence, I believed it.
80 in a 55 when it was brand new? Must have felt great!
I like to imagine my grandpa, a cautious and prudent sort, breaking into a big smile as the cop walked away from his car … thinking to himself, “I can’t believe I just got away with that.”