Saturday, December 28, 2019
the live action new version of the Lady and the Tramp is vintage 1920ish vehicle fun
the animated classic is better than this live action, but that isn't the same as saying this isn't enjoyable to watch
though forced into obsolescence by the Boeing 707, the Constellation imprinted so much on the 40s ad 50s Americana, one was restored in Maine, then moved to NYC to serve as a retro cocktail lounge for the TWA Hotel at the JFK Airport (formerly known as the TWA Flight Center Terminal
https://untappedcities.com/2019/03/23/a-vintage-twa-plane-is-in-times-square-en-route-to-become-cocktail-lounge-at-new-twa-hotel/
After its brief time with TWA, the Connie went on to be a bush plane in Alaska, was used by South American drug traffickers, then was sold for parts, but sat for the past 35 years at Maine’s Auburn Lewiston Airport
the former terminal avoided not only demolition but a scheme to lift the entire structure on to a boat bound for Helsinki.
https://www.sanspotter.com/2019/10/twa-hotel-review/
until the 60s, airplane travel was so exotic and rarified that Frank Sinatra recorded an entire album about the experience (Come Fly with Me), and TWA had the coolest advertising billboards with two-fifths scale model with a working propeller Constellations on top
sometimes it was a cool business district billboard, and one example was 8 stories high in Times Square
https://www.considerable.com/entertainment/retronaut/retro-twa-posters/
https://urbancentury.tumblr.com/page/26
Friday, December 27, 2019
pretty cool photograph, lucky composition and sunrise combine for a cool effect
a Monte, a Gran Prix, and a 73 Camaro?
Halsted Street, Chicago. 1978. Photo by Wayne Sorce.
https://urbancentury.tumblr.com/page/3
the camera was already set up in the right place, and damned if the pile up on the highway didn't cause a loaded semi to swerve toward the camera to avoid crashing into the parked cars and trucks, and lay over because of the ditch along Highway 84 in Lubbock County, Texas
Driving too damn fast for the fog limited visibility, reported to be as low as 40 feet.
So, the red Chevy truck was moving too damn slow to get out of the way and out of the fast lane, and the semi was moving too fast to avoid hitting everything on the road no matter what lane it was in...
but that red Chevy was blocking both lanes when it went to pull into the slow lane, directly in front of the semi that legally must drive in the slow lane.
Lincoln sure got their money's worth from Matthew McConaughey as their commercial spokesman
I bet this is the first tv commercial that has ice fishing with a tip up.
I did that as a kid, and I guess Lincoln either read my bio, or they got lucky to email the only car website guy that has ever went ice fishing with a tip up.
The only line I think I heard in this commercial was "Beats jigging in a shanty"
Yes, you sure got that right. Hanging out in a heated Lincoln SUV commercial beats the hell out of sitting in a shanty jigging with a short fishing pole (you might not understand, but if you've seen Grumpy Old Men, you'll recall the short fishing poles, because long ones would just hit the roof ever time you pulled back to reel in.)
Whistling the Andy Griffith Theme Song at the end is a nice touch, I believe it's been regarded as the national fisherman's song for decades. It's currently the subject of a licensing lawsuit. CBS never had it legally for dvds, and yet, isn't paying the trust funds of the grand kids of the two men who created that music and copyrighted it in 1960... for the sales of dvds with that music. https://deadline.com/2019/05/andy-griffith-show-theme-song-cbs-lawsuit-1202622146/
I find it hard to believe that 59 years after the copyright, the money to be made from the tune anyone who wishes to whistle it already knows, is enough to cover the costs of a federal lawsuit.
And why the hell does he take off his gloves... and thinks he can warm his hands better hith warm breath than a heating vent only an arms length away?
Can you name the actor that has done truck commercials for Ford, Chevy, and Dodge? Plus he auditioned for Toyota
Walter Goggins, prominent in the end of the commercial, was also the antogonist in Justified, where Sam Elliot was in 12 episodes
Since his Dodge Ram Trucks ads are more recent, they are easy to find on You Tube.
But his truck commercials for Ford and Chevy (both in 1998,99) were much longer ago, and this is the only one I can find of either.
he has also made a commercial for Union Pacific Railroad.
and he did a pilot for a tv show Evel Knievel
He even auditioned for a Toyota Truck commercial, way way back, https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1079-armchair-expert-with-dax-28955120/episode/sam-elliott-53336851/ minute 26:56
Things you might not know, but learned while making this post?
Sam Elliott worked in construction while studying acting
he was a main character for the last season of Mission Impossible, and did 6 years in the Ca Air Natl guard, the 146th, with Kurt Russell, who he starred in Tombstone with. In the California Air National Guard's 146th Airlift Wing (the Hollywood Guard) at Van Nuys Airport before the unit moved to Channel Islands Air National Guard Station and became the 163rd
And was on the cover of Playgirl Oct 1979
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000385/otherworks?ref_=nm_pdt_wrk_sm
I didn't realize so many brides liked having a 60 musclecar in their wedding day photos!
after nearly 10 years the VH1 / Peter Max Corvette collection is getting sold off individually to everyone who isn't a resident of Oregon. That state has specific laws about investors selling cars via raffle
The more recent owners, the Heller and Spindler families, bought the cars from the artist Peter Max, The cars languished in a Midtown garage, until the building was sold and the cars had to be moved.
That was when Mr. Heller encountered Mr. Max. “I was the garage broker who moved the cars to the Flatiron district for Peter,” Mr. Heller said, and then moved them again several years later, when the cars had to be moved out of that garage. They went first to Brooklyn and later to Upper Manhattan. They have since moved yet again, to the Lower East Side.
Real estate investors, including Chris Mazzilli - a comedy club co-owner and Corvette concours judge who also owns a restoration shop on Long Island, is overseeing these Corvettes’ final dispersing
The ravages of time have been especially unkind to the oldest Corvette in the collection. “The ’53 was a basket case,” Mazzilli told Robb Report recently at the LA Auto Show. “We have 4,000 hours in this car.”
One chance to win one of the Corvettes — costs $3. There are discounts for larger purchases: five tickets are $10, 20 tickets go for $25 and so on, up to 7,200 tickets for $5,000, according to the schedule on the Corvette Heroes’ website.
The 36 winners will be chosen at random, said Scott Heller, one of the owners. Another drawing will decide which winner gets which Corvette.
No doubt that will max out the amount of money the current owners can squeeze out of their investment.
Between the moving and storing all the cars, some restoring of all 36 of the Corvettes has occurred.
You may have already had a look at the ’53, ’56, ‘57, ’66, ’67 and ’69 on a tv series on HISTORY Channel, or at the LA Auto Show where KTLA shared how the Corvettes were “rescued” after being housed in New York City parking garages for nearly 25 years.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/23/business/peter-max-corvettes-contest.html
https://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2010/03/had-you-heard-about-peter-max.html
https://robbreport.com/motors/cars/a-long-lost-collection-of-rare-corvettes-will-soon-be-sold-off-for-charity-2887548/
https://www.corvetteheroes.com/
Thursday, December 26, 2019
Mighty big xmas gift! San Benito, Guatemala received a 1990 Mack Pumper fire engine from San Juan Bautista, San Benito County. It was loaded onto a U.S. Air Force cargo plane at Travis Air Base on Dec. 11.
“They rely on a volunteer fire department to serve 54,000 citizens and do not have a fire engine,” San Juan Bautista City Manager Don Reynolds said.
The firetruck has an automatic transmission, seats four firefighters and has a pumping rate of 1,500 gallons per minute. It was donated by San Jose to San Juan Bautista in 2011, replacing a 1980s-era engine.
While in storage, the truck became no longer able to meet California emissions standards, and so unable to be purchased by a California buyer, making it a perfect donor to non-emissions countries.
https://benitolink.com/san-juan-bautista-donates-obsolete-fire-engine
Mopar once had two in-house drag racing teams
Two clubs of car enthusiasts, one focused primarily on Dodge and the other on the sister Plymouth brand, raced both each other and the national scene in drag racing.
The Golden Commandos club was conceived in 1962 by a small group of technicians, mechanics and engineers from Chrysler Corporation Central Engineering Department.
Locally known as “Detroit’s own Golden Commandos”, the team continually set the bar at the race track. They developed and evaluated new technologies; sharing this technology with other factory teams
Maybe now the SRT people are something similar, but I bet they aren't drag racing quite as often, not even with the Demon
https://www.hotrod.com/articles/ramchargers-vs-golden-commandos-back-story-revealed/
drag raced for only 325 miles before it was obsolete, that's how fast drag racing was progressing in the mid 60s
the Dodge factory drag race program had the D/Dart program and the RamChargers, and Plymouth didn't get any benefit from that, but, the Golden Commandos were professional drag racing factory engineers, and they made this 273 cu in acid dipped trick Barracuda for F/Stock, 12.50 to 13.99 class.
The Goldfish broke the AHRA F stock record the first time it ran
The Golden Commandos club was conceived in 1962 by a small group of technicians, mechanics and engineers from Chrysler Corporation Central Engineering Department.
Locally known as “Detroit’s own Golden Commandos”, the team continually set the bar at the race track. They developed and evaluated new technologies; sharing this technology with other factory teams
In 1965 the Golden Commandos fielded their wildest ride yet and in doing so they changed the landscape of drag racing forever. The altered wheelbase cars became known as those “funny looking Mopars” or “Funny Cars” as we know them today.
http://carguychronicles.com/2015/04/york-us30-reunion-musclecar-madness/
https://www.allpar.com/racing/golden-commandos.html
https://www.allpar.com/racing/nhra/goldfish.html
