When I was a kid a friend's father bought a new 1958 Oldsmobile with the air ride control, which was quite the sensation. Pulling into his driveway, he would proudly stop and engage the whirring mechanism to raise the rear end so it didn't scrape. It was enormous, fancy and bedecked with huge amounts of chrome. The funny thing was that up until that point, he had been in the habit of buying a new Austin-Healey every two years (and his wife got a new Country Squire on about the same schedule), but that one was just too hard to resist.
Funny characters, always at the cutting edge. They also had the first remote control TV I'd ever seen, with a light gun that you could aim to rotate the tuner. The son, always a wheeler dealer, tried to sell me a headlight for my bicycle, stressing that it was the best light in the world, because "it says so right on the box!" That became a family joke for years to come.
My father had one in the new 1974 chevrolet Caprice convertible , used it for towing the boat and the camper. was vacuum operated, it used vacuum to run the air compressor . not sure if it was Delco one or an aftermarket one.
they had just bought a new 73 Caprice 4 door hardtop, and he learned every automaker had stopped making convertibles, and made some calls and bought the last new convertible in the southeast, a lime green 74 Caprice with every available option, power everything and the 454 engine.
When I was a kid a friend's father bought a new 1958 Oldsmobile with the air ride control, which was quite the sensation. Pulling into his driveway, he would proudly stop and engage the whirring mechanism to raise the rear end so it didn't scrape. It was enormous, fancy and bedecked with huge amounts of chrome. The funny thing was that up until that point, he had been in the habit of buying a new Austin-Healey every two years (and his wife got a new Country Squire on about the same schedule), but that one was just too hard to resist.
ReplyDeleteFunny characters, always at the cutting edge. They also had the first remote control TV I'd ever seen, with a light gun that you could aim to rotate the tuner. The son, always a wheeler dealer, tried to sell me a headlight for my bicycle, stressing that it was the best light in the world, because "it says so right on the box!" That became a family joke for years to come.
My father had one in the new 1974 chevrolet Caprice convertible , used it for towing the boat and the camper. was vacuum operated, it used vacuum to run the air compressor . not sure if it was Delco one or an aftermarket one.
ReplyDeletethey had just bought a new 73 Caprice 4 door hardtop, and he learned every automaker had stopped making convertibles, and made some calls and bought the last new convertible in the southeast, a lime green 74 Caprice with every available option, power everything and the 454 engine.