(first posted 3/12/2014) Wax on, wax off. Well, not quite. I had just finished compounding, cleaning and waxing my girlfriend’s Healey 3000 Mk III–something it had never been treated to in its brief three year history–when this picture was taken. Its British Racing Green livery was shining once again.
Here, we are seen behind the car during a spring picnic at the Brown County State Park in Indiana, not far from Bloomington where my honey was working her masters degree in opera, of all things. As opposed to Chicago, which may as well have been the North Pole, Bloomington started becoming livable far earlier in the spring.
I hate luggage racks
The Healey’s three-liter six was a fairly lazy unit. After I had cleaned the car up, I took it out on Horseman Camp Rd which ran past the park. There was a long, downhill straight stretch that led past Strahl Lake. There I was able to let the Healey stretch its legs in 4th gear overdrive, but the best I could do was 96 mph (155 kph). My time would have been better spent changing the points and plugs.
Carmen Playing her 12-string
But all good things must come to an end, I guess.
The Healey proved to be more show than go–not exactly high strung, but not a paragon of reliability either. Fun to drive in a horsey sort of way, but not as tossable as my friend’s Porsche Speedster, which at the time was just a $600 used car.
Voluptuary that she was, my GF, let’s call her Carmen, was also prone to cancelling trips due to bad karma, or some such BS, which was a term she used for an errant windshield wiper and a flat tire. I tried to convince her that her automotive problems were not due to bad karma but mechanical failure which was a finite phenomenon and therefore eminently fixable.
Then there was her desire to move our relationship from the physical to a more spiritual level. I thought, “Man, she must think I’m crazy,” and so I left. Toodleloo, Carmen baby.
Hmm three past girls and their cars: a ’70 Impala, a Granada of undetermined vintage, and a Tempo. At least I have fond memories of working on the Impala.
I clearly dated the wrong girls. 🙂 I got to drive GF cars like a Mustang II, a Pacer (with Navajo cloth interior) and a 78 Gutless humpback sedan. If there is such a thing as reincarnation, can I come back as Kevin Martin?
I admit to a bizarre crush on the lovely Natalie.
Since you mentioned the lovely Natalie…
Thanks! And…apologies to her, wherever she is today. 🙂
My wife had a Nissan 300ZX, red with black interior, when we met. To this day I still kid her about being attracted to her car 🙂 Actually we didn’t keep the Z very long after we got married. I had taken it to get new tires for the front and discovered that one of the front struts had a two inch bend in it. Carol had purchased the car new and it had never been in a wreck; we never could figure out how the strut got so bent. That revelation soured her on the car and it got traded off on a Thunderbird Turbo Coupe
Beth had a ’70s model Buick Century when we married… I changed the plugs and did a tuneup for her when we were dating, plus repaired some rust spots along the base of the rear window… A branch off a huge oak tree fell on the trunk not long after we married (it looked like the “bustle back” models that followed a decade later), so we sold it off. That I don’t have any photos of it handy tells you a lot about what I thought of it.
I think the Austin-Healey seemed to be the most robust of all the British sports cars, and there is a marvelously-restored, two-tone one near me that I see once in a while.
My girlfriend’s car was a 1970 Mustang convertible.The Mustang was sold in 1979. I kept the girl – she’s been my wife for over 36½ years!
You know what’s really funny? When I was in the air force, I owned my avatar – a 1964 Impala SS convertible. Long before I met her, at the same time, back in Missouri, she also owned a 1964 Impala convertible. Both cars were Goldwood Yellow w/black interior too! Hers was not an SS, however. My car’s top was black, hers was white.
You alls always forget that Sports Cars . especially British Sports Cars are not supposed to be overly fast ~ they’re _Sporty_ to drive and therein lies the fun .
Very different from to – days factory sporting Japanese cars that are also blindingly fast like my Sons’ Subaru WRX Station Wagon .
-Nate
Okay, I’m going to admit that I had to look up the meaning of “voluptuary.” Speaking of sensual delights, I really love the lines of that Healey. I agree with the author regarding that decorative luggage rack; on a car that pretty, it’s the automotive equivalent of a tramp stamp.
My friend had a 63 Healy. Nice in a British car kinda way. I remember him adding extra insulation. The big 6 generated so much heat, you got cooked on a warm day.
Let’s see, for me (the serious ones): Sally – Vega, was an absolute car hater. Heather – a series of beater buy-here, pay-here clunkers (she couldn’t afford to do better), Patti – BMW M3 sedan (automatic, dammit!), Maggie – riced-out Kia Spectra.
The there was the girlfriend (name forgotten) who taught me to autocross: Fiat 124 spyder, traded in on a Pacer with 3-speed manual. We didn’t last long after that.
“Fiat 124 spyder, traded in on a Pacer?”
I think I’m going to be sick….
Sick… From laughing! 😉
The first picture is fantastic. It looks like it could have been a magazine ad of the period.
Notice the coupe are running towards the rocks.
Same thing happen to BMC; it crashed on the rocks (labor strikes) and sank from sight (bankruptcy).
Very similar to a few of my past relationships😱😱😱😱
Your right! Perfect picture for late 60s early 70s
When I was in sub school a recently married guy tried to trade me his 3000 for my 66 beetle. He was upside down so the bank wouldn’t go along with it. Probably the best car trading break I ever got. The VW was a keeper and I think the 3000 would have become a money pit for a sailor with no place to work on his vehicles.
It sure was pretty. Carmen reminds me of a couple girls who were chasing sailors in New London or probably anywhere. The sixties produced some strange things. YMMV thats just my opinion.
Dude, your sending out some serious negative vibes. I’m going to have to put up a mirror to deflect your negative energy. This is totally cosmic. We are on a different astral plane. All we are is dust in the wind.
Carmen had memorized Linda Goodman’s “Sun Signs”. She was a strong believer in astral projection. That worked about as well as her Healey. What I used to do in the name of lust.
She looks like Joni Mitchell in that picture. Very nice.
Reminds me of camping and picnics in Brown County state park, while visiting a GF who was at UI. In my ’63 Corvair; Great memories…
“I tried to convince her that her automotive problems were not due to bad karma but mechanical failure which was a finite phenomenon and therefore eminently fixable.”
It may have been bad karma, or bad vibes; for she owned a British car. She knew mechanical failure was a sure and infinite phenomenon and therefore unfixable! 🙂
Beautiful picture of “Carmen” in black and white. Most everyone will snap a picture with no thought but it takes one with an artistic side inside them to go and shoot such lovely photos! I call this photo “Carmen playing “Lucas-Prince of Darkness Blues, Part IV”………
What a pretty car and I appreciate the nice shine on the hood. I remember those polishing compounding days as well. Wish they had clay bars back then.
Wow, that first picture…
That looks like a group that could be talked into… things.
My dad got one of these when I was 13 and he was going through a midlife crisis. He had always been a fan of British roadsters.The most surprising thing is when you sit in it.The seats are at the same height as the pedals so low you’re sitting with you knees bent at 180 degrees going straight to the pedals. It did have it’s electrical issues…wires that shook loose from the harness and electrical connectors so we’d be looking around for a connector missing a wire…then find it, push it back in and bang she starts.
I only drove it one time…wasn’t that impressed with it but I grew up in the 90s when fwd Japanese sport coupes ruled the day..
A masters in Opera? Far out man.
I didn’t even know such a thing existed, or what a person would do with it, but I’d think the natural automotive choice for “Carmen” would have been an Alfa Romeo or a Fiat. At least then when it left her stranded she could musically curse it in it’s native tongue.
The Jacobs School of Music at IU is heavy duty. My best friend at Dulles sent his younger daughter there, also for opera. A frequent topic of discussion was what the hell she was going to do with a degree in opera when she graduated, which she should have done by now. Maybe she got drafted by the teams in the POL (Pro Opera League).
Looks like fun times, even if they had to end. Pretty girl.
German Mercury Capri, OmniRizon hatch, early ’70s stripper Satellite sedan (yikes!) and an ’80 Mercury Zephyr – baby blue sedan for me. I’m still married to the Zephyr owner. The Zephyr died while we were dating, and I gave her what was left of my ’72 Grandville until she finished college. She was a trooper for putting up with that car – theft and accident damage and all.
Not sure if this counts but one of my 2 boyfriends from school had gender reassignment.When she was Robbie he drove a silver Mk 2 Cortina with peeling paint.
You’ve had an interesting life.
I wish!School,university,civil service( for the past 35 years)
Should have read 25 years civil servant,missed out bus driving/conducting
Hmmm….
When we started dating, Mrs. Jason was driving an ’85 Ford Escort that her dad bought new; it was not hearing aide beige nor even artificial limb beige. Her brothers dubbed it as being scrotum beige. I never wanted to know more.
This Escort had well over 200k miles on it when we started dating. The only drawback it had (other than an automatic transmission) was it used oil. And the coolant fan would run long after the engine was off. Never, and I mean never, try to pour a quart of oil into the crankcase of this vintage Escort while drunk and with the fan running. Just not wise.
After she got her first job, she bought a brand spanking new ’96 Escort. After we married and had Spawn, we sold it to her brother. It’s sitting in his front yard with a very low compression engine. It has around 260k miles on it.
My sister described the 80s UK Ford beige as frog’s belly
That is a much better descriptor!
My mother would have described it as Utilitarian Tan.
Another much better descriptor!
Some guys have all the luck. Past partners have had ho-hum vehicles like the Corolla, Camry, 4Runner, and Saturn, and I recently got married to a woman who at age 30 has never had a driver’s license and has no interest at all in cars, aside from liking Mercedes S-Classes and Land Cruisers. I have been considering surprising her with a W126 300SD, which I have wanted for myself for quite a while.
S class and Landcruisers is a good start. Congrats on your nuptials.
Kevin, your travails in pursuit of the female members of the species are full of mirth and merriment. That pic of Carmen strumming is straight out of Barney Hoskyns’ ‘Hotel California’. And Natalie looks like Linda Ronstadt circa same period. No more car stories from you, just female pics please.
Actually, that angle showing the AH from rear with leaves into the distance is one of the best pics I’ve seen on CC.
Barney Hoskyns. Wow! Blown away by that reference. Never heard of the guy.
Sorry to let you down, but Paul has some fairly strict guidelines for submittals, i.e., they generally have to feature cars, or some other form of self-propelled contrivance. Besides, I’ve just about run out of girlfriends. But you’ve got me thinking.
It’s a great book if the Laurel Canyon sound is your flavour. How about a CC version of the Pirelli calendar? I am loving your pics, girls or no girls.
One of the most gorgeous cars the Brits ever cranked out! I like the luggage rack…gives a little more utility and enhances the style of the car. Oh and I like tramp stamps on my ladies too, so there’s that!
I grew up in NYC and I don’t remember any of my ex’s owning a car. But I can comment on the Healey and the Fiat 124 Spider. My very first car was a 1969 Fiat 124 Spider purchased new. I remember cruising the Mass Turnpike at 90+ mph and feeling rock steady and relatively quiet. It was a fun car not powerful but fun nonetheless. In the mid nineties I bought a 1965 Healey 3000 MKIII from a co-worker whose wife wanted the car out of the garage so she could park her Suburban indoors. I have driven the Healey in many occassions over the years but it’s not as much fun as the 124 Spider. The Healey can barely keep up with freeway traffic, the top of the windshield it at my eye level so I have to duck or sit way up to see out.look When it comes to the looks department the Healey is a winner.
My mother bought a ’60 Healey 3000 in 1978. It was years deep in mud at the time, and shortly after my father finally got it running, with my mother leaning over the hood to admire the engine, the Healey backfired through one of the carbs and singed off her eyebrows, which never fully grew back.
For a few lean months in the winter of ’82-’83, the Healey was my family’s only operable vehicle, until some combination of profound rust and deep snow liberated the front suspension from the frame. It was towed away 4 years later by a buyer who, for reasons unknown, believed it restorable.
Ive never owned a Healey but have owned a couple of Austins and one Morris that used the same engine and even my 55 Westy could see 100mph on the speedo not a very comfortable ton but it could attain it the 61 Westy could cruise at 100 quite easily both those out weigh the roadster but quite a lot so not being able to get any speed out of one speaks more of the state of tune than anything else. The Morris Isis I had was so rusty that at 80mph the carpet inside started moving around and the front fenders would flap so pushing that POS too hard was inviting disaster.
Sigh…
I never had a real girlfriend in my teens or 20s. Still don’t. Lots of escort and massage parlor visits, but never been in love.
After reading some of you guys’ stories my life seems so empty now.
Sometimes it’s better to be alone.Never had many relationships that worked out long term,believe me there’s nothing worse than being in a bad relationship rather than being single.I still wish I could meet someone nice but at 56 I think I’ve left it too late
Some people were just not cut out for marriage. I’m 58 and never have been. But I have lots of memories (good and not so) of past relationships and hopefully still more to come. It’s not over until the Fat Lady sings!
Thanks to the interwebs, we car guys can chat about these things.
An ex-GF recently, suddenly passed away at the shockingly young age of 28.
Hadn’t seen her for 3 years. But once I heard the news, I cried about 5 minutes a day, for a month. That’s when I finally realized I’d been in love.
She drove an Escort wagon.
Licence plate, by pure chance, included “DNA.”
….. was a Biologist.
I’m wondering where in Colorado a “BA” license would have been registered in 1970. Boulder? Thanks for the retrospective, Kevin, wherever you are!
BA was a Denver County prefix back then. The letters had no relation to the county name.
My first serious girlfriend ended up buying a 77 Honda Civic on Vancouver Island and paid a premium because there was a dockworkers strike and few imports of any kind coming off the ships. Didn’t drive the Civic much as she ended our relationship a month later. She took the CIvic to Ontario almost a year later and I’m sure it rusted into nothing after a few years.
When I met the future Mrs.M she had already owned a 67 Volkswagen Beetle and after that a used Pinto. We were a couple in the summer of 1979 and she was driving a bright yellow four-door Pontiac Acadian. Cloth and vinyl interior, manual transmission with AM radio. Pretty car and sold a few months after we married before moving from central BC to Calgary, Alberta. She still misses that car to this day.
Just a few GFs in my history, Liz had a Chevette that old man Oldsmobile bought her (and he thought he was so smart), Jan had a Chevette of her own choice (she could have had a Firebird, and came to call her own car a “Shoveit”), Frances had a Camaro (6 cyl but a nice ride), Katherine did not drive but unwisely hitchhiked to get places, Lisa whose Comet was nicknamed “Vomit”, and Marge who had a Mercury with one of those Breezeway rear windows. When I met the future Mrs. Lee she did not drive or have a car. Our first ride was in my buddy’s 1975 Dodge Dart (he and I had switched cars for some reason I cannot recall), which was a drag racing car. Fire extinguisher, racing shifter, tons of gauges and knobs and switches all about, never mind the noise (that sweet exhaust tone coming from the 340 engine). I assured her it was not my vehicle, I had something much more sedate. COAL to come.
None of my early GFs owned cars – my first wouldn’t have been old enough to obtain a license yet (just as well since that gave us a reason to walk to school together, cuddled up close) – so I associate them with whatever car I drove at the time. Especially one who spent lots of quality time with me in my ’82 Pontiac J2000 LE, with which she is inextricably linked.
Many years later I had a long term relationship with a woman who once owned a red ’62 Stude GT Hawk, which unfortunately was sold long before we met. She spent a year rebuilding the engine with her brother, and had a few photos. That’s about the only interesting car anyone I ever dated owned, unless I’m forgetting something which is very possible.
Love of my life owned a late ’90s Corolla when I moved in with her. Oddly enough, I don’t have a strong recollection of her car. This remains the only GF i lived with and we didn’t go out much since we were already where we wanted to be and who we wanted to be with when we were home, and we lived in the crossroads of a very walkable city so we didn’t need to drive much.
Several of my past girlfriends were musicians of one sort or another (as am I), so while I don’t have many good car stories to relate, I do still have some recordings we made together or songs we wrote. Old car stories are probably less embarrassing….
Looks like a rather dreary day for a picnic in that first pic! Regardless, it’s a very atmospheric snapshot of a long-gone moment in time. It really does look like either a period magazine ad for Healeys, or perhaps a indie rock album cover of sorts.
My first true love was a lovely girl named Janine whom I met during my freshman year in college. She drove an early ’90s Dodge Shadow 4dr in one of those oh-so-’90s electric blue colors – not quite as whimsical as a British roadster, but eminently more practical. Although not exactly an exciting car, I recall it actually being surprisingly peppy and fun to drive – at least in comparison to the river barge Chrysler Newport I was driving at the time. Sadly my maturity level back then was about equal to that of a fruit fly, and the relationship ultimately withered, with us going our separate ways after a little more than a year of dating. She really was a sweetheart, and I still think of her anytime I see a Dodge Shadow on the road…which isn’t that often nowadays, considering their attrition rates. I’ll always have warm memories of our time together – imagining “what could have been” as I navigate my midlife…
I quite enjoyed Kevin Martin’s colourful contributions to CC. His writing style and excellent photography were most enjoyable. RIP Kevin.
My wife had a almost new Nissan 300Z when we met; we still joke about that being part of why I was attracted to her:-) Not true of course but she was the only woman I ever dated who was the least bit interested in cars. Perhaps we should publish a “Cars of a Marriage” article.
“I’m wondering where in Colorado a “BA” license would have been registered in 1970. Boulder? ”
That was Denver County. First letters A through D were Denver. All the “D” cars were rental cars, generally “DR” in fact. Boulder County seems to have started with an “M” and if I remember correctly they were “ML” and “MM”. Larimer County (Fort Collins area) often started with “L”. The small, mountain counties started with “Z”.
I still have Denver County plates “BF 783” from my black ’59 TR-3.