When Tom emailed recently proposing Mopar week, I thought it was a terrific idea. But then worry struck as I thought I may not have much to contribute.
I tend to forget how Mopar rich it is around here.
Since it is summer in the Northern Hemisphere, I have a lot of field work this time of year. It’s a good thing I carry the camera as I would have never captured this ’69 Fury – or any of these others. The tarp sure makes it look like one of the 5,708 convertible Fury’s built that year in the Fury III and Sport Fury trim levels.
www.imcdb.org
For some reason, the theme song from The Brady Bunch went through my head; if one can defragment a computer to purge the garbage, why can’t one defragment their brain?
The Fury does have a good playmate, but this isn’t Mercury week.
In front of the garage was this Plymouth. The decal on the trunk lid sure looks like it says “Road Runner”.
www.imcdb.org
This Road Runner had a sibling on TV, also.
Being pretty tickled about seeing the Fury and Road Runner, about four miles down the road this was peeking out from the trees.
Let’s get those trees out of the way. A shape like this needs to be seen.
What joy! Not only was it a fuselage body Chrysler, it was a two-door! And it appeared to be a Newport.
Getting a better look, a smile suddenly spread across my face. A 1971 Newport wanted to see me; are the automotive gods saying these are my automotive soul mate? We have full CC’s on a 1968 Newport (here) and a 1981 Newport (here).
Continuing on, thinking my cup of good fortune was running over, more Mopar goodness was awaiting me – and in black, my favorite automotive color! This ’49 Plymouth sure looks like it’s raring to go – whether it runs or not. This has to be the car K.T. Keller had in mind when he said Chrysler didn’t make cars to pee over.
Imagine my delight when a second black Mopar was eagerly anticipating my arrival. A base model 1960 Chrysler Windsor (pre-Newport), it was not leaning so much as sitting on a hill.
This old Chrysler looks a little rough around the edges, but still appears ready for action. Despite it sporting wire wheel covers from an ’80’s era Fifth Avenue, this chariot still looks sweet. This was the most popular Chrysler model by far in 1961 with just over 25,000 being built. I wonder how many are left?
The last car to jump in front of my camera was somewhat captive – I found it at a Chrysler dealer. The front row of the dealer is literally about 10′ from the edge line of the highway!
This Cranbrook was the top trim level for model year 1951 and 1952. With a dash of patina in progress (Junior Patina?) on the hood, it was nearly the same height as the Dodge Durango parked next to it.
It looks great inside and out. It even has a favorite – a three speed on the column.
It certainly looks like I had no need to fret as I found all of these on the same day. All these old Chrysler products were just waiting for their moment in the sun!
Hey great finds I’m not seeing as many Mopars as I cruise about in my concrete mixer but a Valiant wagon and Regis Fury saw my camera yesterday I do know where a dead 60/61 Dodge pioneer like I had hides but I havent been down that street recently, today might be that day.
So is the Cranbrook for sale? Didn’t see it on their web site…
I don’t think so. It makes an occasional appearance, so I’m guessing it’s a prop as much as anything.
Wow, great finds!
In an odd “reverse CC effect” kind of way, a “Facebook friend” posted that same picture of Daisy reaching into her Road Runner onto their feed just yesterday.
Im diggin’ that ’60 and Im not normally a fan of those cars. Bitchin’ black quadraport.
Here in the northern neck/middle peninsula of Virginia, there are hundreds of Mopars (and other makes of course) sitting in the woods and fields, mostly victims of the “ahmagunnarestoreitsuhmday” syndrome. Name the bodystyle and I can tell you where one is, including Wing cars, Max Wedges, Letter cars and Hemis. Shame since most will just be left to return to the earth or later crushed by living relatives who dont know or care what they are.
1967 GREEN COUGARRR!!!!!!!!!
Oh darn..wrong week.
Glad to see another 67/68 Cougar fan
I’d love to know what that fender badge reads on that Cougar…
That black 60 looks just like one I barely remember as a kid. It was owned by my mother’s Aunt and Uncle, who were dairy farmers in Minnesota. Aunt Clara was a Chrysler girl. After the black 60, I remember a white 63, and a green 68. Mom’s uncle thought it decadent when she picked out the 63 with power steering, which may have been standard by then.
I will also go on record that the 69 Plymouth Fury may be the best looking of all the fuselage cars (sorry, Cap’n). I would also not kick that green Cranbrook out of my garage.
Power steering and power brakes were still options on the Newport and 300 through at least 1966; only the New Yorker came with them as standard equipment. My Grandad tried to order his ’66 Chrysler with neither p/s nor p/b, but the dealer actually refused to let him. He chose to get power steering.
That green colour of the Fury was very popular,I often see late 60,s big Mopars the same shade at shows
Seeing that Cougar makes me sad. I have a ’68 XR7 sitting in storage right now, ready to be either crushed or donated if it doesn’t sell soon.
In the 23 years I’ve owned it, being the dutiful only son of aging parents pretty much ruined any chance I ever had of fully and properly restoring it. When I was a struggling twentysomething living at home to make ends meet, my folks were taskmasters. On the weekends when I wasn’t working or going to school, their endless stream of home and gardening projects kept me busy. Wether it was my dad with his passion for gardening and his mail-order shopping addiction, my mom’s desire for keeping up appearances, or both of their desire to impress their bourgeois friends, I got caught in the middle. My folks are good people, but the fact that I had my own life and my own interests didn’t seem to register with them at the time. I wish I knew what they were thinking back then.
I’m now 43, living on my own for eons now, but that one thing hasn’t changed. Now that they’re older they depend on me now more than ever, while my projects gather dust in the garage or in storage. My derelict Cougar is a symbol of that.
I love my folks a lot and I’m glad they’re both still around, but over the past 20 years they’ve royally screwed every car project I’ve ever had due to their expectations of me when I was younger, and their reliance on me now. Every time I see a nice vintage car on the road, especially an old Cougar, I get VERY angry at both them and at the overall situation sometimes, and haunted by thoughts of What Could Have Been.
Man, that’s sad. At least you are taking the high road & filling your parents’ needs. When I was young, my father bought a running but terminally rusted red ’67 Cougar, red, black bench seat, 3-speed manual. When he was told the shock towers were collapsing, he then bought a rusted out forest green ’67 Cougar XR7 GT. “Oh, this will be your car someday.”
Both sat in the back yard & were dangled out in front of me….waiting to be disposed of the second I got a “C” on a report card or committed some other minor infraction. They soon disappeared: a ’67 GTO arrived and departed in the same fashion.
Seeing certain cars like this trigger recurring unpleasant memories & bitterness also. Sometimes I wonder if that has anything to do with the excessive amount of vehicles I’ve hoarded over the years.
I wish there was a way to save your car. Surely some enthusiast would be interested in saving it.
The Cougar saga wouldn’t be the first time my folks flushed my automotive dreams down the toilet.
1. My folks were about to pass down their clean, straight, rust-free ’74 Monte Carlo Landau, with 4-barrel 350, F41 suspension, and cloth seats down to me when a minor engine fire caused by a loose carburetor, installed by an incompetent mechanic, changed all that. The damage to the car was confined to the engine compartment. I could have fixed it, but my dad was so disgusted he didn’t want to look at the anymore. I pleaded with him to let me buy it off the insurance company, but he flatly refused.
2. My grandfather was going to GIVE me his straight ’63 Nova 4-door, before suddenly and mysteriously changing his mind and selling it to the owner of the shop that screwed up our Monte Carlo!!! Turns out they were old buddies. I suspect my mom had something to do with that, since she always hated that car for some reason, even when my gramps first bought it from my aunt.
3. When my gramps passed away several years later, I expressed interest in buying his clean 1972 Caprice Classic 4-door from my grandma, both for sentimental reasons and the fact that it was a nice car. My dad said “we’ll see”. He then helped my grandma sell it to some lady in the neighborhood without telling me, and before I could make my grams an offer.
4. Our neighbor across the street had a slightly rough ’73 Nova hatchback with a 350 and I asked him about it one day. The car needed work, but was still a much better car than my dad’s hand-me-down ’78 Granada I was driving at the time. When my neighbor mentioned it to my dad, my dad promptly vetoed any future deal. He wouldn’t tell the neighbor any specifics- only that “we don’t want it here”.
Keep in mind that I was over 21 and therefore a full legal adult when all these incidents happened, but my folks still wanted to make my decisions and do my thinking for me.
If your father is 80 years old, drives a red Corvette and still chases multiple women, we’re brothers.
LOL nah. My dad is 84, drives a white 4-cylinder Camry, and only has eyes for my mom, even after 48 years of marriage.
You did have some really maddening car situations there. I was sort of the opposite, bringing home all sorts of cars that my mother really didn’t like very well and working on them in her driveway all the time.
I guess we are all works in progress. The best we can do is take the good stuff from our parents and recognize the bad stuff in an attempt to do better with our own kids. I hope everything goes well with your family.
I appreciate you guys sharing these unfortunate stories, if only to give us all some perspective. As a son and a dad, I wonder every day if I’m doing right by my parents and kids, not to mention my wife.
I think exercising the right amount of control on a child is critical in his/her emotional and social well-being. The above examples result from too much control obviously.
The decision to never have children manifested itself early in my life so the dysfunctionality stops here. I’m 41 now and sometimes think how much joy it would be to share my gifts with a young child and it gets me down sometimes. It is what it is though and everything happens for a reason.
It’s nice to hear that you question yourself daily about what’s really important. I would be a better husband and son if I did that.
I should add that when I question myself on these topics, my answers often aren’t as generous or as wise as I’d like to think. “We are all works in progress” is right.
Don’t give up on your dream!Hang in there