The world is a funny place.
The older I get, the more I realize how limited our thinking can be. Unless we have travelled or read widely, we can tend to forget the geography we learnt in school, and slip into thinking that all the world is as we see around us. But how different other countries can be, in so many and varied ways.
Case in point: the seasons. As the days grow shorter and weather cools around me, for you guys up north it’s coming into summer. A bit of a mind-bender, that. Rich suggested convertibles as a theme – which seems natural when you think about it from a northern hemisphere perspective, but simply hadn’t occurred to me. Okay then! Time to put that top down!
Yesterday was a lovely autumn mid-twenties day (mid-70s F), and as we passed a Focus CC convertible in city traffic (no time to grab a pic), my daughter wondered aloud why he didn’t have the top down. Good question. Maybe they only had a quick drive to the shops, and thought it wasn’t worth pushing the button? Maybe they didn’t want to leave it with the top down? Maybe it was broken?
I remember Mother telling me back when she was a girl, Grandpa never put the top down on their late-twenties Chev tourer. I never saw it, so don’t ask me which year it was. I showed her photos of each year (as you do when you’re a car nut) but she couldn’t pin it down. I might not have a twenties Chev, but here’s a ’27 T Ford:
What, you don’t want to rough it that much? Well…
Okay, I’m cheating. The top on this Ferrari California is up, but it could be down,
There, is that better?
Okay. I’ll have to be a bit selective from here on, or we’ll be here all day. Given a choice, I’ll usually build a hardtop. Possibly that may be because I saw so few convertibles growing up (as in none that weren’t sports cars), and possibly it may be because I hit my teens about the time the ‘fuselage’ look was coming into vogue, and the roof played a more integral part of the design. So I was a bit surprised to find how many convertibles I had.
If I leave out sports cars, which I’ve covered before, and prewar cars, which I’ll get to later this year, this assignment becomes more manageable. Especially once I put aside T-tops; I’ll cover them another time. Along with sunroofs. And off-roaders. And cars like the 2CV which have a roll-back fabric roof. And a lot of other stuff…
So, postwar American drop-tops it is, like the ’49 Ford above.
One of my favourite cars, this stepdown Hudson is a ’52.
An American friend sent me this ’55 Chevy kit. It took a while, but I’d like to think I did it justice.
I did say no sports cars, but the ’57 Bird was more of a cruiser, surely? I like them anyway, so in it goes.
Okay, there, with a ’58! Definitely no sporting pretensions now!
’58 Cadillac goodness.
More Cadillac goodness, this time a ’59.
Love these ’61s, they look light on their feet, er, wheels.
The ‘62’s tail looks a lot heavier. Don’t get me started about ‘63s.
’62 Studebaker. But of course I barrack for the underdogs.
There, two seats. Um, nice, but this ’62 T Bird still is not a sports car…
I can think of one guy in particular who’ll want to see more of this ’62 Olds 442…
… so here you are!
Another heavy cruiser, this ’70 Bonneville.
And this golden ’72 Oldsie 442 brings this story to an end. No idea what we’ll cover next time, but I’ll see you then!
Ah ………… what scale are these? 1/24th ?
It’s always a delight to view your amazing work. The color combo on the 55 Chevy is the best I’ve ever seen.
My eyes tell me the colors on the ’55 Chevy are an ‘injustice’! LOL! Too late to unsee it…
The ” ’62 442 ” is a ’67 or ’66… ’62 would be Jetfire or Starfire… (I had a Jetfire)
My buddy has a ’51 Ford hardtop coupe. He owned it 40 years before someone at a cruise night told him: “You do know that’s a convertible, don’t you?” He didn’t. Turns out ’51 was one year only available bolt on top (probably worth $5K alone now). It was the only way to get a hardtop coupe. Since all 4 windows roll down on a convertible. Otherwise you got a ’51 2 door sedan.
An artist drew a sketch of a customize ’62 T-Bird that was shown in Hot Rod Magazine. They loved it. Another buddy of mine with a body shop built that car as it was sketched. They super loved it and he, the car, or some mention of them was in seven straight issues of the Magazine (I have them). As I recall, they also made it their Car of the Year. ( I have a special affinity with H R Mag. as we were both born in Jan. ’48 ) Here’s that car:
https://www.hotrod.com/features/73838-1962-ford-thunderbird-convertible
And as a model:
I liked the bullet Birds when I was young (and they were new), and your ‘62 with the tonneau/headrest setup reminds me why. I think The Stig likes it too. The 442’s are pretty nice as well; in fact all of them are. Nice.
Wow, Peter. These are really nice. Excellent model choices, always so well executed, and presented. Thank you for sharing such great, creative work!
I love looking at the background of your photos where more cars are parked. That self park lot behind the 58 Caddy has some nice items also. I wonder what your daily parking rate is.
Nice work. Fave of this bunch is the 59 Ford.
I think the ” ’58 Caddy ” is actually a ’57 Eldorado. Eldorados at that time tended to get hints of the next year’s model/tail fins/design. That’s why the tail fins on that car look like they’re embedded into the body bulge instead of following the typical ’58’s body’s lines.
The gaudy extra chrome also says ‘Eldorado’…
Like your 55 Chevy. Attached is my interpretation I completed 20 years ago.