I love this picture, as it really takes me back. Things were so different, in so many ways. Like that new mom’s exposed midriff. How many new moms would dare do that in 2018? Ok; enough of my relentless obesity crisis harping, although it does sometimes make one wonder if someone put something into the water…maybe corn syrup?
But it does all rather explain how a young family (what’s that?) got by with a Camaro (I’m quite sure the big Chevy belongs to the proud grandparents, who were being visited). Of course for how much longer is another question.
Speaking of questions, how about those of you that have had kids tell us what was the first car you hauled them in?
Me first. When I met Stephanie, she didn’t know how to drive. I tried once in my ’68 Dodge A100 van, but its clutch and column shifter was a bit too overwhelming. We shelved that for a year or so, which is unusual for living in Southern California. We lived just a short walk from downtown Santa Monica, which had shops, a mall and a farmer’s market.
I sold the van and bought a used ’68 Peugeot 404, with a four speed column shifter. That was not making it any easier. This fuzzy snapshot of it and her was made high on the Angeles Crest Highway on Thanksgiving weekend 1978. Yes it snows in Southern California.
not our actual beloved 404 wagon almost identical
But when Stephanie got pregnant in early 1980, she decided she was ready, but with an automatic, please. So I found a gem of a 1970 404 wagon for sale out in the San Fernando Valley. it was only $100, because the engine had blown its head gasket and had not been fixed, meaning the cylinders were all rusted.
So I rented a tow bar and towed it home behind the 404 sedan, over 405 and Mulholland Pass. the good old days indeed. And I found a 404 in a junkyard in Culver City (there used to be several there) for $50 pulled its engine and installed it into the wagon right at the curb in front of this little junk yard. And it ran like a top.
Well, it wasn’t any too fast, with its 1600cc engine that had some 70 or so hp, working through a three-speed ZF automatic. Fortunately starting in 1970, that automatic now started in first gear; previously it started in second unless you selected Low. But it was unstoppable, and would climb steep highway grades in the Sierras at 45mph wide-open in second. We had a giant factory luggage rack like that one too. I could haul vast amount of stuff, between the generous rear storage area and that roof rack.
Sadly, I can’t find a single picture of our actual wagon. But it was a terrific family hauler. After my son was born, it took the four of us and my mom on highly memorable trip up to the Sierras in what would turn out to be one of the biggest snow storms ever. I had a toboggan strapped to the roof rack, along with the skis.
Enough already. What was your first kiddie hauler?
Different era for sure!
1970 was at or near the peak for working Americans. They could still afford a new, or newish car.
People would squeeze into small back seats–and the picture Camaro had one of the smallest seats, and tiny trunk!
It was a forced purchase, tho. You could practically watch a new car age before your eyes. A car a few years old really was a risky purchase. A four year old 2014 car is perfectly reliable and looks like new.
My son was born mid-winter so we drove him around in my winter beater, a 84 Jeep Wagoneer. This was an XJ, a relatively rare base model, trimmed exactly like the more -popular Cherokee Laredo.
Edit- this XJ was a very early production version, made in October 1983, and was an interesting example of the fact the XJ was not quite fully developed when it went into production. I bought it as a dealer demo and it proved to be very troublesome.
Not nearly as cool as the Peugeot, our first kiddie haulers were the Mercury Topaz and Ford Ranger pickup.
Both were 5-speeds, but in the truck only 1st 3rd and 5th were available with the child seat installed. Once we had two kids we gave away the Topaz and got a Windstar. That was a stupid idea, we should have kept the Topaz and got rid of the Ranger.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/cars-of-a-lifetime/coal-1989-mercury-topaz-i-cant-go-im-too-nervous/
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/curbside-classics-american/coal-1988-ford-ranger-the-wee-truck/
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/cars-of-a-lifetime/coal-1996-ford-windstar-anomaly%E2%80%8F/
By the way, I think in that photo the young lady is the baby’s aunt. She doesn’t look very post-partum, and not nearly tired enough 😉
I think that those two are brother and sister and someone left that baby on their step.
Our first “family” car for my wife and I was a 1986 Mustang GT. We had that car for six years and hauled two children in it regularly as well as moving the family to California from Kansas. It made many 300+ mile holiday trips loaded with two adults, two kids, car strollers, diaper bags, and luggage comfortably.
If it weren’t for the idiotic California laws and absurd fees regarding registering out-of-state cars in force at the time (Environmental Impact Tax, later ruled unconstitutional) it’s entirely possible we would still have that car, although we probably would’ve moved to a larger vehicle for daily use after our third child was born.
The Camaro is a bit before my time, but my daughter was ferried around in my wife’s 2003 Accord Coupe, and my son came home from the hospital in my ’04 WRX SportWagon. The minivan arrived within a year after that (replacing the Accord.) We had a family vacation coming up and literally couldn’t get all the baby accoutrments into either car without being able to fold a seat.
Our first kid-hauler was this one. Our daughter, now 41, came home from the hospital in it, and ever since then we blame that for her expensive taste. The first time we took her and her younger brother to a decent restaurant, he asked for a PBJ, she asked for lobster!
Lol
My wife was driven around in a white ’65 404, which her father kept from ’70 to ’86.
My kids were brought home in ’93 and ’95 in my ’88 Uno, which I kept from ’92 to ’96.
The Uno was a very space efficient car, very comfortable for a small family, excepting luggage space. Then again, we were living in a 38 sq mt (400 sq ft) apartment in downtown Montevideo, so we didn’t have many things to carry around. When the time came to use child seats, they would fill the rear seat. That was a nice but not too reliable car, as it overheated at about 30.000 km. I sold it and got my father in law Fiat Elba (a Uno wagon, much longer) with a 1.6 engine and much better luggage capacity. I kept that car from ’96 (it had just 18000km) and eventually sold it in ’08 (108000km). Again, a very nice and well assembled car, with an unreliably engine which overheated even under warranty.
The best anecdote in the Uno was when my son began using his seat and we were driving in light rain. He’d burst into laughter almost rythmically, and we couldn’t find what was happening. He’d be serious, looking at the road in front, and laugh manically. Then stop. This repeated endless times until it stopped raining…and I turned off the intermittent wiper. Sure enough, I turned it again, and this little soon-to-be engineer would burst again.
An easily contented small guy, who has had his license for many years and prefers to take the bus…
We had a 1998 Jeep Cherokee when our first son was born. It was traded not too long after for a 2000 Chrysler Neon. The wife got the minivan bug shortly after the second child was born and she moved onto a 2004 Nissan Quest leaving me with the Neon as a commuter car.
I used to put my boy’s bulky car seat into my (at the time) Triumph Spitfire and take his for drives. He loved it. I’d probably be thrown in jail for child endangerment these days.
We did sort of the opposite. My oldest came home in my 87 Mustang, which was very soon replaced with a new 96 Cherokee (4.0 / 5 spd), and I started driving my wife’s Miata. (She wouldn’t let me drive them in it often, but the kids all loved playing in it.) When our next was born just under 2 years later, she came home in the Cherokee but we immediately added a Plymouth Grand Voyager minivan. Since we both loved the Miata and I loved the Jeep, we became a 3 car family for several years.
One of my favorite pictures from that time was our Christmas card – our 3 vehicles: white Miata, white Cherokee, and chrome-and-blue old school Emmuajunga stroller, all lined up with the San Diego -Coronado bay bridge in the background.
When my kids were toddlers, and slightly older, I used to love taking them for drives (1 at a time) in my in-laws’ 1995 Jeep Wrangler. It has no back seat, so the kids sat in the front, with a commanding view of the road. The noisy, windy Jeep was a like a giant toy for them, and none of that stuck-in-the-backseat nonsense!
Our eldest was born in January of 1992. Racking my brain, I believe he came home from the hospital in either my 1986 Fox body Marquis wagon or our 88 Accord sedan. I think it was the Mercury. The Accord was the main Mommy-Mobile for maybe two or three years.
A fall of 1994 trip with 2 kids from Indianapolis to Texas and back in the 85 Crown Victoria that followed the Marquis was directly responsible for the Ford Club Wagon that showed up in our driveway six months later.
My ex-wife had a ’91 VW Golf 4-door when my oldest was born, but as a colicky infant he was a screamer. When he wasn’t on the washing machine (we rarely had a load of dirty clothes left undone) to be vibrated into sleep, he seemed to be soothed more effectively by the noise and vibration of our ’80 Rabbit convertible. The Rabbit was impractical from an ingress/egress standpoint, but given that the boy was prone to projectile vomiting when the colic came on full force, the white vinyl seats in the convertible lent themselves better to cleanup than the charcoal cloth in the Golf. He was also born in October of ’92, and that Winter was particularly snowy in the Northeast. The Rabbit, while drafty, was much better in the snow than the Golf, which had low-profile all-season tires on it. We lived in a ski resort area at the top of a mountain. Many a late night I’d find myself piloting that Rabbit through a snow squall trying to get him to chill out and sleep.
(An unadvertised trick of the trade was that as a smoker, the Rabbit had tilt-out vent windows, so I could sneak in a smoke without filling the car with noxious fumes while I performed this little ritual. I know…child abuse…but seriously that kid screamed for hours. At least I didn’t pack a flask for these trips. Ya gotta do what ya gotta do.)
Our daughter was born in 1996, right at the peak of US minivan sales. Because of this, my wife endured nine months of family and friends advising her to “You need to go out and buy a Minivan!”
At the time, she was in a first generation Mazda Miata, and had NO interest in making a change. In fact, she drove the Miata to work the day her water broke, and used it to drive our daughter to daycare when she returned to the job (early Miatas did not have a passenger airbag, mitigating any airbag versus child seat concerns).
While the Miata was reduced to weekend car duty through the Junior High and High school years, it’s still in the family- We transferred the title to our daughter last year, as it’s now her daily driver.
Last year, to celebrate our empty nest status, my wife and I flew from LA to Denver to visit friends and pick up her new car- A 2017 Mazda MX-5 RF (We had to fly out of town to get her preferred color and features). I’m pretty sure Momma loves her car more than me- I caught some hell last year when I suggested her 6’3″ husband would prefer to drive something a bit more practical to lunch.
Over the same time period, I have driven a series of beaters, mostly a Fox body Mustang, Isuzu Rodeo, and ’74 Mustang II. They all hauled the kiddie from time to time, but were never purchased as a “Kiddie Hauler.”
That’s cool. Your daughter drives the car she rode in as a baby? Would be even better if she had come home from hospital in it.
I take my kid to Kindergarten in a vehicle my wife’s parents bought when she was 14, which seems mildly amazing to me, but doesn’t register with my wife.
“Would be even better if she had come home from hospital in it.”
It could have happened, except a coworker drove Celeste to the hospital, so the Miata wasn’t present at the time of departure…
Dave,
Is your daughter planning to sell the first-gen Miata at any time in the near future? I’m searching for another fun car and might be interested.
Sorry PJ-
My daughter loves it, so no. In addition, if she ever decided to sell it, my wife would be first in line to buy it back.
1995 Chevrolet Impala SS.
I had a 95 too – at that point I had 3 car seats in the back, they fit no problem.
Daughter was born in August 2014, Son 4 months ago.
2005 Pontiac Vibe was Mom’s Taxi until she bought a new Terrain in December 2016 – wanted more room and loves the service she gets at the local GMC Buick dealer.
Gently used 2010 Toyota Highlander (bought May 2014) and almost paid off. Can’t wait to replace it (CUV appliance is boring me to death.) My daughter is the kind of kid who yells “Faster Daddy” when I’m trying to back into the driveway… 😉
My first came home in a 94 cougar. I grew up in late 70s early 80s and learned that coupes were style and anything with more than 2 doors was just wrong. Things changed pretty quickly
AndyinMA,
I still believe two doors are more stylish than four. Certainly not as easy with kids. My first came home in a ’78 Zephyr Z7 and the second I’m sad to say was stuck with a Geo Metro. (Did get almost 50mpg on the highway) Got our first minivan shortly thereafter however. Now we always have a four door everything because we are old and practical now. Blah!
My first-born got hauled around in a ’03 Mini Cooper S for a while, but that got a bit crazy and I found a ’98 Maxima that did me well for a while, the carsick dog did better iin the front seat and the baby was happy to see his mom in the back with him.
By the time the second came along, so did the ’05 Legacy GT Wagon that is our current hauler.
The car I used and still use is the 2004 Focus 4 door and my wife used a 98 Sable wagon. My first was born quite late in my life while my wife was quite young.
1998 Chrysler Cirrus with the 2.5L V6.
We traded it in about a month after our first child was born in 2002, though. Not that it wasn’t spacious enough for a baby and related items, but because it was rusting out at just 4 years old and needed frequent repairs.
Since a friend of the family was a Chrysler dealer, we then bought a 1999 Caravan, which ended up being the least reliable vehicle we have ever owned.
I swore off Chrysler at that point and have stuck to it.
Our son came home from the birth clinic in our Vanagon Westfalia. But pretty soon he was riding around in my Ford Ranger too. Yes, in the front seat, though with a pretty good car seat. He didn’t move to the sideways facing rear jump seats till he graduated to a forward facing car seat. No airbags on my ‘86. I think our daughter, 2 years later, got her first car ride in the Vanagon also. I say “think” because I’m pretty sure that’s when our BMW 528i was acting up due to various EFI issues and we didn’t trust it. It was sold shortly after her birth, after yet.another.tow.truck.ride and we got the Corolla. The kids still rode in the Ranger, sometimes all four of us, until we got a Land Cruiser two years later.
Our first son came home in my 2002 Grand Am GT. Most stressful drive I’ve ever had.Never had anything more valuable then he and my wife -as passengers.First hauler was a new 2002 Saturn VUE in metallic orange with tan cloth.We loved it, baby, stroller, pack / play and lots of toys fit without issue. Ran great till about 100k miles, Opel V6 wasn’t so good. In 2008 I purchased a company off lease 2005 Equinox for $4800. Only had 37k miles on the odo. Great deal but a real pos mechanically. Had the 3.4 liter intake manifold issue ($670), mount for the hanger bearing on the AWD failed ( $100 parts + $75 bearing press service & my free labor) and a blend motor on the heater box went bad ($1700 dealer quote) -took me two 8 hour days -Christmas weekend no less – to remove the entire dash to the firewall and replace. Couldn’t keep the seats clean no matter how I scrubbed. All the ones in my company fleet had the same issue.Didn’t lose a dime when we sold it though. Unstoppable in snow but felt willowy over the road and looked cheap on the inside.
We had no car when my wife was pregnant with our first because we lived in a walkable city with good public transport and were saving to buy a house. She was cycling to work one day at about 3 months pregnant and was tapped by a Royal Mail van charging out of an alley. She stayed on the bike but came home and said “Get me a car. 4 doors, not too big.”
I went to the auction, reluctantly passed on an immaculate Peugeot 607 diesel and paid more for a 2004 Mazda 2 (example pictured). It was ideal really as it was easy to park in the city but more spacious than most equivalent cars. I had considered things like Focus wagons and wished I had gone for one 4 years later when son no.2 came along and the Mazda was augmented by a Renault Scenic. I sold the Mazda last year for 300 quid with 125,000 on the clock. The guy who bought it for his son drove it back the the Scottish highlands and texted me to tell me how delighted he was with it.
My parents’ first car (after the birth of my older sister) was a Citroen Ami wagon previously owned by my great uncle, but when the floors rusted out they replaced it with a new 1983 Fiat 126, and took their two kids on vacation in it. A 126 is slightly longer and narrower than a Smart car. It was a 652cc air-cooled flat twin.
My wife and I were once Minivan Deniers, so our first Kid Hauler was a 2006 Ford Crown Victoria, which we just sold. I took the picture below a few weeks ago on the day I let it go.
When our first kid was born in 2007, we were under the delusion that our then-current cars (a Ford Contour and a Thunderbird) would be sufficient for kid duty. But then we came face-to-face with reality… a too-small Contour and an aging Thunderbird would not do for shuttling a family on long road trips full of baby gear. So we bought a new car.
I had always wanted a traditional, RWD V-8 sedan – my wife (conservative Midwesterner that she is) felt a similar attraction to traditional sedans. So when our baby was 2 months old, we bought the Crown Vic. We were very proud to have avoided the Minivan/SUV Trap.
But when Kid #2 was born in 2009, we realized that that for 1,000+ mile trips with two little kids… we really needed a minivan. So we cast aside our prejudices and bought an Odyssey in 2010, and the Crown Vic became my daily driver instead (the Contour got the boot). Just this year, we bought a second minivan, sold the Crown Vic, and now the Odyssey is my daily driver.
We’ve gone from being Minivan Deniers to owning 2 minivans. Well, times and people do change!
Yes, it was a terrible day when I realized that one of the biggest sedans made in the world (my 85 Crown Victoria) was an inconvenient PITA for traveling with two little kids in car seats. All our gear had to ride in the trunk which demanded stopping somewhere every time we needed something. If I had to do it over I would buy the Club Wagon again. A minivan would no doubt have worked, but the extra acreage was a big upgrade.
No kids in my history (at least none that I know of), but when I was a teenager, I’d take the family Airedale for rides in Mom’s ’69 Fairlane wagon. Does that count? He looked a lot like this – great dog.
Both of my kids (born in 1978 and 1982) were driven home from the hospital in a 1975 Trans Am Pontiac (red with the requisite ‘screaming eagle’ hood decal). Both were ferried around in the backseat in a GM ‘Love Seat’, a very early safety seat that had the baby riding backwards. Thank God I was in my early twenties and quite slender and agile. Getting the Love Seat in that small backseat, with the baby already strapped in, was quite a trick.
Wife had an ’85 S-10 regular-cab 2wd. I drove a 1970 Monte Carlo. Those were the first kiddie haulers for us.
I wanted to make a ’57 Chevy 210 4-door roadworthy in time to bring our first home from the hospital, but time and financial constraints made that impossible. That car was eventually scrapped.
Hey, I’m apparently the same age as Paul’s son!
I don’t have kids (us Millennials are delaying starting families and all that), but I can talk about the cars I got driven around in as a kid. Not unlike the family in that photo, my mom made due driving me around in a Vega hatchback when I was born. I’m sure she put me in a carseat, but I’m guessing she just put it in the front seat rather than trying to get it in the back. The idea that kids were safest in the back seat wasn’t really around back then (and there weren’t airbags to deal with). My parents did also buy a new 1979 Corolla wagon just before I was born, a fairly bare bones one with a 5-speed manual. I don’t know if their intent was for it to be the kid hauler, being a wagon and all, but mom never learned to drive a manual so the Corolla was dad’s commuter car and I more often than not got driven around in the Vega unless we were all going somewhere and dad was driving. Then when my sister came along in late 1983 they sold the Vega and got the ultimate family hauler, a new 1984 Voyager. They must have been really impressed by it when the salesman showed it to them, because it usually wasn’t like them to be early adopters like that.
The question is…who drove whom??? My son in 1968 in our ’60 Lincoln..
“Do you know why I pulled you over today, sir?”
“Goo!”
Glenn, now you can take your grandchild for a ride in your new ’60 Lincoln conv.
My parents first kid hauler was a 69 Malibu sport coupe, When my twin sister and I came along, they bought a brand new 76 Malibu Classic sedan.
My kid hauler was briefly my 95 Ford Explorer, then when that died unexpectedly, my 77 Malibu Classic sedan became the family hauler for about a year before getting retired from daily family hauler. Now it’s a 04 Buick Rendezvous.
I am HAPPILY free of children!! I’m an uncle 4 times over, and that’s plenty close enough for me. When dating a women, it’s a huge consideration as to the age and number of kids. Zero is the holy grail, although if she has none that are past babysitting and car seat age that’s workable.
One of my long term girlfriends had a 7 y/o. We used to take her Grand Cherokee when it was the 3 of us since my Wrangler wouldn’t have been ideal, even when I had the rear seat installed. Some time into our relationship I picked up my PT Cruiser GT as a daily driver/hedge against the climbing fuel prices. Surprisingly, it was easy to swap the car seat out of the GC into the PT.
If I did have to own a more family oriented ride, there’s no way I could live with going full Clark Griswold on a minivan, CUV or sedan. The current Durango is NOT a bad ride in Hemi R/T or SRT guise, especially since the Magnum is to the point of being a hobby car these days.
I will point out that Clark Griswold did go skinny-dipping with Christie Brinkley so he’s got most of us beat on that score… 🙂 Chicks dig the wood(grain).
1998 Passat wagon. Owned it just a tad over 20 years from May 1998 through June 2018. With over 244,xxx miles it just got too rusty underneath. The death sentence was when the tire shop would no longer put it on the lift to change the tires for fear of folding. Our oldest came home in that car in Oct 1998 and he drove it willingly for 2.5 years once he got his license.
RIP.
We were married in 1976 in Michigan (Dearborn). We had our first daughter in Connecticut after I moved for a job promotion. Car(s) at that time were a 1968 Malibu convertible and a 1974 VW Super Beetle. I recall the SB was the kid hauler of choice at that time. I sold it when daughter #2 showed up in 1979 and bought a new 1980 Chev Blazer.
No children but as the oldest child of a father who was a single parent when I reached driving age I was drafted into duty as transportation wrangler for my younger siblings. This was the late sixties/early seventies so it was socially acceptable to load as many people into the car as needed transporting, none of that worrying about the number of seatbelts or anything else. I think my all time record was taking my middle sister and 9 other 11-12 year old girls to a birthday party at the swimming pool. They thought it was a hoot getting to ride in the back of our Pontiac station wagon.
My parents were sticklers for using seatbelts in the early 1980s, however it was totally acceptable to squeeze two small kids into a seat and make them share a seatbelt if there weren’t enough to go around. I don’t think that would fly today.
My firstborn in 1984 was chauffeured in my 1981 Chev Bel Air 4 door. The nurse who walked the three of us out to the car called it “elegant”. Maybe it was the blue car against the backdrop of an overcast, cloudy, dreary late autumn day in Mississauga. Or maybe she wanted a tired Mommy to feel better since she was exhausted from the hospital stay and quite a bit of drugs while she was an inmate.
’74 Ford Cortina. Getting the baby capsule in and out past that curving roofline was awkward, but we survived.
Also the car that gave me one of my worst driving moments, when Miss Two-and-a-half proudly showed me she’d figured out how to undo the buckle on her child seat in the middle of a busy Melbourne intersection in peak hour, just as I was turning. She wanted to ride in the front like a grown-up.
I brought my first baby home in my ’89 Beretta. He rode in the back seat with his older stepbrother until his younger brother was on the way about two years later. That’s when we got the ’96 Sable wagon.
Being the practical, rational, sort of fellow I am when the kid was born I immediately procured a 1977 VW Westphalia camper for our family hauler.
https://wp.me/p1maKU-RUn
That worked out real well.
I’m pretty sure I was brought home in dad’s Peugeot 403. Mom hated that car because it would break down whenever he was at sea during the Navy days. Mom forced dad to get a car that could be fixed at any gas station, so that was the 1963 Ford Ranch wagon with 3-on-the-tree.
I don’t have any children, but can speak about my brother since there was a power imbalance. When my SIL gave birth in 1998, the bro was tooling around his 1993 Honda Civic 2-door coupe (nice car) while the SIL was driving her precious little red Honda Del Sol which the bro, 6′ 1″ and now tilting the scale at 250 lbs because of her excellent cooking, could barely wedge into. The Kiddo came home in the Civic, but because the SIL absolutely refused to get a more appropriate kiddie carrier and fitting a car seat in the Del Sol was near impossible, forced my bro to swap cars, using his Civic as the transporter, and he had to make due with the Del Sol. Around 2002 the SIL wrecked the Civic*, so the bro got a more appropriate Kiddo carrier, a 2001 Mazda MPV (which eventually became the world’s fastest toy box), but still refused to let him trade the Del Sol for several years. Eventually the bro got a good deal on a BMW 535. They are still married.
Eventually, the Kiddo inherited the MPV as her first car. She now drives a Honda Fit.
*When bro told me his wife wrecked his car, I said: lemme guess, she turned left into traffic and hit something and crushed the front end. Bro: How’d you know?? Me: Because you perfected that technique in wrecking mom’s car (a 1965 Dodge Dart 4 door) back in 1979, and I figured you taught her how. Bro: [Many expletives deleted detailing impossible physical acts].
First kiddie hauler for my wife (now ex-wife) & I was a 1978 Oldsmobile Cutlass Salon Brougham almost identical to the one pictured except ours was a two door, Not only was the car butt-less but it was gutless too. It had a 260 V-8 (A.K.A. a boat anchor), automatic, bucket seats, console, A/C & a AM/FM Stereo radio. And if the engine wasn’t bad enough (110 horsepower), they added a 2.29 rear axle to make it even worse. I swear that car slowed down when it was going downhill.
The kid came home in her mother’s 2001Jeep Cherokee which I had been driving for two months because the ergonomics of the Cherokee didn’t work with a 4’11” pregnant woman carrying a 10 lb baby. She drove my MK IV Jetta TDI (very fast apparently as she had a mandatory court appearance on that ticket) the last two months of her pregnancy. Highway Patrol in SC is very lenient on speeds so I can’t imagine how fast she was going to get a ticket being that pregnant. She never would tell me . . . Those Cherokee’s were good vehicles but I cannot think of another SUV that required the contortions to get in and out of especially for taller folks and pregnant women – the doors were small and this was before telescoping steering wheels.
I came home in a 72 Impala wagon and my parents were both born at home!
First kid came home in our 2001 Volvo V40, Safety First!
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/cars-of-a-lifetime/coal-2001-volvo-v40-the-little-swede-with-the-big-heart/
Second kid in the 2004 Nissan Murano. The kid is great, the Nissan I wasn’t as fond of…
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/cars-of-a-lifetime/coal-2004-nissan-murano-sl-awd-the-trophy-wife-of-cars/
And by the third we got wise and had a minivan at the ready, 2005 Toyota Sienna XLE.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/cars-of-a-lifetime/coal-2005-toyota-sienna-xle-the-love-that-dareth-not-speak-its-name/
It will surprise absolutely no one here that not a single one the cars were still with us by the time each kid reached the age of two, hence none of them have any direct memory of the car they first rode in.
As for myself I just confirmed with my mother it was in a two-tone green DKW!
Brought my one and only back from the hospital in my 2000 Audi A6 back in 2005. Wifey had a 2000 Honda Civic sedan. Car seats fit well in both.
However comfortable the Audi was, it couldn’t outrun the mechanic’s shop…and had to get rid of it as it getting pricey to maintain. Got a pre-owned 2009 Camry LE sedan, which I still have. Wife traded in her 2000 Civic for a 2012 model, which is the one that’s much maligned for its cheapened out interior.
Daughter likes to ride in my Camry more because it has a more comfortable ride, not surprising. Now a teenager, we might just pass on the Civic to her when she gets of driving age.
1985.5 Escort Wagon. Sand beige with a little red pinstripe, manual transmission, AM/FM radio, rear defogger and no A/C. We also took our first family vacation in the Escort four years later, camping in Ontario Canada. That was also our last family driving vacation without A/C 😅
My first kid rode in green Fords, either our 1995 Escort 5 door or the 1993 Ranger long bed. Getting 3 people in the ranger was almost doable with my wife in the middle seat. This is why the Ranger was replaced by grandma’s 1997 Saturn SL2 when kid #2 was n the way. Both cars could handle two car seats or a car seat and a booster with bikes on the roof rack so we never felt the need for a minivan or SUV.
I like the cars from those days, but the man’s hairstyle…Does that part start at his collar-line and travel all the way to his eyes? Also I like my women more sturdy. Gotta be able to carry lotza firewood.
Just kidding everybody…
I was born in Feb 1971 and my parents had a ’68 Pontiac Firebird they had purchased new. After having a hard time getting me in and out of that car, they purchased a new ’71 Olds Cutlass two-door (dad would not go to a sedan) in the fall. I guess it had more space. My twin brother and sister came along in Aug ’73 and we were still a one-car family with the Cutlass until 1976 and they bought a brand new Plymouth Volare’ station wagon.
’67 VW beetle that I had owned since high school. Shipped it to the big island of Hawaii, where my girl was born.
Back in California, I noticed many young families with Corolla wagons at the time.
My son was adopted. Does a ride from the airport count?
If it does then it was in a 97 grand Cherokee limited.
1990 Cadillac CDV in triple white for my son, He drives a Lincoln these days. How ironic….
Our first was our still-current (kids are young) family car – classic Saab 900 Turbo. Gigantic boot, acceptably big rear seat, great cruisey/focused drive for a FWDer. Reliable too (touches wood). recent addition: roof rack!
have added a Honda Fit (Jazz to us) which is a sweet little sewing machine, amazingly well packaged internally with the extra deep boot and the tip up rear seats.
so we’re shunning the minibus type stuff so far…although when we get into the mountain bike/camping era we shall see.
none of this matches what I came home from hospital in, which is the Bentley R Type standard saloon which my dad still has. Wonderful old boat with a surprisingly sporty edge. Used to ‘do’ my homework on the picnic table in the back as a primary school age kid. no seatbelts in the back then (and it was the ’80s).
I don’t have any children but I can relate my own childhood family cars. (I’m 33, born in 1985) My family bucked the minivan and SUV trend despite me being the oldest of three boys. When I was born my mom was driving a ‘77 Toyota Celica ST 4-speed. She had her ‘84 Ford Escort 2-door 4-speed until about ‘93 or so. It didn’t have air conditioning and we live in Alabama! People would be agast now. We also drove my dad’s ‘85 Mustang GT quite a bit. Shortly after my youngest brother was born in 1995 my mom started driving my dad’s ‘73 Beetle quite a bit, We were always a different family. Haha
Right now, my mother drives a ‘14 Ford Focus ST (When I asked her why the ST vs a basic model her reply was that “Those had like 100 less horsepower and the ST only comes in a manual and I can’t have a small car with an automatic. That’s just wrong.” )
I came home from the hospital in a ’58 Beetle. Fast forward a generation. My ’81 Toyota pickup had a plastic console in the middle of a bench seat, and I would frequently put a boat cushion on top of that to squeeze in a third person. When that one was totaled in an encounter with a drunk driver, i replaced it with an ’86 with a full width bench seat with reclining back rests, a fold down center armrest and three seat belts. I was seriously dating my future wife at that point, and figured that this would be our first family car. I didn’t pay enough attention to the fact that Toyota had moved the base of the shifter aft. When our eldest was born, we discovered that neither his car seat nor his mother could fit in the middle of that truck for more than a few minutes, and we quickly replaced it with an ’86 Nissan Stanza Wagon. This was basically a short minivan with a 5-speed and amazingly comfortable front seats. I put many miles on that car trying to get the baby to sleep while his mother was at night school. It looked odd and had a rubbery shifter, but rode and handled quite well.
I have an 18 year old, a 15 year old and a 9 month old (I got remarried last year) My 2002 Durango has been our main family hauler since my first was a year old (my ex traded a ’99 Blazer in for it; the third row seat is very handy) and I have had my 1996 Ram since it was new so I have had the same vehicles for all of my children’s lives.
When I was born, our family car was a ’68 Valiant, but now that my parents had 3 boys, we needed a second car so my Mom got a used ’72 Montego.
My daughter came home from the hospital in my 1996 Nissan Sentra, but ever since then her primary transport has been my wife’s Daihatsu Charade.
1967 Mustang and later a 1975 Mustang II. We raised 3 daughters who are long gone from the nest now. We never owned a four door, minivan, or SUV. The kids as teens complained about riding in the back of the ’79 Malibu coupe on vacation.
Even though it would be considered a no no today we often took one and then later two kids with us in the seat of the Ranchero and then the El Camino.
We have also manged to haul grandkids around in Mustangs with just a small bit of inconvenience. The ’66 is much easier to get people in and out of the back seat than the ’09 or even my wife’s Toyota Solara.
Needless to say, none of the girls now own two door vehicles.
1975 Chevrolet Monza 2+2.
2003 Saturn VUE
It was too small when we realized we were going to have twins next.
So we went to a 2005 Saturn Relay 3 Van.
Captain’s chairs in middle seats didn’t work out very well with another car seat in the third row.
But we drove it until the engine wore out.
Now driving a 2015 Town and Country.
Now that they are finally out of car seats – also my 2003 Crown Vic Sport.
When I was born my parents had a 3-year-old Morris Minor convertible – https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/cc-kids-1958-morris-minor-tourer-convertible/
My gf in the mid-’00s had two baby daughters and a Subaru Baja with the 5 speed manual, the perfect NH car.
Our older son was born just over 40 years ago, and he came home in a rear-facing car seat in the back of my 1975 VW Rabbit 2-door. I’m sure the nurse was annoyed that it took us longer to get him belted in than simply having my wife hold him in the front seat, as was still the norm at the time.
We had a newer Rabbit, a 1979 model, still a 2-door, when son #2 came along. But it wasn’t too long afterward when the Rabbit was sold for a used 1980 Volvo 242 — yes, another 2-door. This car was kept in the family long enough for him to drive it.
Here’s me with son #1 wearing bell-bottom jeans and looking quite thin (no belly!) at the beach. I don’t have any scanned photos of the Rabbits.
Our son came home in and mainly rode in a 1990 Dodge Spirit 4 cyl 5 spd. That car was trouble free for 183k then we sold in 1998. He also rode in my 1985 FILA Tbird; he liked all the switches.