Let’s highlight some AMC products today, with these few images of Javelin drivers and riders. I believe most of the shots were taken in the ’70s, an age with cheaper cameras and film, as will be rather noticeable. However, poor quality aside, they provide a glimpse of the pride and joy in Javelin ownership. Curiously, a good number of shots feature children, which makes me think these owners had both kids and cars as their most precious possessions.
It’s remarkable that every person in each image is smiling. I can see why. I’ve always like the Javelin/AMX especially the first models.
Remarkably, every photo (except #2, which has a ’60s feel), nicely captures some of the essence of the sensational ’70s. The Javelin’s slightly over-the-top styling effectively helping set the tone for the decade’s pop culture.
A blue collar supercar.
Mar 71 is stamped on the margin of #2.
Correct. Has a ’60s look and feel.
Thanks for the link to the BTO song Daniel. My go to album (and it’s title song) was Not Fragile when I was 14 or 15.
This very cool earlier song has a different feel from that one.
Burton Cummings gets a lot of the credit for the success of The Guess Who. But Randy Bachman was a world-class songwriter, guitarist, and singer.
Sleep your sleep
I’m awake and alive
I keep late hours
You’re nine to five
So I would like you know I need the quiet hours
To create in this world of mine
Blue collar
I’d like you to know at four in the morning
Things are coming to mind
All I’ve seen, all I’ve done
And those I hope to find
I’d like to remind you at four in the morning, my world is very still
The air is fresh under diamond skies
Makes me glad to be alive
Although I’m no longer viewed as blue collar I work nights in the medical field. I still identify with this song which had heavy airplay in my hometown on WRIF.. BABY!
Jimmie Bo putting the final touches on the launch that will plant the Javelin in the courtyard of the state pen. So, he can help his younger brother break out.
Thanks for explaining that one 😉 I was wondering what he was up to there. I’m thinking it’s some kind of backwoods kludge for underbody (transmission, oil, driveshaft, etc.) service.
I was having fun, with the homemade ramps. Stunt jumps over rivers or rows of cars or buses, was such a big pop cultural 1970s phenomena, thanks to Evel Knievel and others. Thought I’d inject some humour, touching on the so ’70s topic.
Oh for sure. Having grown up then…and having known at least 2 kids back then who broke limbs doing various Evel Knievel-inspired “jumps” on bikes. Good times….
I had a childhood friend named Jamie Funk (a near perfect ’70s name!), who regularly attempted uphill bicycle wheelies on the steep hill at Canadian Forces base Rockcliffe. Required at least one ambulance call. lol
Indeed… another man of a certain age chiming in here.
I still have a scar on my left hand from trying to jump a small ravine at around 11 or 12 years old in my ’71 Stingray…
Some of you on this thread must be of an age to remember the Astro Sprial https://www.hagerty.com/media/automotive-history/the-greatest-car-stunt-of-all-time-the-astro-spiral/. It was an amazing thing to this then about-to-get-his-dirvers-license teenager.
Of course! The Astro-Spiral is a ’70s legend.
Stunt driver Ken Carter planned ‘The Super Jump’ an attempt to launch a rocket-powered Lincoln Continental across the St. Lawrence River, about 50 kms from my public school. ABC Sports later airing the attempt.
All those kids are now fully grown adults .
I get Jimmie Bo rigged that up to do oil changes and service….
-Nate
“Kids, get away from the car! Don’t be reachin’ into your dad’s Javelin again, to play with his matches!”
That boy outgrows shirts faster than we can put ’em on him!
I always loved the 2nd gen Javelins. It looks like AMC had a Mopar in their office and decided to make it more Mopar.
Those guys sitting on the silvery blue Javelin with the (fake?) side pipes are probably about my age. Hard to believe. I knew quite a few people with Ramblers, and later AMC Gremlins, Hornets, even a Matador, but I have no recollection of anyone with a Javelin – let alone an AMX.
Didn’t dislike the later “Jav’s”; really liked/like the first two years, models though.
Great assortment of photos! The Javelin, any Javelin, is still one of my dream cars. These have never seemed like second-tier cars in their class. Lower volume, because AMC. #TeamJavelin
Here in Southern Ontario, just spotting a Sportabout, Gremlin, Spirit, or Eagle, was a rare treat. Why, I always particularly appreciated AMC products.
Great photos, Rich.
Once again, a great reminder of the colors that were once everywhere on cars.
And a great dose of mullet-goodness on at least those last 3 pics.
The one with the girl in TX is terrific. (And the one with giant kid and his two standard-sized relations 🙂 )
Count me in as a Javelin fan as well. While most here prefer the first generation (and don’t get me wrong, I love it), I’m partial to the second gen and all its curvy goodness.
As I’ve shared here before, my best friend back then had a ’74 he had painted in an extremely bright shade of orange with the tunnel back trimmed in bright white. We had installed the Pierre Cardin interior out of a basket case parts car, and that car looked really sharp. Good times riding around in that one.
Great set of pictures here – each one seems to be telling us a story.
The kid with his sister and the green Javelin looks exactly like me at that age – and my parents used to prop me up against the car in the driveway to take my picture too.
The lead picture was taken on on Bay Ridge Pkwy. in Brooklyn – here’s the current-day view from the same place. Then-and-now comparison below, and StreetView link here:
https://maps.app.goo.gl/EGnCpyPN88Yyq6wg9
Wow, what a difference the trees make. IMO, the block looks so much nicer before that house on the corner cut down all of their trees and replaced them with…shubberies.
The same thing is happening around me, albeit in a landscape that had/has a lot more trees than Brooklyn to begin with. A new neighbor last year cut down over 30 trees on his lot (we have 2 acre lots here). Said that they were “too messy” and kept dropping things like sticks and leaves that he needed to “clean up”. I contended that one of the reasons why we live in the woods is that we don’t need to “clean them up”. Obviously he didn’t agree.
The number of neighbourhood elements that have managed to remain the same, are remarkable.
Downtown Ottawa, Montreal, and Northern New York state lost many thousands of mature trees during the massive January 1998 Ice Storm(s). As well as more natural tree loss, due to disease, and age.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/January_1998_North_American_ice_storm
I live in Northern NY. First it was Dutch Elm disease in the early 70’s. Then the ice storm in March of 1991. Next was the microburst in July of 1995. Then the ice storm of 1998 you mentioned.
Last but not least, as streets and roads got widened, it took much of what was left or replanted after the earlier disasters.
That does make a huge difference in those photos. It looks to me that the missing trees were street trees (i.e., in the public right-of-way between the sidewalk and the street). If that’s the case, it’s too bad that the City didn’t replant sizable trees there, since in those dense settings, street trees make the place seem much more inviting.
Too bad about your neighbor – I’ve known people who’ve done stuff like that and it’s puzzling. I can’t say I blame folks for removing trees that are close to their house, though. The shade’s nice, but wind storm damage isn’t.
I am amazed at how many of these are in the sporty AMX trim. I notice this because it was a big day when my best friend showed me the brand new Javelin AMX painted bright red with gold stripes that his parents bought to replace his mother’s 1960 Studebaker Lark!
I spend a decent amount of time around that Javelin and it seemed to me that AMC did late-stage ponycar as well as anyone did. One of the few times that could be said about AMC in a market segment.
In the second picture (the two Javelins parked side by side) the little boy may be standing in front of a “Mark Donohue” edition SST. One feature was a rear spoiler with a decal of Mark Donohue’s signature on the right side of the spoiler. Or it could be a dealer sticker. Hard to tell but intriguing.
Wild to see a family with two Javelins.