The new car was The New Chevrolet: a metallic medium-deep red (“Carmine”) ’78 Caprice Classic with a blood-red vinyl interior, ordered at Bryner Chevrolet—still a going concern in Jenkintown. Motor Trend’s worshipful review of their car-of-the-year ’77 model pointed out that a Caprice could be specced up to nigh on Cadillac levels of equipment and price. The opposite was also true; my folks specced theirs down to nigh on Impala levels with a 305-2bbl instead of the base straight-6, manual air conditioning, an FM/AM mono radio with one speaker in the dashboard, a remote-control left sideview mirror, and…that’s it. Everything else was basic equipment. No power locks or windows or trunk latch, no interval wipers, no tilt steering, no cruise control, no backglass defogger, no 2-tone paint. Black seatbelts, no interior trim dressup or split bench front seat or velour upholstery, no fancy wheels, no de luxe gauge package.
For awhile, sister and I would hurry to unbuckle at the end of a trip so we could stand up and see the dashboard in time for dad to apply the parking brake and switch off the ignition: first the »[ BRAKE ]« light would come on, then go off as power was cut, and the »[ GEN ]« light right next to it would flash on, then fade out as the engine stopped turning—an artifact of the telltale’s hookup to what GM insisted was a “Delcotron generator” (i.e., the alternator). It was a neat little right-left light sequence and we kids thought it was amusing.
And the car certainly had no heavy-duty brakes, suspension, alternator, cooling system, or anything else. Nevertheless, GM, at apparent random, put in a Turbo Hydramatic 350 rather than the classactionally underspecified TH200; my folks were spared a wallet-bullet by GM’s spasticity. I know because I clearly remember its first-gear windup, which sounded like a proper transmission—the TH200, in first gear, sounds like the cheap imitation it is. Just as randomly, this car didn’t get one of the nerf (improperly hardened) camshafts GM installed in zillions of ’74ish to ’82ish Chev 305 and 350 engines. It wasn’t just Chrysler products you had to hope for good luck with in the ’70s, but good luck was sort of baked into this car from the start.
Soon enough after the Caprice’s arrival, I got over the Dart’s departure and found enough sight-sound-shape-texture details in the Caprice to keep me entertained. My early-childhood synaesthesia had begun fading, and so most of these were much less abstruse: the key-in/door-open buzzer sounded like it was permanently pronouncing the first syllable of “Angry”, the turn signals went “kerTee? kerTee? kerTee?”, the hazard flashers went “Dote…Dote…Dote…”, changing the radio station by pushing one of the preset buttons made a “SWUTCHinn” sound, that kind of thing.
The rear windows rolled only halfway down, but that was surely better than nothing; in 2019 I found a letter from my father’s father to my parents, scolding them for wasteful extravagance in choosing the Caprice rather than a Malibu. Fortunately his counsel on the matter arrived after they’d already bought the car, or my sister and I might’ve been stuck back there with a Malibu’s fixed windows.
And speaking of windows, the car was designed before finite-elephant analysis and airflow simulation and suchlike, which is probably why driving with the front and rear windows open on either side of the car (or both) at certain speeds would set the vertical run of a fastened front seatbelt flapping rhythmically and whapping against the B-pillar trim: “Beck! Beck! Beck! Beck!”.
I reckon my parents got the car when they did for a collection of sturdy reasons: the Dart was ageing, this great new model and its big ads had come along, and dad still had solid income for having not yet left the abusive Philadelphia law firm where he worked. By and by he got hired by a firm in Denver, and my folks found a house, so all that was left was to move there. In the Spring of 1980, my folks packed me (newly four) and my sister (seven) and themselves into the Caprice and we headed West.
We left the house in Wyncote for the final time last thing at night, proceeding only as far as a motel somewhere near the Interstate. Sister and I were hungry, and what was available at that hour was french fries in a styrofoam box shaped like a seashell—a mealy meal that foretold most of the rest of them on that trip. Breakfasts were at the motel—often a Howard Johnson’s, so not only little hold-in-the-hand boxes of cereal but also eggs and pancakes and (questionable) orange juice. But we ate many lunches and dinners at McDonalds; whaddya gonna do on a road trip with a coupla whingey little kids?
Back then people still believed in the fairytale of the –swimming pool non-peeing section– restaurant non-smoking section, and sister and I dipped the ends of our french fries—the real ones, at that time—in ketchup to provide a red end as we “smoked” them. Monkey see, monkey do.
But seriously, though: whaddya gonna do on most-of-a-week’s 1,800-mile road trip with a coupla whingey little kids? My parents’ solution was a small Panasonic cassette player which they’d use in the front seat in the morning for boring tapes of grownups talking, and if sister and I behaved ourselves we got to use it in the afternoon.
What did little kids listen to in 1980? The Smurfs, maybe; I’m sure it was tiresome. Still, my folks kept their word, and most afternoons we got to use the tape player. They also surprised us with a Simon, which was a hot new item at the time:
When we weren’t listening to tapes or playing Simon, we were serenaded by the car’s rolling noise; tires of the late ’70s were quite a lot noisier than today’s. We also went up the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, since it was on the way; I remember the weird lift more than anything.
Mechanically, the trip was uneventful; the car did fine. The scenery scrolled past at a slow pace, especially during the long stretches when there wasn’t much of it; both parents were conservative drivers, and I’m sure they kept to the 55-mph speed limit (as evidenced by the Pinto wagon you’re about to see undertaking the Caprice). Eventually we reached the sign of the promised land, where some stranger took hold of the movie camera for a few moments, and most of a day later we pulled in at the new house. Neighbour kids quickly assembled to check out us new arrivals:
We settled in. The car got a new rear licence plate and its first front one—mother took me with her to the DMV, and just after the clerk handed over two green-and-white RN-2328 plates I learnt the difference between the words “lessons” and “licence”. There was also a trip to Mike Flannery Chevrolet for the car to be adjusted for Denver’s altitude. And another, and another after that; Flannery’s service department was not very competent, as it seems. In checking for this story whether they’re still around—they’re not—I find they were in legal trouble at the time, on probation for false and misleading advertising, deceptive marketing practices, and other I-am-shocked behaviour.
That winter we decided to try out skiing. Dad drove us the two hours up I-70 to Copper Mountain. I don’t know what kind of time he and mother had, and sister seemed to do okeh, but I had a pretty goddamn miserable day in ski school: bundled-up clothing layers, very uncomfortable ski boots, and futile attempts at putting the skis in a pie-wedge formation to slow down. I couldn’t even warm up with hot chocolate like the other kids; it had milk in it and I was intolerant. When it was finally time to go, we got back in the car and dad gave it a severe case of indigestion. I mean he flooded the hell out of it up there more than 9,700 feet above sea level. I guess he pumped the accelerator once or twice too much, then worsened things by continuing to pump as the engine failed to start.
Instead it turned over in that extra-quick manner flooded engines do. “It’s spluttering! It’s spluttering!”, sister and I helpfully songsang from the back seat, which surely improved the mood up front. By and by, dad decided a jump start would be necessary—he didn’t know much about engines. Someone was flagged down, and their correct advice was that a jump start wasn’t needed and wouldn’t help. Instead? “Put a stick in the choke”, he said.
“Put a stick in the choke! Put a stick in the choke! Put a stick in the choke!”, sister and I chanted, eager to do our part. Presumably the adviser was able to put his advice into practice by removing the air cleaner lid, pointing out the choke, and putting a stick of some kind in to hold it open, because before too much longer we were on our way. No stick was probably necessary; if dad had just held the accelerator to the floor while cranking, the carburetor’s own choke unloader would’ve done the job. Dad didn’t know much about engines.
One day in 1981, as mother steered the Caprice into the parking lot of the public library on Arapahoe Road, there was a CLENKaCLENG-CLANG from under the car. She pulled into a parking space, shut off the ignition, and then came more noise from under the car: GLOONK!(slosh)…GLOONK!(slosh)…GLOONK!(slosh). A tire iron in the gutter had flipped up as the car’s tire rolled over it, and its sharp end punched a hole in the gas tank, which was now gloonking its contents in an expanding pool on the pavement. Mother flung the driver’s door open, ran round and opened the right rear door, and screamed at me to get out of the car. I had no idea what was going on, and it wasn’t unusual for mother to scream, unprovoked and out of all proportion to whatever was happening, so I didn’t perceive any unusual urgency. I unbuckled and climbed out the car at my usual speed—five- and six-year-olds were considered to have outgrown child seats back then—whereupon mother grabbed me and ran (it began to dawn on me that something was the matter) into the library, which shared a building with a bank.
I didn’t get to see any of the excitement outside; I wound up being parked in the office of one of the bank employees. Her name was Ms. Mick and with mother’s permission she offered me a sugarless hard candy. While I was sitting on the floor behind Ms. Mick’s desk, lemon hard candy in my mouth, I saw a curious device mounted in the upper front corner of the underside of the desk: a little box with two red pushbuttons on it, one on each side facing away from each other, and a wire leading away to somewhere. The button pair was just begging to be squeezed, so I did, a few times. Er…whoops. Well, I guess emergency responders were needed, though not really the type I’d just alerted. In the end there was no fire. The car got towed and I don’t remember how we got home from the library.
Mother had signed up at D.U. for a(nother) go at law school, and one night in 1983 she didn’t come home on schedule. Dad and sister and I began a gradual worry ramp-up as the hour grew later and later. Finally the phone rang: she’d been halfway through a junction of two major thoroughfares when someone ran a red light and T-boned the Caprice fast and hard. I never saw the damaged car itself, but I did see pictures. The other car had hit her driver’s door and B-pillar, and caved in the whole middle of the left side of the car. It was adjudged fixable (remember body-on-frame cars?). I knew there was a thing such as auto bodywork—a Sesame Street segment had covered that subject; I remember the body shop man in it telling the customer “y’gunna nevvuh know da diffrince” in a thick Bronx accent. But I wasn’t clear on how the inside of the car could be fixed, and I asked my dad about it. He said they would use pieces of the original doors on the replacements. That didn’t quite make sense to me; I was thinking of the doors as unitary rather than composite, but eventually the car came back looking just about the same as before, though the locks on that side were a little wonky.
Dad credited the car’s side-impact guard beams for saving mother’s life and limbs. He was probably right. That and the seatbelt; mother and dad were devout belt-users, which was very unusual in the States at that time. Everyone in the car had to buckle in—family, friends, coworkers, no matter—no belt, no move; no exceptions.
One day in 1985 we drove up to have supper with our friends the Smiths, who lived above Nederland at around 9,000 feet—about 3,500 feet higher than home. As we went our way up the winding, narrow, slow roads in the last miles towards their house, we detected a steady hornlike tone, gradually growing louder. We figured it was some kind of an alarm, maybe at a construction or forestry site somewhere we couldn’t see. We parked in the Smith driveway, got out, and quickly figured out the noise was coming from the car. It sounded like a stuck horn, but not like the car’s actual horn. Dad cocked his ear and walked around the car, eventually homing in on the rear licence plate. He flipped it down, loosened the fuel cap, and with a “PHHFWHSHHhhhhhh” the horn tone ended. We must’ve had a tank of especially volatile gasoline, and the high altitude made it evaporate so much that it overwhelmed the vapour containment system; pressure in the tank built until it forced open the overpressure valve in the cap. The valve itself was oscillating between open and closed, doing exactly like the reed in a wind instrument. Hornpipes, fillpipes, what’s the big difference?
Generally the Caprice aged well without major failures. The (in)famous accoustic headliner didn’t sag, but it did fade where the sun hit it on the inside of the C-pillars. For some reason a vivid green(?!) steering wheel wrap was applied. The steering column’s upper bearing developed a noise that sounded like that “oooOOOOoooweeeEEEEeeeeoooo” of an old AM radio tuning across the dial. The speedometer’s bearings wore so the stirrup and cup went “ting-ting-ting-ting!” and the needle flicked from 1 to about 20 miles per hour. The door pulls pulled off when the screws broke through the plastic end brackets (repair parts were readily available from NAPA). The parking brake release broke (ditto). The battery died one afternoon between mother bringing us kids to Nellie Vertenstein’s house for our piano lessons and trying to drive us home thence. I think I remember a radiator hose failure, and the bumper’s plastic impact strip fell off outside the bagel bakery.
As I’ve previously described, the car developed a badly clogged catalytic converter that made alarming noises but didn’t get fixed; nonfeedback carburetors and catalytic converters were a bad marriage even at sea level, and we lived more than a mile up.
By 1987 my folks decided it was time to replace the red car and sold it to Laurie, but before I can tell about Laurie’s buying the red car I’ll have to tell about the blue car.
Tune in next week!
I think that a lot of people’s experiences with that body style Caprice were similar-far from perfect, but mostly good. Today it’s fair to assume at least a couple of years of problem free motoring at a time, interrupted by only minor issues, for many years. There was a ’75 Caprice in our family which had been very troublesome, but the ’77-up Bs and Cs in our family were usually such an improvement over the car that they replaced that their own flaws were overlooked.
My parents bought a new 77 Impala wagon when I wad a teen. The ony thing that ever went wrong was the A/C. Once the compressor seized on the Cross Bronx Expressway, and this was when stripped cars on blocks were a common sight there. There was a horrible screeching, Dad was obviously very worried. He turned off the A/C so he could hear where the sound came from … and it stopped. He was so relieved, but didn’t get it fixed for quite a while. A few years later I was at some event out in the Pennsylvania Dutch country, and the (finally fixed) A/C decided to dump the whole load of freon into the passenger compartment when I got in to go home.
The only other failing was that the rear springs wore out quickly after a 7000 mile road trip filled with a lot of heavy camping gear. What a big change from their previous 2 cars, a 72 Vega wagon and a 67 Saab 2 stroke wagon.
My first car was a used 1979 Caprice Classic that I bought in early 1985 when I was 19 years old and the Caprice had 58,000 miles on it.
It had the 305 2 barrel which was rated at a lowly 130 HP for that model year coupled to a 3 speed automatic…..I believe it also had 2.56 rear axle gearing which made for low engine RPM’s on the highway and 19 mpg.
It was two tone….black primary color with silver on the sides of the car.
It was not a loaded car as far as options….though not a bare bones car either as it had A/C and power windows, factory installed rear air shocks along with the standard power steering and brakes….No cruise control, no power seats, no intermittent wipers, no fancy stereo system beyond a simple AM/FM radio, no power locks…but it served me well for the 5 years I owned it.
I traded it in with 89,000 miles for a used 3 year old S10 Blazer and in hindsight, I should have kept the Caprice longer….The S10 suffered from a lack of power from its 2.8 V6 and drank gas to the tune of 10 mpg city and 17 highway.
C&D said onlookers confused it with a Seville. Was there much difference in quality and refinement between them besides the Caddy throttle body fuel injection and rear disk brakes?.
I vote this model ,MB 123 series and Volvo 240s as the most reliable cars ever built in the last century.
I have personally seen a Chevrolet Impala go for one than 1,000,000 km with absolutely no engine repairs. My dad bought it new and then made it into a taxi. The body finally gave up the ghost and was no longer worth fixing.
I pulled out the 350 and sold it for $200. I spent the money on beer.
Those 2-tones they put on the ’77-’79 Caprices looked really sharp. In 2005 or so I was a day late pouncing on a Hemmings ad for a very fully loaded ’79 Caprice in your same black/silver, with very low miles and a very friendly price…dammit.
Nice story, Daniel. The sounds, textures, and smells of the cars we grew up in stay imprinted for life, even if we never got to drive them ourselves. I will always have the blood red interior and nasty door-open buzzer of my family’s Aries in my memory bank.
I used to think the B bodies were big and bland, but stories like yours and the many writeups about them on this site have given me a new appreciation for these. I’m glad your mom survived the t-bone, and it probably is attributed to driving a big, safe Caprice.
My 79 Caprice got rear ended twice at stoplights at a 5 mph impact speed from the other car.
My car had no damage thanks to the steel bumper…The plastic bumpers and front fascias of the other cars suffered damage.
As a fleet operator, I loved the 5 mph bumpers. One could actually bump something and not spend $1500 to fix it.
Modern “bumpers” are a bad joke.
Priorities have shifted from preventing car damage to preventing pedestrian damage.
Another enjoyable reminder of the joys and tribulations of childhood. You note the low level of equipment on your family’s Caprice, but I don’t think that was unusual in 1977. Particularly on a Chevrolet, as GM buyers had been conditioned for two generations for go to another dealership when they were ready for a nicer car. Mid-trim models with a/c, V8, auto, PS PB and not much else was pretty normal. My Mother’s 74 Luxury LeMans and my stepmom’s Cutlass Supreme of the same year were both top-of-the-line models and were equipped almost the same way. An AM/FM radio with crummy speakers was a big upgrade!
It was good to read that your Mom came through the crash so well. Yours was not the only family obsessive about seat belts. My mother always insisted that they be used – although we never used the separate shoulder strap that stayed neatly tucked into its clip on the 72 Cutlass. And she didn’t seem that concerned that there were none in the back seat of the 64 Cutlass. But whenever someone sat in front those belts got used.
My parents also were devout seat belt users as well., and insisted everyone in the car use them. Both spent time working in hospital emergency rooms in the 1950s, seeing auto accident carnage. Dad even installed seat belts in his Morris Minor as it was too old to be so equipped.
Ironically my first car accident was the first time I went anywhere without a belt. My friend’s grandmother drove the two of us on an outing in her AMC Hornet. I was 9 or 10 and vary concerned the seat belts could not be found . Grandma had jammed them under the seat cushion. I vividly recall her saying “You don’t need the belts, I judge my distance. “. She drove only TWO BLOCKS before piling the Hornet into the back of a 71 Cutlass Supreme, the impact piling me against the dashboard.
I’ve never driven without belts again, as I recall.
There were some real anti-seat-belters in that generation. When I bought my 68 Newport in the mid 1990s the only belts to be found in the car were the shoulder belts clipped to the headliner. I was expecting a junkyard expedition to find some, then took out the rear seat cushion to see if any mounting hardware was there – lo and behold, the entire set of seatbelts was neatly folded up under the back seat. I wasted no time re-installing them.
My grandfather (father’s father; owned the green-in-yellow ’72 Dart described in last week’s instalment) didn’t care a feather or a fig for seatbelts. Whenever he’d visit and get in our car, my parents and us kids would set up a chorus of directives to fasten his seatbelt, which I have to think made him want to smack the lot of us. He’d have a few tries, then say “Go ahead and drive; I’ll just hold the belt”. Not good enough; the car wouldn’t move until the click.
Kind of amazing he survived the end of the Dart; he might have been wearing the lap belt, but I wouldn’t bet on it.
My guess is AM-FM radios were also comparatively expensive options. I was elementary school aged, but my dad bought AM-FM radios at Sears for the family cars in the 70s. Eventually these were replaced with Pioneer Super Tuners – remember that blast from the past.
Keep an eye on next week’s instalment. 🤓
Thanks, J. If you’ll look closely at the second pic of the Dart in last week’s episode—the one with my mother and sister standing behind it—you’ll see the shoulder strap hanging down; my folks were among the statistically-nonexistent people who used them.
I figured out you’re between me and my brother in age. I’m not sure what was different in your area, but the kids I knew wore seat belts, and my parents generally did, too. My maternal grandparents didn’t in town, but would when traveling by interstate. The other grandfather did, I don’t remember riding with that grandmother before she died. I don’t doubt that early 70s saw less use because they were less convenient in design, too. By the early 80s anyway, seatbelts were the normal as far as the people I was around.
Your people and mine were outliers; take a look.
Looking at that data and shaking my head in a superior manner, I was going to make some smarty comment about the slow decrease in the stupidity of the population or somesuch, except for this: it was only perhaps 10-15 years ago that I realized how dangerous low-back seats are, so I’m not really in a position to preen. (I seriously thought their only relevance was for a rear-ender, forgetting my year 7 science that for each reaction – here, forwards ho – there’s an equal and opposite one backwards! Oh dear).
I also thought that lap belts were a good thing, and it’s true that they’ll save you from ejection or perhaps inadvertently killing another occupant, but in a serious prang, they cause appalling injuries to the wearer. The local buff book, Wheels magazine, began not including cars without lap/sash in all seating positions from its influential Car of the Year from about 2001. Had an immediate effect, too. The little Opel Corsa (Holden Barina) released in ’01 recalled any sold and retrofitted them in the middle back seat, and went on to win the award that very year.
Belt usage was made compulsory here in ’71, causing an immediate 13% drop in fatalities, and it’s only ever fallen since. Anecdotally, I’d put belt use here at 99% today. However, when the stats on deaths are looked at, there’s still a really depressing proportion, about 20% from memory, who were unbelted, though it must also be said that many such were also drunk or high too.
Australia was an early leader in 3-point (lap/sash) seatbelt fitment—they were offered as at least optional equipment at least as far back as 1964 or so, I think—and I’m hazy on details, but didn’t some states and territories mandate their fitment and use earlier than ’71?
The US (and perforce Canada, handcuffed to American regs by the powerful American auto industry) was a late adopter of front 3-point belts, and a very tardy adopter of rear 3-point belts and belt-use requirements. Arguments against were the same thoughtless, ignorant ones now in fashion about masks to slow the spread of COVID: freedom and liberty, government overreach, junk science, it affects only me so it’s only my choice, they’re uncomfortable, etc. It’s an unfortunate cultural peculiarity, as it seems.
I tried wearing the shoulder belts my parents’ ’73 Olds Custom Cruiser and later on my Ford Pinto. They were awful. Properly belted in you could not touch or operate any of the controls on the instrument panel (lights, wipers etc). The retractable ones from later years were a vast improvement.
Completely agree. Couldn’t reach to release the parking brake, etc—ridiculous. The unitary 3-point belt was known and commercialised technology at the time, too; Volvo had them, Saab had them, they were in just about everything sold in Australia, Chrysler were building Valiants and Darts with them in Switzerland, etc. I really think the separate shoulder belts were a deliberately nasty, cynical, crass attempt—one of many—by the automakers to turn American public opinion against auto regulations in general.
Driving 55 in the fast lane is called Nestoring, after a man called Nestor who bragged in the Wash. Post about doing so to slow down Beltway traffic to the legal speed. An avalanche of abuse fell upon him.
When I was 3, my grandmother came to visit us in Alexandria from NC in her brand new ’64 Cadillac, and the neighbor kid (not me!) left my tricycle behind her car right before her departure. Backing over it punched a hole in her gas tank. I don’t remember a huge panic, because my mother had considerable sang froid. Fortunately, we lived only a couple of miles from Lindsay Cadillac, a favorite haunt of mine in the 70’s after we returned in ’69 (Dad was in the Navy). The second house was even closer.
Some years ago a spokesman for the Washington State Patrol said, “If you want to regulate other people’s driving, you should apply to join the WSP.”
Never in my whole life have I see so many cops on a road than in Washington state. I-5 is thick with them. My solution is to drive the speed limit.
It’s ironic because if you follow the Left Lane Prius page on Facebook, many of the pictures come from Washington state. The Prius drivers actually do the job of the WSP with absolutely no expenditure of public funds.
I will add that as item numberrrrrr »flips pages…flip, flip, flip, flip, flip, flip, flip«…6,969,090 to my list of reasons I’m glad I quit Fecebook a decade ago. 🤓
In my state it’s illegal:
The law requires that on multilane highways, where the speed limit is at least 65 miles per hour, drivers must stay out of the far left lane except for passing. The exception is rush hour, when motorists are not able to move over.The Colorado State Patrol had sought the change because they thought the practice of slow driving in the fast lane contributed to road rage.
It’s a good law, assuming it’s enforced. The same with the Minimum Speed Limit 55 signs posted next to the left lane when heading up I-70 Westbound towards Conifer/Evergreen.
Jim, I think it is enforced, or it was. I recall DP blog comments from people complaining about being pinched for not moving right “even though I was going 68 in a 65 zone on the Turnpike.”
Related (but NSFW): Craigslist Ranters Take on Slow “IDIOT DRIVERS” in Denver Fast Lanes
Much like the underground coal fires near Glenwood Springs, the keep-right-except-to-pass debate has been burning for many years.
Yeah and I’ve seen many thousands of “slower traffic keep right” signs in California and never heard of anyone being pulled over for driving too slow in the left lane. CHP only seems to care if
#1 you’re speeding
#2 you’re drunk
#3 you’re on a cellphone
In that order.
Impeding traffic, reckless driving, cutting people off, who cares. Besides they can’t see that stuff if they’re sitting by the side of the road looking thru a radar gun.
But yes, technically it’s illegal here too.
Yep, here is Nestor’s original 1984 Letter to the Editor about driving slow in the left lane:
Dr. Nestor’s (he was a cardiologist who drove a Chevy Malibu) letter was in response to another letter written by a woman who complained about being tailgated. His response generated a flurry of additional letters over the following month — some pro-Nestor and some against.
Several weeks later, this letter (below) was published, which cemented Dr. Nestor’s name in local lexicon:
Artificially-low highway speed limits really do a job on lane discipline, and the 55-mph U.S. national limit also spawned smug, pious, smarmy self-righteousness like Nestor’s. It came in variant forms, too (I’m a taxpayer; I paid for this road and we have freedom in this country so I get to pick whatever lane I want, etc).
In my experience a lot of it has to do with local customs, local rules and local enforcement. In much of the Mid-Atlantic and southern New England passing on the right is illegal, and at least used to be enforced (CT especially). In California I am passed on the right at least half of the time, and I never ride in the left lane. (“Pass left, drive right”). It happens just as often on an empty freeway, and even when I am in the 2nd to right lane of a 5 lane freeway. I get it – it’s a lot more comfortable for the passer – but it’s very dangerous. (I recall 18 wheelers with two bumper stickers with arrows: ” passing side” and ” Suicide”.)
As for regional differences, I was shocked at how polite drivers were when I visited Minnesota – good lane discipline, and they’ll let you in with your turn signal. And of course Boston drivers are legendary…
I want to chime in another reason why people tend to drive on the left lanes.
In 1989, my cousin and I drove from Germany to Italy via Austria. What shocked us the most was the awful condition of asphalt-surfaced highways in Austria. The right lanes had the biggest and deepest ruts we ever saw. The ruts were wider than my cousin’s VW Golf Mk1, and we struggled to maintain control of the car. We ended up driving on the smoother left lane for the rest of travel to Austrian-Italian border. To make the matter worse, Golf’s small diesel engine barely had enough power to reach the highway speed limit due to the higher altitude. We unintentionally pissed off every driver on the left lane…
Austria was caught off guard in the 1980s when Switzerland implemented the expensive annual vignettes. Most of vehicular traffic travelling between Germany and Italy suddenly diverted to Austria, leading to the rapid deterioration of road surface.
Fast forward to today: my friends and I drove through Austria a several times. I am happy to report that many of highways there already have thicker concrete surface and are free of deep ruts.
Great write up. I tend to think of these Chevies as a more dependable choice than the various Valiants/Darts whose praises are more universal. Perhaps a Dart from the 60’s would have been more memorable, but by 1975, it would be requiring many expensive repairs due to poor body integrity (welded in torsion bars, spring shackles, rust, etc) and have more electrical issues such as starters, alternators, endless ballast resistors, etc. While the driveline was proven in the Dart/Valiant, the Chevies would just run longer without endless issues. I guess a lot of it was down to luck, whether you managed to get a “good” one versus a “bad” one.
Chrysler’s starters and alternators were perfectly fine and quite durable; what made them seem short-lived was the wide, cheap availability of poorly-“remanufactured” items requiring early and frequent re-re-re-re-replacement.
Ballast resistors lasted just fine, too, until the cowl-to-hood seal would fail, allowing water to drip onto the hot resistor, which would then break. Fixing the actual root cause of the problem staved off a need for serial replacement.
There was no rust on the Dart when it went away, just a fair collection of dents, including one across the top of the roof from where mother had got confused and pushed the garage door button right after shifting into Reverse to back out.
Keep in mind that the automotive state of the art advanced enormously between the two model years at hand here, 1970 and 1978. The later-model cars weren’t necessarily inherently better (Aspen vs. Dart, for example, by just about every measure of durability and dependability), but there just huge leaps in what was possible and feasible in every aspect of automotive engineering and construction.
Daniel
I think that you might have a point. I replaced the alternator/starter with a C/T reman unit, and I recall the ammeter pegging on the highway a month later, so the trauma of the event is still evident some 35 years later. I had a starter replaced on my Eldo a few year ago that gave up the ghost within a month and was put off reman units at the same time. The ballast resistor was a poser when it first went, but I kept a supply in the glove box and could whip them out in minutes. The ’78 B body was a generation removed from the Dart, contributing towards better reliability. Please keep the great stories coming, and if you should come across a perfect ’75 Valiant Brougham coupe with 318, keep me in mind….I would still have to be able to crawl underneath and not see a speck of rust, though, and need multiple counseling sessions, though.
If C/T means Canadian Tire, just you wait til the chapter two Caprices from now!
Yes. Sad news. The alternator in the Valiant went, and I obtained another from said supplier. The ammeter would go from normal to full charge, and then full discharge in seconds about a month after I bought it, so no refund. The starter was also sourced there, and I think that they were “rebuilt” on the cheap. Thank goodness that I can now get new for the price of a rebuilt, but I do still have some oddities that you can only get rebuilt.
The Eldo had a starter rebuilt and installed at a local Firestone, and I was stuck away from home with a no start shortly after. Thankfully, I knew a transmission specialist that put in a new starter, but it too was out of the 30 day warranty and they wouldn’t refund labour. I get the feeling that they install new brushes, clean it up and then send it, and missed out on any flat spots on the armature, etc.. I’ve been sour on rebuilds ever since.
My ’78 Chev Bel Air coughed up her timing chain a few hundred yards from home, so I was able to coast to a spot right in front of my place and call CAA from the comfort of home. A sure sign that a car is working on your side!
No goodness-thanking’s due on that one, the “100% ALL FULLY COMPLETELY NEW NEW NEW!” items available at parts stores that used to push “reman” parts are Chinese imitations; it’s still a try-your-luck situation just about the same as before.
I grew up with a 72″clam shell” Buick Estate Wagon. Even that car was relatively stripped. Standard was the monstrous 455 4bbl and the THM 400…Other than that the only options were A/C…The first A/C car my dad ever bought, a third seat, roof rack, rubber bumper guards, remote control driver side mirror, AM radio and body side molding…No power windows, locks, tilt wheel. It was replaced with a 78 Estate Wagon….I can’t tell you how much nicer that car was. Smoother, tighter, quieter, better handling and faster. It had a few more options including the Olds 403 4bbl. No third seat but it had the notch back front seat with folding center arm rest and chrome accents….very classy…plus the seats were bright red, complimenting the burgundy exterior. It had wide chrome rocker molding which looked great too. But no power anything..no tilt…pretty basic but a great car
I do remember the classified ads of the day. Lots of “V8 PS/PB”.
Daniel: Really enjoyed this write up and boy, do I miss “Calvin and Hobbes”! I laughed out loud at the inserted strip! And by the way, I STILL have two similar models of the Panasonic cassette player displayed, one of which was my “go to” in my no radio equipped first car. Eagerly awaiting the next installment! 🙂
I have Calvin and Hobbes on my Instagram feed. Have a good laugh every morning!
Funny how the symbols were already standardised when that model was made, but the word equivalents weren’t yet. Play, Stop, Pause, and Eject, okeh, but “Cue” instead of Fast Forward and “Review” instead of Rewind.
To avoid constant C-battery replacement on the trip, they went to Radio Shack and got a clunky power adapter for the tape player; it plugged into the otherwise-idle cigarette lighter.
Candy cigars and cigarettes notwithstanding (as I’m a bit older than you), my brothers and I “smoked” McDonald’s french fries in exactly the same manner on more than one occasion. And I agree that there really was no such thing as a ‘no smoking’ section in any restaurant.
No-one in my extended family owned a Caprice – the closest would be my Mom’s Citation, which was a rolling slush fund for the local mechanic.
My brothers and I rode to school with my Dad in his ’71 Vega notchback (later to become my first car), and for whatever reason, he was a stickler for seat belt wearing. The Vega had the shoulder belts that were stowed above the door, so I usually had that on since I rode shotgun and my younger brothers were stuck in back. This habit paid off less than a week after I got my learner’s permit, when Dad let me drive home from the house we were building in Winder, GA and we got hit by a drunk driver who lost control on a rainy curve. The side-impact beam in the Vega’s door did its job, and we spun out across the oncoming lane of traffic into the ditch, where the car flipped up on its side. Dad had to bust the door glass out since the door was caved in and we climbed out unscathed. Pushed the car on its feet, and drove it home after the police did their bit.
Oh, I do remember those candy cigarettes. They tasted sort of like Pepto-Bismol with extra mint—gross, and unlike anything else—and came in a variety of pretend-brands with very realistic packaging. I think they were a deliberate ploy to plant and normalise ideas early, priming little kids to be more receptive to real cigarettes later on. And the candy cigars came in pink and blue; I think they were made of chewing gum.
Those separate lap and shoulder belts were an uncomfortable damnuisance, but they were a whole hell of a lot better than what came before (lap belts so that perhaps the bottom half of you might stay put, kinda—I once again invoke Shelley Berman).
Side-impact beams really work, not just anecdotally. I’m glad they’re required in the US and Canada, because otherwise they probably wouldn’t be present.
Side-impact beams really work, not just anecdotally.
Porsche learnt the painful lessons about the virtue of side-impact protection in the late 1970s. Porsche initially elected not to implement the US-mandated side-impact beams in its European-marketed 928 until one of its test drivers was killed in the side collision. The door caved in and caused extensive fatal injury to the driver. Afterwards, Porsche changed its policy and installed the side-impact beams to every model ever since.
That is interesting, Oliver. It is a shame that’s what it took to get the message through Porsche’s heads—a message ignored by Mercedes, BMW, Audi, and the people who make the ECE Regulations. X-(
Another enjoyable breakfast read.
My first exposure to these downsized B Bodies was through a well-to-do (inherited) friend of one of the engineers at the tv station in LA who had set up a fleet deal with a local dealer. He went through the option list like a kid with a fistful of money at the candy store: every conceivable HD component, and of course all the niceties for the occupants. It had the 350 4V, of course.
It was quite the car, in terms of its all-round performance. I was truly impressed with what GM had wrought; finally the big American car had nothing to be ashamed about again. For a couple of years, anyway.
It was my last really positive GM experience. And it was GM’s last really positive experience: in 1978 they had a huge 46% market share, as they were crushing Ford and Chrysler. But it was all downhill from there.
I remember once in the Roger Smith era when they hit 60% of the domestic market, which I didn’t realize at the time must have meant only US brands. I don’t think I’ve seen a graph of domestic v. import sales per year.
No wonder you liked these so well – you got to experience the 1% of cars that had everything these should have had!
My first experience was more varied. A 77 LeSabre sedan that was a decent car but slow as molasses with the V6 and a 77 Cadillac Fleetwood that was capable of burnouts with the 425 V8. Neither had any kind of suspension upgrade, though, and the Cadillac in particular was pretty roly-poly.
Well, the only thing that really mattered to me was the 350 and the F41 suspension. The rest were wasted on me.
My wife’s 77 Olds Delta 88 had the FE3 suspension, which was just marvelous. I had never been in a car that size that handled that well in everyday driving. I’m thoroughly glad she ended up with that car over the Monza Town Coupe she was trying to purchase.
At my one company, we had a motor pool for work related travel and they had a Chevy Impala that I drove often. I’m pretty sure that car may have been a 9C1 Impala, as it drove better than most other cars that size. The only letdown was the 305 motor, it was a bit on the weak side. I would reserve the car so often that it became known as “George’s car”.
The parts and pieces to make decent drivers out of B bodies were there, but they had to be chosen. For the vast majority of people buying cars, they weren’t looking for special performance, they just needed to get around.
Any idea what might be the difference between FE3 and F41?
It’s basically the same: a rear anti-roll bar, stiffer springs, shocks and bushings.
An FE-3 equipped Olds 88 was, in my opinion, peak B-Body.
I can’t fault your friend’s candy-store treatment of the order form. I’d’ve done exactly the same.
When I was eleven or so, at a “Summer Enrichment Program” put on by the University of Northern Colorado (sort of a pick-your-own-classes summer school thing), one day I saw an absolutely gwahgeous ’77 Caprice Classic in the parking lot. Deep metallic green with a tan interior, and bristling with options—fancy wheels, power locks and windows, tilt, cruise, backglass defogger, split bench seat, de luxe gauges, interior trim, exterior trim, Comfortron automatic HVAC, a top-line Delco radio/tape deck, the works. Photography was one of the classes I’d picked, and I convinced a classmate to take pics of me sitting on the front bumper. I wrote out in shaky longhand what I guess was my first such note and tucked it under the wiper, asking to be called if they wanted to sell it…um…in…like…five years or so. No reply, alas.
Word of the day: classactionally
…the classactionally underspecified TH200.
Lol
»bows, doffs cap« Uhhhthenkya. Thenkyavurramuch.
There’s plenty of nice little gems like that sprinkled playfully throughout Daniel’s writing. I especially liked ‘finite-elephant analysis’. Disappointed when I followed the link to find out that it wasn’t a thing. Sounds like something out of Terry Pratchett.
Thank you, Peter. I’m glad they bring smiles. I’ll keep sprinklin’.
I wanted to comment on the equipment levels of the cars in the 1970’s. Many folks (like my parents) had lived through at least one World War and the Great Depression. In addition, my folks were immigrants, they knew the value of money. So, even though my dad liked cars our new ones were largely just-under mid-level models. Sure we had Montereys or Montegos, but they were the low option engined ones with PS and AM radio.
My latest car is a 2009 model; the car has power everything. Economies of scale and streamlined manufacturing make this possible, but there are days I miss the 3 speed manual, crank window, AM only beaters I drove for a while. Similar to my single speed, coaster brake cruiser bike that I got over the Holidays… Stone simple, just ride and drive.
And oh for the days when you could drive an old car with busted a/c and not get cooked out of the thing on a hot day because all of your fresh ventilation air has to run past the fully-functioning heater core before it gets to you.
That’s why the good lord gave us brass quarter-turn ball valves and pipe thread to hose barb adapters!
The reality is that the options back then were absurdly expensive. To get a nicely optioned car, the total markup was easily 35-50%. That added up, especially when your weren’t leasing or taking out an 8 year mortgage.
Perhaps it paid for the additional color choices that we don’t have now. Or are they just giving us what they can get away with? I’m annoyed about all the black-dominated interiors, but it’s saving me money.
My father always said about options that it was just something else to break… I agree about the options being rather expensive at the time. When my brother bought his first new car in 1978, he’d hoped to get a nice car. It didn’t work out that way. He got a rather spartan Mercury Zephyr ES sedan for about $4100, IIRC. He wanted an AM/FM cassette radio, but it was an expensive upgrade, like $350 or so. He ended up settling for a AM/FM radio only.
If you thought your Impala basic, be assured that that is merely a matter of perspective. Allow me to blather for a moment.
In Australia, in 1978, the big news from GM was carpet.
Oh yes, that’s right, genuine artificial loop pile, on most of the floor (boot not included). Even harder to believe, a standard rear-window demister. It is possible, though dependent upon unreliable memory, that a locally-made AM radio was also fitted, and even though it turned out to be tuned almost always to the spark-plug frequency, I am probably wrong, as it seems far too indulgent.
The engine was a 200CI six with emphysema, the transmission a tangled bullwrestler column mounted three speed – though it is true about 40% got the three speed local version of the French GM automatic, here known as the Trimatic, or Traumatic to its many victims – and the steering was four and half turns of I’ll Park It Somewhere Else Muscle-o-Matic manual.
And in this factory spec, the vast, vast majority of the top-selling car was sold – and then driven in one of the hottest and driest countries on earth.
So imagine a long trip such as you describe, but in this latest and best from Holden. Oz roads were, and are, made of a coarse chip outside of the cities, and they caused even French cars to get a bit loud in the tyres: everything else roars as if the end of days are nigh. It’s hot, so the windows are all down, and the wind nearly outdoes the tyres for racket. The lungless engine is doing an idiotic 3000 rpm at 70 mph – god knows why gearing was so low here for so long, but it was – and the poor surfaces of the two-way “highways” meant a battle with the steering, as it became very vague about where to go at speed. Rocking, roaring, welded to the vinyl seats and probably a nearby sibling, hot, dried-out, and eventually, just exhausted, a child just longed to be There (and was sometimes foolish enough to enquire as to whether or not that was nearly the case). A tape machine, we had too, but wasn’t much good: in all the din, it was about as good as listening to a rock concert from five suburbs away. (And besides, mum had it, and didn’t share, and didn’t listen to good stuff anyway, but I digress).
What I would have given for a small V8! An automatic! What my mum would have done for power steering (and what I would have given not have all that walking from where she did come to rest)! And most blessedly of all, an airconditioner, and wouldn’t have cared if was so manual that I had to wind the fan myself. (Aircon was still a Ford and Holden option into the late ’90’s!)
So, when next you ponder the injustices of your childhood brought on by the parsimony of your progenitors, spare a thought for those less fortunate, for their suffering exceedeth that even of a camel with a needle stuck in his eye as he entereth the gates – I think that’s right – and pause before you make claim that your folk down-specced your family car.
Looking forward to more tales next week, Mr Stern. Your stuff is most engaging.
Good points, JB, artfully made—you can come to my singalong any ol’ time! (And thanks for the compliments; I’ll endeavour to carry on earning them).
I’m a little confuzzed, though. My knowledge of Australian cars drops off sharply on either end of the ’62-’81 Chrysler-Dodge products, but my impression is most of those had carpet as standard, their transmissions were fine (stick shift) to excellent (Torqueflite), their engines were excellent, their steering was well-sorted with or without power assist, etc. Assuming that’s at least mostly true, how can Holden have put out such inferior cars and retained such a superior market share? Was it purely just people buying by rote?
(Of course, that doesn’t negate your points about aircon and vinyl seats and that.)
Perhaps I should’ve been clearer: my folks’ car was a low-spec version in context of what was available. But it wasn’t unusually low-spec in context of what many people bought at that time. More I think about it, the Caprice was equipped almost identically to the Dart that came before it, apart from the FM radio, V8 engine, and aspects of safety and emissions control regulated more stringently in ’78 than in ’70.
Still: vinyl seats?! Luxury! We had to go out, barefoot ‘cos we ‘ad no newspaper to wrap round our feet, frow rocks at a horse ‘cos we could only dream of ‘avin’ a spear, let alone a gun, skin the horse and tan the hide by ‘ittin’ it wif our own two ‘ands, fold that up and sit on it.
Ah.
Now, there is a possibility that, in relation to factual cogency, I may have slightly increased the value of some facts over other facts, and also that some of those facts may or may not have been entirely based in truth, or not, but even though I admit to it only as a possibility, this potential fact may itself relieve your expressed need for understanding of which facts are which. Ahem.
That said – and I do hope that was helpful – Oz cars were awfully basic by US standards for years and years. As late as ’74, a Kingswood had vinyl floors and even drum brakes as standard. I’m almost certain it wasn’t till the HZ of ’77 that carpets were fitted as standard. A top-of-the-range Premier (or, say, Valiant Regal) only had auto, better seats, carpet and some trim bits to differentiate it, though many of those got options, understandably. The Chryco and Ford ranges were about the same. And as they all brought out fatties in ’71-72, they all really needed P/S (with the super-vague Chrysler being the least-worst for weight). People did indeed buy by rote, but that began to shift as well-equipped, well-made Japanese cars showed them other possibilities.
I speculate that an industry highly-protected by tariffs (and foreign quotas) made for relatively expensive cars, so options of P/S or A/c added too much, as well as which the entire nation was simply not as wealthy relative to the rest-of-world as it later became. Add to that a certain Anglo-uptightness about being too flash or sybaritic, a much more closed-off nation generally, and a belief in the myth of Holden as “Australia’s Own” and there might be the answer somewhere there to the endless sales of of some rather punishing machines.
To be entirely fair, the HZ referred to had suspension sorted by a German engineer, and was transformed from all Holdens before it into something really good. If fitted with the Oz-designed Bishop power steering, a/c and even the small 253 V8, it was a pretty damn good car for ’77, at least as much of an improvement on predecessors as the ’77 Chev seems to have been to its. Just a pity the bulk of them weren’t sold that way.
All of this waffle is really only to say that even a lowish-spec ’78 Chev Caprice seems a pretty flash car from here, and one helluva lot nicer for a long journey than what we mostly got, which is probably all my comment should have said!
It wasn’t that different here: these ’78 Chevys came standard with the 250 six and three speed manuals were still standard on some Chevy models.
Great COAL, thanks Daniel!
My family had just ‘returned’ to the US and I was 12 when these cars came out, and every day, there were more on the roads.
I think, in general, this is just one of those cars, like the original Mustang or the original Honda Accord. A good car that seems to bring out good or pleasant memories.
While the 1977 Impala AND Caprice came with the 250 six as the standard engine, none of GM’s full-size 1977 cars offered manual trans–at least not those for sale in the US.
All 1977 GM full-size cars had standard automatic, power steering and brakes–at least the US ones. Perhaps the Canadians got an entry-level Biscayne or Bel Air variant that may have been decontented.
The entry-level 1977 Collonades came with 3 on the tree as “standard” (though I’m sure that was extremely rare) and non-power brakes, perhaps also nonpower steering. The Cutlass offered an optional 5-speed with the anemic 260 V8. Probably lifted straight of the the Vega/Monza/Sunbird…
Ha, I have one of those Panasonic tape recorders packed away in a box.
I have and still use one of those Panasonics. The Cue/Review labels are because they added a feature so during playback, you could push the FF/Rew buttons and still hear a very speeded-up audio, to help find the start of the next track, or replay the same one, etc….
Now you’ve just reminded me sister and I tried amusing ourselves with the sped-up tapes that way, until our parents said to stop it or they’d take away the player.
Great story about the B-body road trip. I have notice missing white wall tires on the Caprice at the end of video, which I guess were not common back then. What is the reason, better tires available without the WSW?
Friend had nice two tone blue 79 Caprice with unstoppable drivetrain 350 V8+TH 350 loaded to the roof, including sunroof, posi, AC etc.. Imported from Switzerland, they like it fully loaded over there. Enjoyed many years of service when the engine started to knocking. But then new buyer transfer it into drag monster running 12s a 1/4mile so the Caprice keeps getting love. On the picture with my 87 Brougham (EU version sold new in Switzerland as well) back in 2009, happend to be missing WSW as well at that time.
I think it was just that my parents didn’t pay extra for whitewall tires—I don’t know for sure, but I guess they were an extra-cost option.
That’s an interesting ’87 you show; it has the EU side mirror, but the US headlamps. Maybe EU taillights? Can’t see ’em from here. 🤓
Black wall tires got you rollin, that’s what counts. Just did not know the white walls were optional back then, still learning.
With the headlamps, you surprise me they are US specs. I never replaced them and did not never notice the difference between mine and other EU specs Caprice but maybe I did not pay too much attention. But sure shine quite nicely with good quality OSRAM bulbs. The taillights are on the other hand, US specs by intention and we had one word or two about its LED bulbs in past. Still have EU taillights on the shell, they are getting very rare, but don’t like them.
Various countries on the European continent accept and reject various items of U.S.-spec vehicle equipment. Switzerland allows U.S.-spec (or nearly so) whole cars.
This Chevrolet Caprice in Australia has the ECE headlamps taken from Datsun Bluebird 910 (1979–1984). A perfect fit, methinks. I did look up and found out that this Bluebird model was sold in continental Europe as well. So, you should find the ones with correct right-hand-rule-of-road headlamp lens.
I came across a Swiss vendor’s ebay listing that has so many export taillamps from General Motors for sale. Try him and see if he has a set specifically for your Caprice.
https://www.ebay.ch/sch/dobritz/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_ipg=&_from=
Wow, that’s got to be the best alien-headlamp graft job I’ve ever seen. GM did much sloppier jobs on other models—I’m thinking of certain Cadillacs in Europe.
My Father bought probably the nicest (looking) car out of the showroom in October 1978, a ’78 Caprice Classic Wagon, like the one you picture with a burgundy interior/exterior with woodgrain. It was loaded, probably had the most options of any car he was to buy, but still had the 305, but did have the trailer towing package as he still had our ’73 Viking camper he hauled with it. Instead of a strip speedometer, his had the round gauges, including a fuel economy (vacuum) gauge.
Alas, didn’t have the car long, it succumbed to the same fate as yours, on route 281 near Johnson City, as my Father was taking some relatives on a tour (our relatives being almost all on the East coast, meaning we didn’t get them stopping in as we lived so many miles apart). Another car broadsided him, and rather than get the Chevy fixed, he bought the worst car he ever owned, an ’84 Pontiac Sunbird. He should have fixed up the Chevy and driven it a few years more
An interesting read and thanks for the link to learn about French fries!
Great movie clip of your trip to Colorado!
About the same time, our family was relocating from Connecticut to California and my daughters were 5 and 3 at the time. We drove the trip to visit family along the way (about a week) in our 1980 Chevrolet Impala station wagon with the DIESEL engine. What a pain in the butt that trip was with two young girls and a poky DIESEL.
Our furnishings were shipped and another car was on the van (1973 VW Beetle). I dumped the Diesel wagon shortly after arriving in Ca for an Olds 98.
Groan, I can only imagine. At least on an Interstate trip you wouldn’t have much worry that the nearest gas station wouldn’t have diesel, but you’d’ve had to cope with fuelling a passenger car at a truck stop. Also, yeah, zero to 60 in…ohhhhh, maybe sometime later this month
Thank you so much for this. My grandmother had a Caprice of similar vintage and your sound effects are spot-on. I used to giggle at the car’s sounds as well. Thank you for triggering an old, happy memory.
Y’welcome! 🤓
6.15.2023
I’m amazed I missed this the first time out .
Good stories and THANK YOU ALL for the various links ! Marty Feldman was a god to some of us .
? when was that clip filmed ? .
-Nate