My father-in-law has a huge talent for finding and procuring both cheap cars and low mileage cars. It’s even better for him when he is able to combine the two into one example.
In the early 1970s he was able to do just that with a 1957 Plymouth having 8,000 miles which he purchased for a pittance. This was the car used to transport his only daughter home from the hospital in very late 1972. However, in 2001, he was only able to cover the cheap part. Enter one remarkably clean 1992 Ford Crown Victoria, a car that would have two chapters in my life.
Like my 1986 Crown Victoria, this baby blue Crown Vic had been purchased new by the Missouri State Highway Patrol. In a weird twist of fate, paperwork in the glove compartment revealed it had been assigned to a trooper in Cape Girardeau County, meaning it was from my old home turf.
However, its trajectory in life deviated significantly from my ’86 when it came time for the Patrol to divest themselves of it at just under 50,000 miles. Instead of being purchased by a university, this Ford was purchased by the Missouri Department of Mental Health and assigned to the Northwest Missouri Psychiatric Rehabilitation Center in St. Joseph.
While it may be a bit early for an aside, I have to include something into this memoir for some context. I subscribe to a YouTube channel called The History Underground. The Rehabilitation Center, formerly known as (hold on, it’s a reflection of times passed) State Lunatic Asylum Number 2, operates and maintains a museum called the Glore Psychiatric Museum which shows the history of treating mental illness.
The History Underground recently toured the Glore museum. The preview picture is a bit graphic, thus not shown here, but here’s a link to the video. It’s mind-blowing (I’ve visited the museum and it’s even more mind-blowing in person) and I only mention the video as it helps give some perspective on where this car came from – plus it’s also just plain old fascinating.
Incidentally, our house in St. Joseph was contiguous with property owned by the Rehabilitation Center. It was a short walk over the hill and across the field to get there.
With all that said, how specifically did this Ford enter my life? Glad you asked.
I had been keeping an eye on various state auctions, which is how I had learned about my ’86. When this Ford came up for sealed bid auction in mid-2001, I told my father-in-law about it. He subsequently entered a bid for $651.50 and won the car. It had right at 100,000 miles on the odometer.
The only real out of the box issues with that Crown Vic were the valve guide seals were no longer overly vibrant, a not uncommon issue with the early 4.6 liter V8 engines, and the fuel pump croaked as my in-laws were driving it back to their home about an hour north of St. Louis. After that it gave them great service.
In January 2002, an extremely pregnant Marie was given a baby shower by her brother’s wife. Their house was twenty minutes from my in-laws house, meaning a nearly four hour trip to get there.
Marie was seven months pregnant by this point and her ability to get into the Thunderbird was marginal and it was nearly non-existent for her Escort. We talked about how to transport her to her parents. She decided we should take my ’86 Crown Victoria as she could stretch out easily in the backseat. Problem solved.
This is NW Missouri by some definitions. St. Joseph is mostly in Buchanan County, seen highlighted here
However, there were objections raised after the plan was executed. That ’86 Crown Victoria had a leaking heater core and I had bypassed it, meaning there was no heat. Thinking about it, I never did replace the heater core, so I was driving a car with no heat in Little Siberia, also known as Northwest Missouri. Either I’m tougher than I realize or I can simply ignore such things. Or maybe my drive to work was simply that short. Who knows.
The lack of heat didn’t bother Marie. She was relentlessly hot during this time and she had some blankets if need be. The trip was a snap.
Well it was until her parents learned my Crown Vic had no heat. That went over like the proverbial turd in the punchbowl. That’s where this ’92 first entered my life as we were sent back to St. Joe in the ’92, with my in-laws keeping my ’86 at their house. This loan (trade?) was a long-term loan (trade?) and, due to Marie’s ongoing pregnancy-induced mobility challenges, this would be the car in which we brought Eileen home from the hospital.
This loan lasted until late summer of 2002. In that time we put a bunch of miles on that Ford due to many follow-up doctor’s appointments for both Marie and Eileen. This series of events had been brewing for a while and was a secret storm until it hit with its full fury.
But, in regard to this particular Ford, it had its own little secret storm. In late 2003 or early 2004, my in-laws gave Marie and me this Crown Victoria. While it was free, a transmission leak was diagnosed as a bad torque converter. It seems the transmission must have been dropped when the car was owned by the Department of Mental Health. In turn, a bolt of some variety had chewed up the torque convertor before becoming lodged into the bell-housing.
After that pricey little endeavor, all that Ford ever required was a quart of oil every few hundred miles. It was a good running and driving car that was light years ahead of that ’86 in every possible metric except oil consumption. That ’86 never used a drop.
Toward the end of 2004, we got a call one night from a friend of Marie’s. She and her husband, Gene, along with their five kids (ranging in age from 12 years to 4 days – yes, you read that right) had lost the transmission to their 1991 Ford Taurus wagon while headed back to their old house outside of Kansas City from their new home near Omaha. The transmission in their Taurus had crapped out right at St. Joseph and they were two miles away.
They needed refuge for the night. How can you say no?
The rest of this little soiree was covered here. For anyone remembering it and thinking it was exaggerated folly, it isn’t. It truly did happen. One could say that was yet another secret storm involving this poor Ford.
In short, I ultimately loaned them the Crown Vic a few days later as they wanted to go home and I wanted them to go home. Gene took a real shine to that Crown Vic and, as they were needing a second vehicle a few months later, I sold him the Crown Victoria and gave my father-in-law a cut of the sale price.
While Gene has many talents, automobile maintenance is not one of them. Despite my having told him repeatedly to keep the oil topped off, he didn’t do so. A year or so later, Gene and his family relocated to Dayton, Ohio. He forgot to check the oil and the 4.6 in that Crown Vic seized.
Last I knew, Gene had sold the car to somebody around Dayton who had given that Crown Vic one last hurrah – he entered it into the demolition derby at the Ohio State Fair.
(Author’s Note: The Secret Storm aired on CBS from February 1, 1954, to February 8, 1974. All Crown Vic pictures have been harvested from the web.)
Little pearls like:
“This loan (trade?) was a long-term loan (trade?) and …”
– and –
“… as they wanted to go home and I wanted them to go home…”
make reading a good story even better as I smile when these pop up here and there.
I’ve always thought that the early Ford Taurus/Sable wagon twins were nice wagon designs but were ruined by the fact they have problematic transmissions, engines (3.8), power steering, and A/C.
Crown Vics might have had issues here and there and were not space efficient, but they were old and solid designs. 100,000 miles was just the beginning for them.
It is amazing how many miles some Crown Vics have racked up during their lives.
Mr. and Mrs. Gene gave me that Taurus wagon. It cost me $40 to have it hauled back to my house, then however much to title it in my name, just so I could donate it to charity after it sat in my driveway for a few months. I got hosed on that deal.
We saved them from another potential disaster a few years later, after we moved to Hannibal. The Chevrolet minivan which replaced the Taurus appeared to have low tire pressure. I offered to check the tires, but he declined. They left and got to the end of the street, before coming back. I suspect she grilled his butt about it, since all five kids were onboard.
I checked the tires. The first had all of 11 psi in it and I discovered steel belts having poked through the rear sidewall on one of the rear tires. The other rear tire was similar. I don’t care to think about what could/would have happened when one of those tires gave up between there and Dayton, Ohio.
As another who has experienced both the box and aero versions of the Crown Vic, it is really hard to believe that they could be considered the same car – for two cars that supposedly share so much, they feel like they could have been built by different companies. My 93 was a great handling car, and I would imagine that yours with the police suspension would have been even better.
And I know EXACTLY what you mean on the valve guide/oil consumption issue on those early 4.6 engines. I will have my own story on that in several weeks.
That history piece on the mental hospital looks like it is worth a watch.
The differences between the two cars are indeed vast.
You will definitely want to watch that video. I stumbled upon the channel when the host was visiting the site of the Battle of the Bulge so he covers a lot of territory, literally and figuratively. There is another video of him in Indianapolis visiting the presidential home of…whichever president was from Indianapolis. A little sleuthing revealed him to be based a shade over an hour away from me.
That would be Benjamin Harrison. Maybe I should watch that one too – I have lived in this city for 40 years and have driven past the Benjamin Harrison home more times than I can count, but have never visited there.
I suspect you will enjoy it. By no means am I shilling for the guy, but some video hosts are simply far better than others.
The Harrison home is a gem and the docent was excellent on my visit there from California in 2013. We often miss important sites in our own areas! I chastise from the vantage point of being a house museum docent in LA where we are now attracting more local visitors, in part because of the changes in travel brought about by the pandemic.
This reminds me to some extent of the Petersen House in Washington DC, across the street from Ford’s Theater and where Abraham Lincoln died a day after he was shot, and now on display as a historical site. I worked a block away for the over a year before deciding I should have a look. If you didn’t know its historical significance, it would be utterly humdrum, a typical 19th century rowhouse. What struck me most upon walking through it was the oddity of having a house there at all; it is in what’s now a completely commercial district with no homes anywhere in the vicinity; the area has been zoned for commercial and industrial use for at least the last 100 years. Even most of the nearby hotels are gone. Both the Petersen house and Ford’s Theater are preserved; the latter’s lower floor is now a Lincoln museum and the main floor is used as a theater. Some key artifacts are at both locations; others still exist but are kept at other places, such as the rocking chair Lincoln was sitting in at Ford’s in the Presidential suite which is now at the Henry Ford Museum. The horse-drawn Studebaker carriage Lincoln rode to Ford’s Theater in is at the Studebaker National Museum in South Bend, occasionally lent out to the Smithsonian.
Another great COAL chapter Jason. You and JP Cavanaugh are putting so much effort and fine details into your car biographies, it is very much appreciated. Us readers look forward to these every Saturday and Sunday now. Really enjoying your practical, and unconventional methods, to acquiring each car. And how you have remembered so many specific purchase details. Of course neat, the way they mostly follow a police car theme.
I am floored looking at the Missouri county map you supplied. 114 counties in Missouri, and 1,378 townships. By contrast, we have 22 counties and 200 townships, here in Ontario. With a significantly larger population and sq. mile area. I do hope it generally translates into more accountability and service at the local and community level.
This is a great installment, thank you!
Thanks. The police car thing never seemed so heavy until I started to schedule these pieces. It wasn’t any sort of plan; obviously, this one just sort of happened as did another. For the most part, when actively acquiring one, it was a matter of seeking cheap, durable, and reliable. It generally worked well in that regard.
You got me curious…Ontario’s population density (15.94 / square km) is just under half that of Missouri (34.1 / square km). That could account for some of the differences in the number of townships. Our smallest county (in both size and population) is Worth County (in the blue highlight above) with a population of 2,200 last I knew.
That’s an interesting point Daniel made, that I hadn’t really thought of. Worth County is about 267 square miles (so a chunk of land around 13×20 miles.). Just think of the expense (paid by taxes) associated with the number of individuals that run the county that could just as well run something larger if two (or more) were merged etc. while still being considered “small” in population as well as area.
In that particular case, that very scenario has been discussed at various times. It would make sense but that sticky political element seems to rear its ugly head at about the same time.
A little story about Worth County…years ago I met with a county official for some work-related item. We talked about their (lack of) tax base. He said there is a little clause in the Missouri Constitution in which the state will assume a county’s expenses should the county ever be devoid of funds. Knowing this, he was about to order some equipment, knowing it would tap them out and the state would pay for it.
Given how rural that part of the state is, consolidation of some counties could help defer some costs but it’s not like any individual county is offering any wonderous array of services. You’ve now got me wondering about the logistics of doing such a thing…
That clause is worthwhile for the benefit of the populace on the surface but obviously deeply flawed in execution as demonstrated by the county official, who’s function is most likely duplicated ten miles away and a single piece of whatever equipment it was could likely serve both (or more) counties just as well along with only one salary as I presume they don’t work for free…And yes, I avoided the word “politics” in my initial response as it’s obvious.
In California, during the big budget cuts of the 2000s there was much consolidation of police and fire forces between smaller (and immediately adjacent) towns/cities. While the number of line personnel presumably didn’t change, obviously there was no longer a need for two chiefs or two HR departments or two admin buildings or whatever when the departments went from 30 to 60 officers/firefighters etc. From a purely cost perspective it seems to make a lot of sense. The chief now overseeing twice as many people or twice as much area doesn’t need to earn twice as much money since a lot of the responsibilities and duties don’t increase proportionally if there are ten, twenty, or a hundred line personnel.
But yeah, you’d have to be a truly dedicated “public” servant to propose and follow through on eliminating your own job and whatever perks (officlal and unofficial) come with it for the benefit of your community.
Amalgamation and consolidation of overlapping public service costs and redundancy can, and has been used, at higher state and provincial level by political campaigns to gain voter support. Sometimes deceptively. Examples can be shown either way of better services with combining resources. Or disaster, with less accountability and service for residents.
I was just struck at the number of counties and townships in Missouri. I thought the numbers seemed quite high.
This article on the number of Texas counties I think hits the point of why many states have such small counties. https://www.texastribune.org/2018/07/03/beto-orourke-visited-all-254-counties-texas-why-are-there-so-many/
“Brooks said counties needed to be small enough that residents could travel to and from their courthouse in a day on horseback to do business. Most farmers couldn’t afford to take more than one day off to travel to the county seat.”
Regarding the tax base issue, sales taxes make up much of the revenue in my state and those counties that take in less than 70% of the weighted average get money from the money the state skims off of the counties/cities that get more than average. The net result is that many of those municipalities that are regular beneficiaries keep the local tax rate low while many of the better off municipalities tend to crank it up to the max allowable under state law.
In my 20 years of experience working for local governments, I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s an optimal size. Too small, and a government is unlikely to be self-sustaining, and will have to rely on larger units of government for many services. But too big, and the government itself loses accountability to the people it’s serving.
The optimal size seems to vary greatly, due to things like the type of government powers, type of representation, the competitiveness of local elections, and the personalities/preferences of the people who run the place (both elected and career officials). But in general it seems that mid-size places are better-run than their larger or smaller counterparts. Just my two cents.
Another excellent chapter that I’d heard parts of over the years. What stood out (beyond that fact I liked these cars a lot and seemed to ride in a lot of the Las Vegas LPG powered taxi versions for some reason, let’s just call it a minor life phase…) is the oil consumption.
You wrote like it was no big deal or totally normal that “all that Ford ever required was a quart of oil every few hundred miles”, this, in a modern car that had what seemed to be around 100k miles on it. I’ve had a fair amount of cars over the years, a decent number of them with more miles and have never had the need to add a quart at every gasoline fill-up or do some major maintenance job to stop that occurrence. I think the most I ever had was a quart every couple of thousand miles or when I remembered to check and I thought that was a little odd too, coincidentally on a bigger-engined Ford as well in that case.
Did I just get lucky or is this something people consider normal? And I’m not talking about some 50’s jalopy, but a bog standard, modern-ish car. I think it would drive me nuts to have to do that, you’d likely be driving around with a case of oil in the trunk…
Good question.
I view it as being typical for that particular car. In general, it’s atrocious. Yet I knew the valve guide seals were weak on the early 4.6 liter engines (this car was an early ’92, the first year of this generation and first year for the 4.6 being in it) so I simply expected it.
It wasn’t a quart per fill-up, more like around every 600 to 800 miles.
My only other oil user was an ’87 Dodge pickup, but it leaked it much more than it burned it. It was a great crack sealer for my asphalt driveway.
As Jason noted the oil consumption issue was limited to the earliest versions and then it really was only some of them. I’ve had two (actually still have one) of the version #1 2v 4.6s, those built before 12/91 and neither of them used much oil and both were used as daily drivers until about 200k. Yes they would be down 1/2~1 qt when it was time for an oil change but that was it.
Now I had purchased both of those with more than 100k miles on them so it is possible that someone had the valve stem seals replaced before I got them.
Why just the other day while cleaning the basement, I ran across a whole case of oil…the old dino-juice type that I no longer use and in a viscosity I don’t use either. It took me a moment to remember that this was something that I used to carry around in the trunk of one of my cars. I just can’t remember which one.
I eventually got rid of the car I guess, but I kept the oil.
Jason – the illustration of the ’92 Crown Vic reminds me that I always thought those were the best looking of the long run. I like the nose and I like the greenhouse.
And a note about Missouri. That state always seemed to spend the just a bit of extra money on full wheel covers. This observation goes back to the ’60s or so. Their patrol cars were seen in a variety of normal colors and seemed to always have standard, full wheel covers. But for police identity and black walls, a MHP sedan could have been a regular civilian car. Was this part of a strategy to sell decent, attractive cars at 50K miles? Colorado and Nebraska used to have two door sedan very basic Plymouths with dog dish hub caps and which wore whatever color scheme was used on all cop cars. Missouri cars actually looked decent.
Agreed about the ’92. When the grilles were reintroduced in 1993, it was obviously a forced attempt. Then, simply due to numbers seen, the ’92 nose started to look out of place in comparison. The greenhouse is one of the best ever on a full-sized Ford, and better than the ’98 and later greenhouse.
From what I have learned over the years, the attractiveness for resale is exactly why. It’s nothing unusual here to see patrol cars in silver, black, red, green, blue, white, gray, etc.
Count me in as a fan of the aero nose and 6 window roof, that is why there is still a 92 hanging around here even though it was retired from DD service many years ago.
Back when CVs were regularly coming out of service at the auctions I’d go to, Black and Whites usually went for $1k or less, all White $1200-$1500 while those in color could top $2k.
Thank you Jason for another terrific installment. Quite a few great connections and threads woven into this one. Your friend Gene…man, who doesn’t know someone like that? In fact, I for some reason I’ve never understood have more friends like that than not. Some folks, gotta love ’em (and I’m serious about that), but they just do not connect with things like checking the oil, tire pressure, tire condition, or the kind of thinking that says “If your car is making a loud knocking sound and there’s smoke coming from under the hood….STOP.”. Furthermore, repeated close calls and sometimes actual failure doesn’t seem to result in changed behavior. I’m sure the reasons for this vary tremendously, but let’s just say (as you did) thank goodness there are enough Jasons in the world to help avert disaster as (hopefully) often as possible.
Also, the discussion of population density here in the comments is fascinating and makes me thankful again for the tremendous diversity we have just here in this country. This I say from my state – the 3rd most densely populated in the nation with 339.4 / sq km. And as the 7th smallest state in the country, we only have 14 (largely meaningless) counties and 312 towns (plus 19 cities…which accounts for Boston). I think that it’s often overlooked by many just how differences in things like population density affect day to day life and behavior. At the far margins (say, NJ vs. WY) the differences are obvious…but even when comparing MO at 28th with MA, having 10 times as many more people per sq km here in MA impacts how one thinks about and actually interacts with their neighbors in things like driving, shopping, development etc. I find all of that fascinating, and am glad that CC has once again given me something to ponder today. 🙂
Jeff – in your discussion about population and geography you mentioned my state – Wyoming.
Cheyenne, my home, is the largest city in the smallest state (by population). There are 23 counties in Wyoming; the most populated is Laramie (where Cheyenne is the county seat) and second is Natrona (Casper). Cheyenne has about 65K residents and Laramie County about 100K. The very low population here means that when voting for a US Senator we electors in Wyoming have about 67 times as much leverage in the senate as an elector in big California.
Traffic in Wyoming is never an issue and driving within the state is often a very lonely trip – with few services along the way. Cheyenne to Jackson is a long and mostly boring trip that can be a challenge for several months of the year. My and our antipathy to electric vehicles can understood by one making that trek, especially in the cold.
Yep, and your lived experiences underscore exactly the point I was attempting to make. That is, the population density you have in Wyoming is a significant part of the basis for how residents of your state experience things from political representation to what and where they drive. Sometimes it’s good for all of us to take a second and realize that these seemingly common experiences are different based on where we’re from…and to appreciate that we have a wealth of experiences all around us if we just know where to look 🙂
State Lunatic Asylum Number 2
Ten years ago or so I spotted a Spastics Association of Hong Kong bus in Tsim Sha Tsui.
My friend autocross’ a Mercury Marauder, its no slouch either. Some minor mods and the 4 valve 4.6l engine, 4.10 gears and some sticky tires, he really hustles that machine thru the course.
Another fine chapter Jason. The adjective I used to describe my wife’s state of pregnancy was ferocious. She was quite ferociously pregnant in the final month, one would be scared to sit next to her that she might blast off..
I’d put the difference in counties between Ontario and Missouri down to the fact that Missouri is settled all over the state, whereas the majority of Ontario is extremely sparsely populated.
Thanks. It is utterly amazing – and scary – what pregnancy can do to a woman. I shan’t elaborate on my experiences.
It’s been a while since I was there, but I knew Ontario got desolate in places. My first time there we rode a train north out of Sioux Ste. Marie; there was a bomb threat and we had to stop in an area where there was nothing but trees. It took the provincial police over an hour to get there due to the remoteness.
If you discount Northern Ontario and their few municipalities (Counties don’t exist in Northern Ontario) with their low population, and just include Southern Ontario, the sq. miles is much closer to Missouri at 44,099 sq. miles. Missouri is 69,715 sq miles.
There are 22 counties in Southern Ontario, with a population of 12.78 million people. Missouri has 6.2 million citizens total, and 114 counties.
Population density of Southern Ontario is 306/sq. mile. Population density of Missouri as of 2018 was 89.1/sq. mile.
The number of counties and townships in Missouri still appears very high relative to Ontario. Many more jurisdictions representing much fewer people! 🙂
The Crown Vic in your first photo looks very much like the on my employer bought for use as a shared company car. It was the same color with the 15-inch lace alloys, an LX with the handling package, dual exhaust, and 210 hp as I recall. It was a great driver and the trunk was huge. I still love the no-grille look and 6-window greenhouse of the first-year Aero Vic.
Ours was purchased very late in the model year, and I don’t recall any oil consumption issues with the 4.6-liter V8.
On the issue of county sizes in the US, I recall reading an article that most are now too small for the most efficient governance. We certainly don’t ride horses anymore for transportation! I think article recommended 2- or 3-county mergers for the smaller, rural ones, especially in the South where county size is especially tiny.
Another good story well told .
Used fleet vehicles _can_ be a total pig in a poke but I’ve had very good luck with them .
I hear you about some folks who put their families at risk on bald tires and frayed drive belts etc. but never fail to afford ciggies / alcohol .
As long as the tires hold air “they’re fine ! don’t worry !” this makes me worry more .
Older vehicles, even ones that didn’t lubricate the roadway often used a quart of oil per tank full of gasoline .
German cars are horrible this way ~ they’ll be fine drivers but dribble and weep oil at prodigious rates until you take the time to replace an amazing amount of rubber grommets, bushings oddly shaped hoses and so on .
When I stop to fill my 40 year old Mercedes Diesel taxi truckers often comment : ‘you could eat off that engine’ when I know touching it would give oily fingers but at least it is not soaking wet .
As far as pregnant women, whew .
I made the mistake of a lifetime by holding my ex wife’s hand as she birthed our son .
OUCH .
-Nate