Earlier this week we got a glimpse of a young PRNDL enjoying his Dad’s white ’63 Impala. Well, I got to digging through the JPC archives and can now say “two can play at that game.”
I have mentioned my father’s ’63 Bel Air wagon before. It was actually a company car, but because it was not the car my mother drove everywhere, it (of course) became my favorite because it was different. This first shot is of me and my little sister posing in front of the old wagon, probably 1965-ish. With a better scan, I wonder if this picture would show the remnants of the treasure map I drew on the left rear door one summer evening. Can’t search for buried treasure in a suburban yard without a map, you know. I went to bed and forgot all about it. When I got up the next morning, my mother informed me that my father was quite unhappy with me. I went out front to find Dad gone to work and my prized green permanent marker ground into the dirt next to the driveway. I guess I picked a good morning to sleep in.
This second picture shows one of my favorite places to spend time in the Chevy. The hood was easy to open, and the front bumper was shaped perfectly for a small pair of Red Ball Jets to stand on. The blonde kid in the striped shirt was my next door neighbor Kevin Bordner, whose mother would later drive a string of hot GTOs. I vividly recall warning Kevin that he had better get his hand off of that radiator cap. I was allowed under the hood on a “look but don’t touch” basis. You may be interested to know that you are looking at pretty much my entire experience with the smallblock Chevy V8, right here. So simple that even a six year old can fix it?
These are Kodachrome slides digitized the quick and dirty way by photographing them with my camera set for close-ups. Edit – Special thanks to Nuts In Aloha for cleaning up my too-dark photos. I located a few more pictures of interest and will dip into the well again some time.
In the top picture, it appears you and your sister were color coordinated to match the color of the Chevrolet. That’s some pretty good thinking! 🙂
While not a fan of white, that Chevrolet does look pretty darn good in that color.
Yes, we were a very clean family 🙂 . I recall reading once that white was the most popular color on Chevrolets every year during the 1960s, finally outsold by gold in 1970. I know that it was my father’s favorite car color over many years.
color correction makes photos this age look so much better.
Yours looks so much better – thanks for that. I use a free version of Photoscape and have not mastered much beyond sizing and cropping.
just easier on the eyes as well!
So did you have some traumatic childhood experience with this car to explain your disdain for Chevys? Maybe it’s so repressed, you don’t even remember. There are psychologists that specialize in repressed memories, you know. Did the Chevy’s hood start drooping, and threaten to eat you? Or did you actually touch something, like the hot radiator cap. I’m sure the right professional can get you to reconcile your feelings, and you’ll soon be shopping for a similar car. I know of a nice ’64 Bel Air six for sale… 🙂
Oddly enough, I really loved this car. My disdain for these did not take hold until after I got old enough to actually drive one. It wasn’t just me – thinking it over, I think this was the only Chevrolet to live in our family during my entire life.
He said it was a small block, so he was probably like me… fascinated by the gleaming Chevy orange engine with the cool Turbo Fire engine decals.
Nice looking wagon,my parents would never have let my brother sister and myself wear white,it wouldn’t be white for very long with us kids.
We were actually in our pajamas, likely after a bath. Not sure how we managed to go outside (onto a wet driveway, no less) like this, but here we are.
The top picture captures the ethos of the era for me as well – just move it up to about 1971, and park a Grecian Green ’68 Impala sedan in the same place. We lived in a ’60s modern home in a neighborhood with smallish trees.
Like your car, it was usually very clean, and the whitewalls sparkled. We had dog dishes, one that may have come from this car, and three of another style. The tire styles were usually mis-matched – my Dad had Firestone 500 dual strip whitewalls in the summer, and standard strip snows for winter. My Dad took care of things carefully, but we also had to make do at times as well.
A great picture . I enjoyed the visible to me treasure map on the side of the Chev,
I do love wagons and these are terrific pictures. Thanks for sharing.
I have really got to dig in the family picture box this weekend. I know there is a picture of me as a toddler in front of our 73 Monte Carlo and one of the Beetles that was always in the driveway in the 70’s.
Great pics, JPC!
Did your Dad’s Chevy have a red interior too?
Someone (I think you) had mentioned how it felt to be in such a low driver’s seat with the big steering wheel up so high. I remembered that today on my way home from work in my Honda Civic and nearly laughed out loud. I had the cruise control on and realized that my knees were surrounding the smallish steering wheel. (Still comfortable, though.)
I was thinking that if some dude could say the same thing about driving one of those old Chevies, I’d certainly want to stay on his good side! 😉
Yes on the red interior. Years later, a college roommate found a white 62 Bel Air 2 door sedan, also with red interior, that gave me an adult perspective on driving this car. I’m of average height, but that car’s low seat (probably mushed down from age, too) and high column still made me feel like a kid. One of my sons is 6’6″, and he would probably like one of these just fine. 🙂
Wow that is one really stripped out Impala. It even lacks a door mirror. I thought my dad was a cheapskate but his cars always had the mirror, radio, automatic and V-8. He was too cheap for power steering and brakes, though! He said the steering wheel was big enough that steering was easy and that drum brakes self-energised, so neither was necessary. He may have had a point until his 1970 Pontiac Strato-Chief, which had neither power steering or large steering wheel!
In the suburban neighbourhood I grew up in, there was scads of Chevy wagons. They were just a go-to family car. In this era, a Chevy was a car that drove well, was as durable anything else and didn’t cost the farm to buy and run. That’s a huge market to lose and lose it they did. A shame, really.
Wow is right – but for a different reason. I had not noticed that this car lacked a side view mirror. But I had noticed a whitewall on the front and a blackwall on the back.
I have no doubt that my father hated this car. He rated a company car about 1964, and got this one, picked out by someone else. Once we got the 64 Cutlass hardtop, the Chevy sat in the driveway on any family outings. Knowing my father, I am quite sure that he did not view that white box of a wagon (at least it had PS and PG) as something befitting a young up-and-comer. When he got to pick his own car in late ’65, it was a much nicer 66 Country Squire with full wood paneling and wheel covers (white, of course).
Nice shots – I always liked the big Chevy wagons from the ’60’s. I saw an identical Biscayne wagon a few years ago that had been an ambulance back in the day, and it had been restored with the original paint scheme. I know that my mom has an old black and white photo from 1964 kicking around somewhere. It shows my grandma holding me (at 1 year old) and my older sister, standing in front of our ’61 VW. I’ll have to grab it sometime….
I concur with the Chevy wagons as the standard family car. We had a 1970 Kingswood, which was one level below the woodgrained Estate. White with dogdish covers and whitewalls. Equipped with AC, the 350 CID (or 5.7 liter V8). We took it everywhere, could load up a lot of cargo. I hated sitting in the rearward facing 3rd seat because I got dizzy.
I later learned to drive that sucker, and even parallel park it on a city street.
Very durable, but it gulped down gas – I think it got around 12 mpg on a good day.