The Cars & Trucks of My Formative Years, Part 4 – This Potpourri Flavored Stew Ain’t Just Cars

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– Posted on June 19, 2025

So far in this series we have seen pictures pulled from the refuse pile.  Not this time!  This entry has some flavorful pictures, but there was nothing standalone.  So what else is a guy to do than make a (hopefully tasty) stew?

First up is the old state capitol building (does that need to be capitalized?) in Vandalia, Illinois.  The date on the back of the picture says June 1986.  I have no memory of this trip whatsoever.

Since we are talking buildings in Illinois, here’s a picture of the house where I lived from age 3 to 22.  The balcony and to the right is the original structure; my parents added the red brick part.

The house wasn’t quite as large as it looks and real estate in the area was relatively cheap – and it still is.

Long ago a person of fleeting national prominence was lampooned for claiming the ability to see another land from their living room.  I never understood the hoopla over that statement; this house overlooked the Mississippi River and I could see Missouri from my living room.

The driveway was on the other side of the house and saw much over the years.  Not only did the vehicles from the first three parts of this series occupy this space, so did this 1978 Plymouth Volare my parents bought new.

That is me on the bicycle.  With this picture having been developed in July 1980, this would have made me seven years old here.

The open field behind me is where Orville would later build his house when he was in his early 80s.

In 1983, the Volare had 103,000 miles and was dumped for a lightly used ’83 Plymouth Reliant…parked here in about the same spot as was the Volare.

That is a very thin me in this picture; I’ve been making up for that trimness the last several years.  I’m not sure if I was laughing at my sister’s unique outfit or my dog Pepper appearing to prepare for Unloading Procedure #2.

To the right of the Reliant picture was an ad-hoc parking space.  My paternal grandmother periodically used this spot to park her 1971 Ford Maverick during a quick visit.  That car facilitated my undying respect for the sheer robustness of the Falcon platform.

While the front of the Maverick cannot be seen, this was about the time my grandmother was attacked by a rogue oak tree that jumped into the road and clobbered the front of that Maverick.  This photo was also developed in July 1980.

I have written about the front yard repairs on that Maverick; oddly, that overhaul took place in about the same spot as its shown here.

Incidentally, this is my little sister who just turned 50.

Here’s a thought…it is claimed people decades ago simply looked older at any given age than they do now.  I would agree with that, based upon this picture alone, which was taken in 1936.  This is my paternal grandfather, Isaac Edward.

How old was he in this picture?  Seventeen.

The night my mother and I dug through these pictures, I unearthed a picture of my great-grandmother Allie, Isaac Edward’s mother.  I vaguely remember her.  My mom commented how ancient Allie looked in the picture.  Flipping the picture over, it gave Allie’s age at the time of the photograph.  My mom got quiet when I said she is now the same age as Allie was in the picture.  My mother is pushing 80 and has yet to acquire gray hair.  It’s a genetic thing that I inherited also.

Speaking of my mother, let’s flip to her family.  I show this picture (taken March 31, 1959) as it wonderfully encapsulates the time period and it gives a face to several people I’ve mentioned in the past.  This is my mother (seated, far right) with her mother’s family.  This picture was taken at her uncle’s (back row, fourth from left) home in Houston, Texas.

My grandfather is the bald guy in the back row (age 35), with my grandmother to the left (then 32), holding my mom’s younger brother.  I have referred to all three multiple times over the years as “Albert”, “Iris”, and “Ron”.  It should be noted my grandmother’s family was tall, as my grandmother was 5’10” and she’s far from being the tallest one there.

Seated to the left of my mother is her Aunt Mary (for whatever reason, it always slid out of everyone as “Ain’t Mary”), with her husband Jon behind her, holding their son.

Ain’t Mary and Uncle Jon are the ones who owned this 1976 to 1978 Mercury Grand Marquis.  Long ago I wrote about Mary using a 12 gauge syringe to administer hot therapeutics into the ass of a miscreant who was eyeballing her Mercury.  She and Jon were living in Cut and Shoot, Texas, at the time.

What I never disclosed in writing about that Mercury was having also learned there were two others over time who received similar medication from Ain’t Mary for similar behavioral ailments.  She, like my grandmother, did not play games.

Jon was in the oil business and would later have this 1967 Ford as a company car, seen here with my shorts wearing grandfather.  Jon always had to wear long sleeves at work due to his having topless women tattooed between his wrists and elbows.

My great-grandparents, also seen above, had this Studebaker pickup several years prior.  They were driving this when involved in a head-on collision with a Buick near Poplar Bluff, Missouri, around 1952 and it nearly killed them.  I was fortunate enough to meet both of them, with him passing in 1975 and she in 1984.

Sadly, all but my mother and two others seen in that picture have left this world.

Since I lobbed out that downer, here’s another.  Taken in 1961 this is my maternal grandfather “Albert” (in back, second from the right) along with his mother and siblings.  He would have been approximately 37 years old in this picture.  He was the sixth of the eight.

All but the youngest, in blue on the right, are gone.  Of the other seven, five lived to be well over 90, with Juanita, standing next to my grandfather, living to be well over 100.

Stella, on the far left, later had a Cadillac in which I received a ride from Hell.

Clem, in the back row on the right, once had to teach Stella’s dog some manners.  The only liberty I took in that essay was the car; I have no idea what it was, but the rest is real.

However, it is in pictures where one remains forever.  Until man can time travel, pictures are the conduit to transport one back to priceless memories and experiences.  Odd as it may sound I can best remember the voices of those lost when looking at their pictures.

Pictures are also able to teleport a person into the setting of happenings before their birth or time of awareness.  I can almost feel being present in this picture.  This picture of my Grandpa “Albert” showed he had been doing one of the things he loved most – deer hunting.  If only I could identify the pickup – and the location.  This wasn’t his house.  Nor is that Buick familiar to me.

I suspect the pickup was not his as this picture was taken in 1974; at that time he would have had his 1971 or 1972 Chevrolet C-10.  His was also red but had a white roof, so this isn’t it.

Here is his C-10 at my parents’ house in January 1979 – it’s hard to see, but the top is white.  Pay no attention to those four slipping around on the ice.  My mother got irritated with my father when he took this picture, but he captured the spectacle so I could use it 46 years later.  Or maybe I took the picture.  I don’t know.

As a bonus, my parents’ ’73 Ford Torino and “Ron’s” ’76 Monte Carlo can be seen in the background.

Yet I have saved the best for toward the end.  This is an older version of “Albert” after bagging another buck in 1987, shown in the back of his ’79 Chevrolet Scottsdale.  I rode many miles in this pickup and even put a few miles on it myself.  Powered by a 305 hooked to an automatic, for me this is the ultimate of Chevrolet Square Body trucks.  All others pale in comparison.

Like all things in life, this brings us to the conclusion of this series.  But we have one last picture I wanted to include but didn’t know how until now.  As I was typing and sorting through how to present pictures, I could hear Grandpa “Albert” question me for having taken this last picture.  I took it at a rest area in Florida in the 1980s.  Not having the same urgency to stop as did my father, I walked around a bit before going.  Walking down the sidewalk, I saw this in the water quite close to me.

Stupidly, I took a picture before vacating the premises.  I can hear Grandpa say “Jason, why in the hell did you take a picture of that?  That’s nothing but bad news waiting to happen.”

Indeed, it was.

 

More links, to add to the many above:

1983 Reliant – The Lioness Feeds Tonight

1977 Impala – A Roadtrip to Cut and Shoot

1970 Impala – A Trip to Houston

1992 F-150 – A Trip with Grandpa Albert