Film critic Elvis Mitchell gives the "treatment" to some of the most influential and innovative forces creating movies and popular art and entertainment - discussing everything from their inner conflicts to their interior design.
"My First Car" - WDET Listeners Share Their Stories
WDET is reaching out to listeners through the Public Insight Network to collect stories and photos of their “first cars” just in time for the 2012 North American International Auto Show.
The responses have been amazing and fun! Share your stories/photos by clicking the car!
"The Corsica was the first new car from a dealership that my family ever bought. Before that car we had to make due with a series of used cars (mostly mid-70s and early-80s models) and family hand-me downs. When I got the car in 1996, my senior year of high school, it was still in good shape but that trusty tape deck and radio was part of escape. Since gas was under a dollar a gallon, I could get away from the house and head out “into the woods” from time to time playing my music as loud as I wanted. But, I’ll never forget the dead of winter, parking by Lake St. Clair – looking at the ice flows – and listening to Ed Love on WDET with my first girlfriend.”
“My first car was a 1948 Chrysler Coupe. It had a checker board grill, two doors and lots of room in the back to haul fellow high school students to St Joe's High near the Eastern Market. I was only 14. My dad bought the car for $600 from one of our bartenders who was going through a divorce. It was yellow and slick. My dad got me a farmers driving license. They were issued to family members of farm people. We did indeed own a farm in Croswell where my dad had a milk station, where farmers brought their milk and he shipped it to his creamery near E. Grand Blvd. He also had a tenant on the farm that used to raise lambs. My dad owned a creamery and a slaughter house on the Eastern Market and a bowling alley on Woodward. I would do the shopping for the businesses using my slick car and drive my buddies to school.”
"In 1990, my first car was a 1982 Chrysler Lebaron. That car had been parked in a field for three years after the gentleman who owned it tried to paint it with cans of spray paint. I believe it was blue gray when it left the factory, but by the time I owned the car, it was "silverish teal". The car was very dented and rusted, and was supposed to be an uncle's winter car in place of driving his new car. My uncle sold it to me for $500. Everytime it rained, the car stalled out due to an electrical short, which took over two years to find. Driving around town had to be based on the weather for the day. My brother then bought it off me three years later for $300 and drove it another 3 years. He junked it after that."
"My junky 1982 Chrysler LeBaron was hit my a drunk American while waiting to cross back over the border into the U.S. after a night in Windsor. The guy was so drunk he thought my car was a lot nicer than it was, and offered me $800 to fix the "damage" if we did not call the cops. I was 19 years old, so I took his money and never fixed the car. His damage actually balanced out the dents in the bumper that were there when I bought the car."
Mary Price: "1953 Pontiac"
"Mine was a gem of a '53 Pontiac, Hydramatic, $150 with 26,000 miles on it when I bought it in June '63. Plush seats, radio that got every station you could think of, from WJR to WLAC in Nashville, TN (both clear channel stations). Straight 8, gorgeous hunk of metal. The precursor to Clint Eastwood's GTO. I loved it. It kind of quit life at about 49,000 miles, but wow, we got our money's worth. We drove it to Washington, DC, as the March on Washington was taking place, went to a big professional meeting - APA (Rick was in grad school, then) in Philadelphia, thence to VT (my parents were mildly nervous about all this trekking, unsupervised, cross country - I had assured my dad that I used their insurance co., as if that were some comfort. He replied "anything you can afford can't be safe." He had long told us that if we wanted a car, anytime, we would have to buy it for ourselves ("we" being my sister, brother, and me). I pointed out to him that I had done just that. That was when he came up with that smart remark. But he had 37 years on me, so it shut me up, except the comment about his insurance co. I brought it to our marriage, in 1964. That car was so strong it survived a "sandwich crash" my then-new-husband endured. The driver in front of him slammed on the brakes, Rick hit the brakes of the Pontiac, and nearly stopped, but not quite. Meantime the guy behind him slammed on HIS brakes, and didn't stop enough. The car in front and the car in back sustained significant rear and front end damage, respectively. Not so much as a scratch on my iron pig! (I still think of it as MY car .... even though we had it together, after we got married, another few years, since his first car was a dog of an Austin, never worked right, cost 10 times as much as mine, really!, and was dispatched when we got married.) I still get a little misty eyed when I spot one of those old grey-green Pontiacs, '52, '53, '54 era. They were COMFY! and smooth riding. Loved it."
“My first car was a used light blue 1978 Chevrolet Chevette (Shove Vet)!"
“Besides getting stuck in the snow on a regular basis, seeing the ground through the floor board which had a large hole in it and having to manually apply windshield washer fluid to defrost the windows, the car was great! When I first bought it, I couldn't wait to drive it. After all of the problems, I wanted to shove it!”
"My first car was a 1966 Opel Kadett. Dad bought it for $500 but I paid him $50 a month to pay it off. I used it while attending the University of New Mexico. It was parked on campus one day when a Post Office truck hit it. There was only minor damage but the insurance settlement of $200 was just enough to pay for my next semester's tuition. I graduated in 1973, sold the Kadett for $450, and bought an airplane ticket to Honolulu. The island was crawling with servicemen and I met and married one... whose first car was this 1968 Dodge Charger.
It was love at first sight...both car and husband."
John McGrail: "1970 Volkswagen Type 3 aka Squareback"
"Our first car,bought in the summer of 1970 was a Volkswagen Squareback also known as a Type 3. It was dark blue with a white interior,a standard 4 speed transmission. We bought it because the price was low,less than $2000,and because it got great gas mileage,in the vicinity of 28 miles per gallon. We kept the car until 1978 when we replaced it. In between we bought a second square back because we loked the first one so well."
"VW owners loved their cars and we were no exceptions. Besides being practically unstoppable in snow, they were fun to drive. But they were beset by demons that love conquered. The cars were poorly prepared for winter conditins and rusted quickly due to road salt. The heating/defrosting system was clever, utilizing waste heat from the aircooled engine that traveled by sheetmetal ducts up to the windshield and passengers compartment. However,these quickly rusted out along with the rocker panels,leaving the passegers with no heat and the windshield iced up. Once on a trip back to Maine from Boston a colleague and I encountered a severe snow storm. The moisture caused the windshield to ice up to the point where we were scraping the inside of the window. My colleague, the son of VW owners, suggested that we turn off the heat and open the windows and since the air temperature would equalize there would be no frost. He was correct and for 70 miles we drove in frigid temperatures with a clear view of the road. But winter was not the only curse,a hard rainstorm would flood the interior of the car necessiating that I drill a drain hole in the floor boards. Toward the end of its life the car developed a rusted or frozen gas pedalcable. Driving under this condition necessitated a co-pilot (either my wife or my 5 year old son) to pull on the rope attached to the the gas pedal while I or my wife used the clutch pedal and the brake pedal. When my son pulled the rope he would shout "Whoa,horsey". We nevertheless loved the car and its many failings, eccentricities and foibles are to this day a part of family lore and a source of continuing amusement. The car must have made an impression on us. We replaced it with a Chevy Malibu wagon, replaced the wagon with a van (registered as a wagon), replaced the van with a GM custom van (also classed as a wagon), recently purcased a Chevy HHR (that looks like the squareback) and several years ago purchased a 1957 Chevy Townsman station wagon and belong to a station wagon owners club."
Dick Kernen: "1940 Ford convertible"
“I was 17 going into my senior year and one day I said to my Dad, "you've probably forgotten that I've had my driver’s license for a year now, and I'd really like a car"....to which he replied, "then go buy one...don't wait for me to do it because I don't make that much money". So to my great joy, I found a 1940 Ford CONVERTIBLE!!!...for a mere $100.00! What a cool ride. I drove it for about a year and, genius that I was, sold it for $150.00! and bought a 1946 Ford coupe. Keep in mind that this was 1955 and $50.00 was a big deal. I've owned dozens of cars since then and this was THE WORST PIECE OF @#%^&* I've ever owned. Ended up running it head first into a tree, and drove it for months with the hood tied down to the bent front bumper. The good news was that good old Dad helped me buy a1950 Mercury... think “Rebel Without a Cause”...James Dean...same car. The chicks loved me.”
"My first car was a 1969 Pontiac LeMans. Dark blue, 350 cu in motor, power glide automatic transmission.”
“At age 16, I bought it sight unseen for $50 from a coworker. With great anticipation, I awaited the tow truck delivery of the car, and when it arrived I saw a broken windshield, 3 flat tires, and a bullet hole in the door. I quickly learned that the radiator and water pump both had bad leaks, the battery would not hold a charge, the starter was burnt, the fly wheel was cracked in two, and the keys didn't fit. Learning as I went, I slowly fixed everything that was wrong with the car until finally I got it on the road just before high school graduation. After 100 miles of driving, the oil pump failed and destroyed the lifters and bearings. I rebuilt the motor, again learning as I went, and got the car back on the road. After another 100 miles of driving, the transmission stopped working. I replaced it. Then without any more road time, I sold the car for $125. In all, I lost quite a bit of money on that car, but it was the best education anyone could get for the money! And it was fun.”
“I got my first teaching job and bought a 1966 green Chevelle. I could afford it and it was new, that is about the best I can say about it. With it came a marriage proposal from a man without a car. (Years later I started buying the kind of cars I wanted rather than what was practical)”
“My husband got a job offer in San Francisco (the heady times of Haight-Ashbury and the protest of the war in Vietnam...what could be more romantic?) so we packed the green bomber and headed West. The two week trip to get there was our honeymoon. In those days gas was pumped by a gas station attendant and we were constantly surprised that everyone wished us "Congratulations" on our wedding and new life together. How could they tell??? It wasn't until somewhere in Utah when we discovered that my brother had put a note above the gas tank opening that we were newlyweds and that we should be congratulated.”
"1973 Mercury Comet, blue (and rust), called the “Krishna car” for a prominent Maharishi University sticker. The passenger door was smashed shut, so riders had to slide over the bench seat from driver's side, or sit in the back. Once, while accelerating to enter the freeway, the hood flew up, hit the windshield & knocked off the rear view mirror. When it rained really hard, or if I hit a big puddle, the electrical system would just shut off. I loved that crazy car. The combination of a big engine and completely bald tires was perhaps not the best way for a teenager to learn to drive. "
“My first car was a 1963 Pontiac Bonneville. It was at least 12 feet long, with two big bench seats that could easily seat four people each. It was fairly low slung and had the last remnants of fins on the back. It was mostly grey with very faded maroon trim. We lived in Western Wyoming where there are often ferocious winds. My best girlfriend had a Mustang, which would get buffeted by the wind. Not the Bonneville...it was so low and so heavy and so powerful, I could make it through any snow, wind or ice.”
“I purchased this huge gunboat of a car for $75 from my brother in January 1974. He had purchased it for $125 from a former customer on his paper route. I was 17 and living on my own for the first time. I lived in a beat up trailer house 20 miles from where I worked and needed transportation. I would drive that car to work and to junior college, put it in overdrive and cruise down the freeway in what felt like my living room. Without even trying, that car would hit 80 miles an hour, its ride was so smooth and its engine so powerful. I drove that car for a year, until it needed new tires. I sold it back to my brother for $60. He drove it for a few more years, then sold it to someone else. The last we knew of the car, it was still going strong in 1980.”
“My first car was a 1972 AMC Gremlin – purple with gold stripes. It had a 232 straight 4 cylinder engine with a black vinyl interior and a great A.M. radio. I installed an under dash 8 track that was later stolen but I got the last laugh as only 1 channel worked.”
“The first car I owned was a sweet little '68 VW Bug, black. It was a peach of a car. I bought it not long after I turned 16 and got my driver's license. Intimate little party mobile that got me all over the place for a year or so. One night a friend busted the key off in the ignition, and while I waited for the garage to get a replacement part I drove all over the place, starting the bug with a screwdriver. I was dumb enough to let the car go when I decided to take off for parts unknown. One of the dumbest moves I ever made. I don't have a lot of regrets, but selling that car is one of them.
When I came back to the area I went hunting for another VW Bug. This time, I was not so lucky. I found a '67 that was ultimately denounced as a demon by that crazy old Romanian Gypsy mechanic who had a garage on Rochester Road across from Wagner Park. The Demon Bug From Hell developed a habit of suddenly losing all power with no warning, most often on a freeway on or off ramp, leaving me stranded in a dangerous place. I'd have it towed to the Gypsy, he'd curse me and shriek and throw a wrench. He'd fix it, it would run fine for a couple of weeks, then out of nowhere the same problem would occur all over again. He replaced so many parts, he finally told me after the sixth or seventh episode, "You sell me car for price of parts I replace. I set on fire. No more drive this bad, bad car. Done with car. Done with you. Yes?" So I left the car in his yard. I think he gave me $500. It took a day or two to straighten out some issue with the title. I finally drove up with the title all squared away. I couldn't see the car anywhere. The mechanic spotted me coming and began throwing a collection of wrenches in every direction. He let loose a furious, spitting tirade, what could only have been a genuine full blown Gypsy curse in his Romanian language. It seems in the intervening period between the time he paid me and the time I delivered the title, someone had broken into his yard and stripped the Devil Bug right down to the wheels. There was not a usable scrap left on the thing. He actually offered me another hundred bucks if I would walk away without saying another word and never, ever come back to his garage again. He wanted nothing further to do with me or my demonically possessed Volkswagen. Not too long after that, his shop was closed and he was never seen again. Hmmmm.”
"My first car was a four-door Plymouth Valiant. White. Baby blue interior."
“The car was purchased so I could drive myself back and forth to my first "real" job, teaching seventh grade at Emerson Junior High School in Livonia. It was 1963 and I was 23 years old, fresh out of the University of Michigan. My father helped me decide what car to buy and he paid cash for it. I agreed to pay him back with a monthly check of $100 from my salary. He didn't charge me interest. My dad firmly believed in paying cash for everything. If you haven't got the cash for something, he said, then you don't need it and shouldn't buy it. My next car, he said, was to be paid for with my own cash, so I'd better take good care of this one. The cost of the car? $2,000. I got married in 1964. The first thing my husband did was pay my father the outstanding balance - about $900. I kept the car for about five years, the husband for about 25 years. I now drive a Ford Escape.”
“A blue 1977 Chevy Nova with a straight 6 cylinder. Loved that car!”
“The radio didn't work, so I duct-taped a portable radio to the dashboard, which became my signature sound system. There was also a dent in the passenger-side dashboard where I would routinely punch whenever I couldn't get it started. Despite that, I loved that car and sadly sold it for scrap in 1986 after blowing a head gasket.”
“The first car that I owned was a 1989 Chevrolet S-10 Blazer. I was 18 when I bought it in anticipation of the long winters I was sure to encounter in the Upper Peninsula...it had four wheel drive and a reasonably powerful 4.3 litre V6. In the three years I owned it, I went through an engine (which was already worn out when I bought it), an alternator, three starter motors, exhaust, a set of tires (the first set were slashed by a kid I went to high school with), and the body panels had rusted so badly, it appeared to be flapping as I drove down the road. That was the vehicle that made me a fan of Jeeps (a 2000 Cherokee was the Blazer's replacement, and still goes after 11 years and almost 200K miles).”
“I took it out onto the stamp sands at the mouth of the Portage Lake Shipping canal and almost got stuck...so I started carrying an old GI shovel. Later that winter, I did get stuck alongside M-26 outside of Eagle Harbor, MI...I eventually got un-stuck after a half hour of sweating, swearing, and digging.”
David Blythe: "1951 Chevrolet Bel Air"
Photo from imcdb.org
"My first car was a 1951 Chevy Bel Air hardtop coupe, black with red interior."
"I worked the summer of 1957 reconditioning used cars at a Chevrolet/Oldsmobile dealership for the money to buy that cat which I did in time to have wheels for my junior year in high school. I drove that car throughout my high school and college years and then sold it when I entered the Marine Corps after graduation from college. Seven years later (1970) when I returned to my hometown, that car was still running strong. I've never had another car like it."
Robert Swartz: "1954 Chevrolet"
"My first car was a 1954 Chevy 4-door sedan. Faded green with dulling cream color top. No air, no radio, no class, NO power - but it was WHEELS."
"The Bald Pickle - my first car was a '54 Chevy sedan. It was the cheapest model they made, I think it was called a "210". I had just turned 16, got fully licensed, and had saved about $400 from helping on the farm. I think my dad was leery that I wanted to get some kind of hot rod since we'd looked at a '57 Ford with a very tired V-8 so he put out the word with all the salesmen he knew. When the used car salesman called dad and said he had one that was 'brought in by an old lady who only drove on Sunday' dad decided right then to kick in $100 to seal the deal! So since it seemed like a sound car for it's 8 years of age and only 32,000 miles, it became mine! The first time I drove it more than a couple miles I started to believe the "little old lady" story because both the heater hoses blew off from the pressure and heat. I was almost across town to my girlfriend's house (of course) so babied it in there; let it cool off; of course that took lots of time; and headed back home with lots of extra water for numerous cool-down stops. I don't have any pictures of the original car but the one included was a nice 2-door that I saw in a parade several years ago. Same color scheme too. That gosh-awful green with cream top was even the same and I think it was that above mentioned girlfriend who tagged it with the name, "Bald Pickle" all those years ago. After 3 years I started to college and needed a better, highway capable car so the "Bald Pickle" got traded in. The good news was that the girlfriend stayed and has put up with 43 years of marriage so far! And there's lots of "Bald Pickle" stories to tell our grandkids."
“Our first car was a 1963 VW bus that we bought in 1973 for $100. It needed about another $100 worth of repairs to get it drivable. We lived in Philadelphia, which was in the midst of a graffiti epidemic, and since this car was parked outside a graduate student apartment building at Temple University and hadn't moved for months before we bought it, it was a prime target. The summer after we bought it, we drove from Philly to Ft. Lauderdale to visit my aunt and uncle, a well-off and rather fastidious couple. My mother asked if we planned to paint the bus before we left, and we were dumbfounded by the question - until we got to my aunt and uncle's beachfront condo and saw that the visitor parking was right out front for all to see. I hope it wasn't too embarrassing for my aunt and uncle, though when they introduced us to their friends, at least one said, "Oh yes, I saw your, ahem, vehicle out front." While we were in Florida, the first gear stopped working, so on the way home we had to be careful to park it on an incline so we could push it to a rolling start and jump it into second gear.”
“My 1st car was a baby blue 1989 Taurus. It was the family car for years and years and already had been well broken in by the time I inherited the vehicle. And by "broken in" I mean "broken" in several aspects. The seatbelts were always twisted into contortion shapes...it had no radio unless you considered static as the latest jams...bench seats that drooped in the oddest of places and a cloth ceiling that frequently needed pinning/gluing and holding up at times.”
“For all of the car's faults, I was still only 16 and it was a free car. Which was more than most of my friends had fresh out of drivers training, a newbie on the roads of life! By all means, I was not the best driver to say the least, but my parents trusted me as a teenager and let me drive to school and on the weekends (deeming I had a purpose and wasn't running the streets amuck) Three days into my new journey of driving I ran into a little hiccup. Picking up a friend for school, the car completely died at the light less than a mile away from school. At the time, cell phones were used for emergencies mostly so this is not an easy solution as it may seem. Especially since the prepaid calling card I had for such cases had long since been used for recreational use like it was not intended. Instead of explaining the empty calling card, being late for class because of a tow truck/parents and whoever else had to get involved to solve the dead car problem, my friend and I packed up our belongings, locked the doors and high-tailed to school on foot. I had all intentions of taking care of whatever needed to be done once we arrived, obviously that did not happen or this story would have little entertainment value. Being the adolescent teenage girl, preoccupied with other more important things 99.9% of the time a period went by with no resolve to the mornings hassle. I was glad to be in class on time and not have to deal with another tardy on my record.
Almost immediately sitting down to second period I was called down to the principal’s office. "What they heck could it be for?" I was puzzled. Stepping into the office I was greeted by both my parents a set of police officers and my counselor. "Rachelle why was the car abandoned in the middle of the road dead at the light with no phone call to anyone and no emergency lights on? "That is extremely dangerous, young lady" My mom was not happy! Oopsie...that's right the car! I had totally forgot about it! My reply you ask to the room full of angry adults? "What are emergency lights?" Ticket day three not a good idea to leave a car in the middle of a busy intersection. I still to this day chuckle every time I have to use them :-)”
“My first car was my moms, two-toned, 1985 Mercury Cougar. There was also a Cars tape stuck in the tape player so it was Cars-or-nothing til I was able to pry it out.”
Alex Trajano (WDET voiceman and host of "The Moth" in Detroit): "1976 Volvo Wagon"
“My first car was a 1976 ORANGE Volvo wagon. My friends called it the Enchilada. The suspension was toast, it had almost 200k miles on it but it was my key to freedom! I never locked the doors and friends would hide in the back and would show themselves after I had been on the road for awhile in order get dropped off at various places. I bought my first 4 track recorder with this car. It died at a 7-11 in Troy on a Slurpee stop with my best bud.”
Pat Batcheller (WDET Morning Anchor): “1980 AMC Eagle Wagon”
"My first car was a 1980 AMC Eagle Wagon, black with all-wheel drive."
“I was on my way home from a job interview at WSJM in St. Joseph in 1990 when the engine died. I'm driving north on US-31 near Saugatuck when all of a sudden, I hear a loud "PING thunk thunk thunk thunk thunk". That was all she wrote. It was a Sunday afternoon, and I had to be back to work at my job in Ludington the next day. Wasn't gonna happen. I'm stuck on the side of the freeway, it's snowing, and I've got to get a tow truck."
"I'm a little fuzzy on the details (it was 22 years ago) as to how I got hold of a tow. I know I didn't have my own cell phone at the time. Either I had a bag phone that I borrowed from my employer at the time, or I walked to the nearest exit, went to a gas station, and called from a pay phone. The latter seems more likely, since I wouldn't have had a phone number off the top of my head, plus the image of me trudging a half-mile through a snow squall makes a better story, so let's go with that."
"Anyway, the tow truck comes and takes me to a shop in Holland, which wasn't going to open until morning. So I got a room, stayed overnight, called my folks in Trenton, had a remanufactured engine installed, picked it up, and drove home to Ludington (Again, there are some memory gaps here-I don't recall how I got to the motel, the garage, or what excuse I gave my boss for why my car broke down and what I was doing in Holland)."
"Long story short-I got the job. Good thing, too, otherwise I'd have REALLY been screwed!”
