That car cracked open the door to independence
Madly pedaling in our early teens. Cousin Marco and I raced our bicycles down the middle of a street, leaning into the right turn that marked the beginning of the downhill slope toward the center of the city called Goes. Suddenly cresting the slope, we saw a sports car coming head-on. We both swerved to avoid a collision with that sports car, and as we raced past, I realized I never seen anything like that. I kicked back on the pedals, stood on the coaster brake, and, with a locked-up rear wheel and a big slide, I came to a stop. What I've seen was the most beautiful sports car ever! Couldn't stop looking at it. I searched over the beautiful curves of this sports car to discover the name. Stingray, I was circling around that car, and at the back, another name, Corvette, was displayed. On our way back home, on a 5-kilometer bike ride, I kept thinking about that Stingray and how it looked so incredibly perfect.
My visits to the local garage just around the corner from my home after school hours and on Saturdays landed me a job at age 13. The paid job was only for the hours I had off from school; no way I was able to skip school, since the owner of the local garage knew exactly whether there was school or not. The owner of the local garage became a mentor and a very personal one. The experience, the knowledge, and his professionalism in both his work and his life were a fantastic way to learn new things and to improve my professional career. One day, my neighbor, a young guy but way older than me, who lived 2 houses further north from us, purchased a 1974 Camaro. I noticed this Camaro in his driveway on my way to school. That gorgeous car attracted my attention the first time I walked by. My eyes roamed over the curves of this model, noticing side pipes hooked up to its exhaust system. Never seen anything like that, it had that astonishing Cool factor. A car like a Camaro was a very unusual sight in the Netherlands in the seventies, so it didn't go unnoticed by many people. Much to my surprise, the Camaro pulled into our shop while I was at the garage that afternoon. I found out my boss didn't like working on American cars, so I approached him to tell him I could handle the job. I saw this as a lifetime opportunity to learn about American cars. That Stingray, as seen earlier in life, came to mind, and history was made as I set out on my adventure into the unusual (in my country) cars made by American Manufacturers. I remember my neighbor taking me on trips in the Camaro. He drove that car around in the province with me in the passenger seat. It was his daily driver for years in the mid-seventies till he sold it and bought a 1979 Pontiac Trans Am.
When I was old enough to get my license, it cracked open the door to independence. Pedal Bikes, Mopeds, and Riding Trains broadened that circle for a long time. But life changed when I bought my own ride for 2000 Gilders in 1978, a 1974 Toyota Celica LT. For me, the much-loved American cars were financially out of reach, and the lack of support from my parents and mentor in this American car adventure led to a more affordable but still sporty solution. The world changed. Not only did I have my own set of wheels to take me anywhere, anytime I wanted, but I also had my first automotive lump of coal to begin polishing into a thing of beauty and pride. This joy has stayed with me to this day of writing and far beyond. To this day and in the past, every Gilder (dollar) not spent on beer & girls went into my car hobby. Every spare moment I didn't spend earning money, going to the bar, or hanging out with friends & girls went into the car hobby.
I never forgot that day when my 1974 Toyota Celica came back from the paint shop, and after I built up my freshly painted car from bumper to bumper, the fuel cap was leaking gas onto the freshly painted surface, bubbling the paint just underneath it. I don't know what I'm trying to say here, but it was a devastating sight, but repairable, nonetheless. Although the Celica had a 1600 CI engine, a 4-speed manual transmission and it was the LT model and not the more desired ST model, for me it was a pretty automobile with a loud Pioneer stereo (purchased tax free when I served my time in the army) playing in there, it looked sharp, and I felt pretty cool cruising around in it. Hot Rodding wasn't much of a thing in the Netherlands (forbidden by law). Like most of the '60s and '70s kids, we knew Hot Rods from watching American movies or from reading it for us, well-known Chroom & Vlammen, the Dutch version of Hotrod Magazine. Boyd Coddington and Chip Foose ruled the roost, but not everyone followed suit with copious amounts of chrome, billet, and teal accents. My interest in American cars and Hotrods was starting to develop, and I loved it.
At 18 years old, I didn't know where to buy all the accessories and performance products for my wheels, let alone find the funding to finance a project featured in magazines. Internet and/or social media didn't exist, so if you weren't familiar with the Car or Hotrod Culture, you became inventive and created your own Drag racer that looked like a hotrod. A spoiler was added to the trunk lid, and my work at the local garage allows me to collect a pair of used 15-inch Camaro Tires, not the newest ones, but still some threads left to enjoy the ride I was looking to create, without any safety issues. They were 15 inches, but my Celica came off the factory with 13-inch tires. 15-inch tires at the rear axle would give me the drag-racer look I was trying to create, and I got all excited when I held the tire beside the Celica's rear wheel and looked at it from a distance. I found 15-inch rims from a Datsun at a local wrecker yard that would fit the bolt pattern, and through a friend, I found a company that could widen the rims so they would give the Camaro Tires the wide Drag Car look seen from the back. Also, the Camaro above had changed its side pipes for an OEM exhaust system, and my neighbor didn't want the side pipes anymore. He gave them to me. No need to explain how happy and excited I was, and in no time, I had adorned my ride with those shiny chrome side pipes. Firing up the engine, roaring out of the side pipes, and feeling the warm air out of the Celica's heater on cold winter days or riding with the windows open in summer, no B-Pillar, the cool look of the hardtop, loud disco, soul, and funky music coming out of that Pioneer radio cassette recorder, life was good. I found out that the 15-inch wheels and the side pipes violated the law when the police pulled me over. My Celica was impounded, and the 15-inch wheels and side pipes were removed and forfeited. This car took my friends and me on many adventures, from holidays on beaches in Spain to car shows in almost every country in Europe. If I think back, we've definitely got a few things to laugh about.
Caught with the Hemi Bug at a later age
I began to learn about early Chrysler engines with hemispherical combustion chambers, the so-called Hemi engines when I attended a car auction in 2017. A farmer and collector of "everything Mopar" collected a field full of Mopar’s from the forties to the eighties just half an hour south of Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan. Walking through this field with all the collected Mopar metal I read all the information that they had written on the windshields of every single car, Manufacture, year, engine type and vin numbers. I knew hemi engines from reading in magazines but that did not go further than the amazing 426 of the late Sixties and the new introduced 5.7 Hemi in 2003.
The Fisher Body Inspiration
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