Peter Behrens's Blog, page 439
December 18, 2014
Morris Minor 1000 Estate
The car is being rehabilitated at Sean McKay's shop, Affordable Performance, on the Naskeag Rd. Becky Smith sent us one from London last summer. And Craig Manning spotted one amongst the Trabis of Berlin. Then there was the Morris Minor van "straight outta Devonshire" that we spotted in Maine this fall,
Ratten: The Volvo Review
They have a collection of these at Alan's Auto, the Volvo shop in Portland, Maine.
December 17, 2014
No Cupholders: 1961 Oldsmobile Ninety Eight & Supersized America
It's funny how the overabundance of food plays out in contemporary American life. Most obviously in the obesity epidemic. It's dispiriting, to arrive back in the US or Canada from a less voluminous country like The Netherlands, say, or Italy, where the population is relatively slender. Another aspect that I've noticed: people seem to expect food and drink to be provided almost everywhere these days, in every setting involving more than a one-on-one meeting. Parent meetings at school, for example: there is always someone deputized to provide "snacks." Like we can't do without food for an hour. At many business meetings there is the tray of gigantic muffins--often studded with chocolate--- and the box of Starbucks coffee. Cupholders proliferate in cars, and people are feasting or gobbling on their way to work. It's Food, 24/7. The current cultural mania about cooking and baking and restaurants is part of the larger story of overabundance...
I've noticed that when classic cars and trucks--any vehicle made before the 1980s--are being test-driven in the old car magazines the writers, knowing their audience of super-sized guys, will usually make some reference to the difficulty of fitting in behind the steering wheel. The older the car/truck, the narrower and tighter the fit. Trucks from the 1930s? Fuggedaboudit.
And don't get me started on the bottled-water thing. I see this supposed need to constantly "hydrate" as faux-science perpetrated by corporate giants of the bottled water biz.
Anyway, no ungainly cupholders in this Olds. It was a sleek machine. Though maybe not quite so sleek in real life as in the advertisements. GM art of the era really pancaked the cars.
December 16, 2014
Downtowns (Helena, Montana)
At Autoliterate we yearn for the downtown experience. 'Downtown' these days---does that word have any suggestive zing, other than in NYC, where it implies the varied regions below 14th Street? Hell, Burlington VT used to have a lively mixed-up downtown, most of it along Church Street. Montreal had a hell of a downtown along rue Ste-Catherine. Portland, Maine's downtown was Congress Street. Thousands of towns from Nova Scotia to California once had lively downtowns; most are decrepit now. Partly due to changing technology, partly due to some terrible planning decisions-or more often, lack of planning decisions. We need to reinvigorate these districts somehow. Not just turn them into dubious "arts districts" or tourist zones. Helena Montana had a downtown in the Fifties. Thanks to Larry Nordell for passing along the photo.
December 15, 2014
1937 Ford one-ton
from Alex Emond: "This rusty sculpture is in a yard in Bracken, Saskatchewan. Very nice...a bit of a fixer-upper. The lines, the shape, the beauty of the rust. One fine pile of junk."--AE
Kaiser Jeep M715
Caught the Jeep in Freeport ME. A bunch were produced for the Vietnam-era military but I understand that the contract was cancelled before the entire run was delivered. Many of them ended up in fire departments around the country. The owner of this low-mileage unit bought it from the Goffstown NH Fire Department. These machines were heavy-duty: they were called 5/4 (five-quarter) ton trucks.
December 14, 2014
Garry Winograd "White Sands New Mexico"
Garry Winograd White Sands New Mexico 1964, in The Open Road: Photography and the American Road Trip
