Peter Behrens's Blog, page 584

One Morning in Maine

I met this 1930 Ford Model A Town Sedan outside the post office in Brooklin, Maine. It's a nearly-original car. Richard Hero, the owner, says his father bought it from the original owner in 1959.



The o.o. took delivery of the car in 1930 in Westborough, Mass. (BTW, Autoliterate found another 1930 Model A, a Cabriolet, in Nova Scotia a couple of weks back.) When the Heros got the sedan, it wore a layer of grey housepaint; the car was repainted its original colors in the mid-1970s.



The body has never been off the frame: all the welds are still there. It has been in Maine since 2006.
      If you've been following Autoliterate, you're aware we have a weakness for trucks, especially clean old Western machines. This International Harvester KB-5 was spotted at McVay's Garage in Blue Hill, Maine but it was wearing a South Dakota plate and, from the age and condition, we suspect it spent most of its life out there on the dry plains. Looks like a grain truck box, except there's no little door in the back to slide grain out of. It  probably was a farm truck, though; perhaps used for hauling livestock?


International Harvester's  K and KB trucks were introduced in the mid 1940s. In total there were 42 models, 142 different wheelbase lengths and load ratings ranging from 1/2 ton to 90,000 lbs. Acording to Wiki, the machines were known for durability, prewar design in a postwar era, and low price. The followup to the K, the KB, was introduced in 1947, with the characteristic difference being a widened lower grill appearing like "wings". The KB series went all the way up to KB-14.








And there's a graveyard of International Harvester KB's up in...where else? Saskatchewan. That prairie province seems to be the old truck center of the universe.

My Brilliant Careerism, part 3.

Proposed book jacket design for US (Pantheon) edition of THE O'BRIENS, due out March 2012

My Brilliant Careerism, part 2.

PB profile in The Globe and Mail, Saturday July 30 2011:


Peter Behrens blends fact and fiction in family saga The OBriens ...
With his second novel, the Montreal-born writer brings his Irish-immigrant clan to life by uncovering his maternal grandfather's past.
www.theglobeandmail.com/news/arts/.../article2114125/

Walkabout in Mar Vista

Our Southern California correspondants, Becky Smith and Craig Manning, live in Mar Vista, a wonderfully unknown neighborhood tucked in between Santa Monica airport and Venice Beach. Oh we miss Southern California and the layered assortment of aged vehicles parked on almost every block. Something about sun-faded near-originals, survivors that have lasted 30 years or more, warms the recycler's heart.
      We also appreciate well-restored cars & trucks though, to be honest, we find the most popular restorations--mid-50's Chevrolets--a bit...boring. Don't much go for the whole fuzzy-dice-on-the-mirror 1950s nostalgia thing: within Autoliterate's memory, Fifties Nostalgia commenced as an industry in about 1972, nearly forty years ago (remember Sha Na Na? and of course American Graffiti) and has lasted far too long.
        On the other hand you rarely see Plymouths as carefully tended as the 1968 Fury convertible Becky caught napping in Mar Vista last week:
     BTW, there seems to be a nice looking Fury convertible for sale at Car Gurus.

     Another find in Mar Vista: Craig Manning nabbed this SWB 1962 Ford F100 Custom Cab. We like everything about this truck. It's certainly been repainted: wonder if that turquoise was a factory color? If not, it should have been.


This 1959 Custom Cab was for sale in Vermont: looks like original paint, and may have been the original factory turquoise. The red wheels are great!

2 Saskatchewan Chevrolets and the Maine Dodge

Summer has happened. We are deep into it, and have been book-touring The O'Briens in Canada (please check the events schedule; maybe we'll see you along the way!)  We have kept an eye out for interesting vehicles, and have received field reports from correspondants in Saskatchewan and Southern California.
            Alex Emond recently visited Jack's Cafe in Eastend, Sask., which Autoliterate reported on in an earlier post. We are very glad to hear the place is still going strong. Next time you're crossing the plains of southern Saskatchewan on Hwy 13, time your route so you do breakfast chez Jack. When I was last there, they were still curing their own bacon.


Alex caught this 1927 Chevrolet roadster in Ponteix, Sask. Her owner told AE that she purrs like a kitten.


Also in Ponteix, a very clean 1968 Ford F-100 Custom.
Looks like a quiet town.


And Alex found a very clean 1958 Chevrolet for sale in Aneroid, Sask.


An original Saskatchewan truck!


And from the other side of the continent: driving the back roads from Montreal home to Maine, Autoliterate caught this 1950 Dodge in W. Sumner, Maine. It looks like a very-nearly-original car, in excellent shape, though the parking brake was perhaps untrustworthy, which is why a rock was wedged in front of the driver's-side-rear tire.






Next Autoliterate post will include field reports from Becky Smith and Craig Manning, our Southern California correspondants.

The Model A and the Barracuda

Autoliterate has been traveling through eastern Canada on The O'Briens book tour,  keeping an eye out for machines, and meeting extraordinary people. At Grande Pre, Nova Scotia (Evangeline country) there was the original, unrestored Mercury M-3 pickup. A couple of days later, Autoliterate met Geanna and Larry Walker at a dinner party in Sandy Cove, N.S., on the Digby Neck.


Larry is a lobsterman and after he mentioned owning a couple of old cars we ducked out of the party, jumped into his minivan, and headed up the road to his barn. Where he swung open the door,


and backed out this 1930 Ford Model A convertible cabriolet.


            Nova Scotia is full of surprises.
            Lobster season on the Digby Neck runs from the last Monday in November to the last day of May, which is why you see a lot of Larry's gear in these photos. The lobster boats around here

 are much bigger than the Maine inshore boats---they work way offshore, and through the winter, when conditions out on the Bay of Fundy are much rougher than in summertime.
            We sped down to the wharf at Sandy Cove harbor. Larry opened another shed, and

backed out this 1966 Plymouth Barracuda.