Cars: 52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy & History

My Front Plate

From Amy Coffin and hosted by Geneablogger.

What was your first car? Describe the make, model and color, but also any memories you have of the vehicle. You can also expand on this topic and describe the car(s) your parents drove and any childhood memories attached to it.

My First Car 1969 Javelin



Here is my first car in all it's glory.  This was a 1969 AMC Javelin.  I ordered it new and picked the color out.  It was a new fancy metallic rust color.  It is the only brand new car I have ever own, after this one I purchased at the end of the year or a one year old used car.  I think I paid $3000 for this car new.  I paid cash because I had inherited some money from my Mother Edith's Uncle Vic which had been sitting in an account until was 21 years old. 

I had learned to drive in a week.  My Mom (Annette) had started to teach me how to drive, a stick shift, a 3 on the column and I had done well driving with her, she was calm and patient.  After she became ill with cancer my driving lessons with her stopped.  My Dad took over and patience was not one of his strong suits.  He would scream at me and heaven forbid I grind a first gear.  He would yell, "Are you going to grind me another pound of baloney." He alternated between that and "If you ruin my car you will buy be another one."  That is enough to strike fear into a 16 year old girl.  Plus he said he would never buy an automatic car.  I wanted an automatic.  So I didn't finish learning how to drive with my Dad.  Just before I turned 21 I took driving lessons from a driving school, I had my lesson with in a week and shortly there after I had my car. 





Sitting on Fort Lauderdale Beach

This is the car I took my first road trip on with two friends.  We drove from Fort Lauderdale Florida to Canada.  We made stops in Washington DC, New York City, Boston, Cape Cod, Prince Edward Island & Quebec City.  We got lost in Washington DC, when around traffic circle more than once in Boston.  We saw my Aunt Em in Long Island City, New York had a $5 Lobster Dinner in a church on Prince Edward Island.  Oh was that good. 
The car no air conditioning and I thought about getting air added but that wasn't as good as factory air, so I never did.  I had an accident with it when I was working at Mount Sinai Hospital on Miami Beach, Florida.  I was stopped in front of the old nursing dorms, a car was stopped in front of me letting someone cross the street.  I looked up in the window and saw the car coming behind me too fast, I braced myself for the impact.  She was waving at a guy and not paying attention.  And you got I was the baloney in car sandwich.  The frame was bent.  

I did drive a stick shift when I was around forty a four on the floor, it was a silver Sunbeam.  The salesman had to teach me how to get it into reverse.  

The other car with great memories was the 1957 Chevy Impala, or at less I thought it was an Impala, it might have been just a sedan, but it was a four door, two tone and had fins!!  When we moved to Florida my Dad drove us all the way from Whitestone, New York in that car, a pregnant wife and three kids in the back.  That was before interstates and air conditioning.  We three kids had to take turns sitting in the middle and I can remember, he is touching me routine going on alot. 

1957 Chevy ours was two tone, rust and white

My Dad's left arm was so tan from hanging it out the window.  And when you sat by the window you got tired of the air on our face.  I wish I could remember how how it took us to drive to Florida.  It seemed forever.  We had a flat tire one day and my Dad had to take everything out of the trunk to change the tire.  Including his favorite pots an pans which were Guardian ware. Which I now see are collectibles. 

Guardian Ware

This last two pictures were taken off the web from some site, that I forgot to get the names of.