by Wayback
I go way back.
I was born at the peak of the Post World War Two baby boom, 1956. More U.S. babies were born in ’56 than in any other year. The turbulent 60s formed me from the age of four until fourteen.
The automobile capital of the globe was my home. My local main drag ran perpendicular to the end of my street.
Woodward Avenue where myriad hot cars and hot rods have cruised. The Village of Pleasant Ridge where I was raised is midway between Detroit and Pontiac, Michigan, cities connected by Woodward
Avenue.
Our family car was a Chevrolet Kingswood Estate station wagon. Did we actually call them “beaver wagons” way back? Yes, due to simulated wood panels on their sides that a beaver might like to chew on.
The first car I owned was a 1960s vintage Mercury Comet that I drove ’til it died. The Comet had a 6-cylinder internal combustion engine (ICU).
After that I paid $200 for a Ford Fairlane with a massive
V8 engine. For you who have never had that term explained, it is an engine with eight big piston heads, four on each side of the engine. The eight heads take the exploding power of gasoline mixed with air and channel the energy caused by the explosions down their hardened steel arms which are all angled downward in a V-shape toward the bottom center of the engine, where they connect to a shaft, which they turn round and round. That shaft ends up turning your front and back axles on which your four tires are mounted.
Madonna was a local high school girl who lived near Woodward Avenue way back when I drove my Ford Fairlane V8 along it. But Madonna was undoubtedly out there cruising along Woodward Avenue in some similar vehicle to mine. These days some of the hottest action along Woodward can be found during the Dream Cruise (click link for more info) to which even Jay Leno shows up.
Ouch! I just remembered a moment way back when. I said something during my high school auto shop class for which I swiftly received the “board of education.” That was a whack to my backside from a board wielded by the auto shop teacher. I was against corporal punishment in public schools, as were other teachers at my high school, so that whack was heard all the way over at the real Board of Education and changes for the better took place in my high school auto shop class.
Ah yes, where was I. Oh yeah, I’m just going for a lunch break now.
I’ll be on my way back soon.
greenfamilycar 