The new January 2012 Hemmings Classic Car arrived today. Therein is a report of a gorgeous, 11,000-original-mile 1960 Oldsmobile Dynamic 88 sedan; the most common 1960 Oldsmobile, but a real treat to see one so well preserved and read the story about it.
There is a full rear-of-the-car picture that reminded me of a short conversation in the fall of 1963 with the older black porter/janitor whose duties included dusting the cars on the showroom floor at Indianapolis' Snider Auto Service; the primary Studebaker dealership where I hung out as a teen-ager, alternately pestering or amusing the employees....all of them.
New Studebakers were displayed along both sides of a wide center aisle/driveway up through the middle of the showroom, so to speak. Customers coming in for service would more-or-less drive between two rows of new Studebakers on their way back to the service write-up area. This forced them to look at the new cars, but did cause the new cars to require more frequent dusting than in a more "sealed" showroom environment. There are pros and cons for either arrangement.
Anyway, I would talk to this gentleman from time to time as he always had something interesting to say. I was 17 at the time and I'm sure he was at least 60.
Sometime in September 1963, he was dusting the deck lid of a 1963 Lark on the showroom floor. We got to talking about the up-coming 1964 Studebaker line. Since he was at the rear of the '63 and indicated he had seen photos of the new '64s, I asked how he liked the new rear-end treatment on the '64 Studebakers.
He said, "Yeah, they look just like Oldsmobiles!"
I had to do some high-speed mental backing-up a few years on Oldsmobiles so I didn't say anything stupid and quickly figured out he was talking about 1960 Oldsmobiles; their sideways-mounted taillights with a horizontal division bar down the center [Super 88s and 98s] that came to a point defining the outer edge of the rear fenders. He was right, of course; there is a similarity.
'Couldn't help but think of the old gent and his comparing 1960 Oldsmobiles and 1964 Studebakers today, 48 years later, as I read the new Hemmings Classic Car.
(Geeze, why do such seemingly-small things "stick" with you but you can't remember what you did on Tuesday of last week?) <GGG> BP
There is a full rear-of-the-car picture that reminded me of a short conversation in the fall of 1963 with the older black porter/janitor whose duties included dusting the cars on the showroom floor at Indianapolis' Snider Auto Service; the primary Studebaker dealership where I hung out as a teen-ager, alternately pestering or amusing the employees....all of them.
New Studebakers were displayed along both sides of a wide center aisle/driveway up through the middle of the showroom, so to speak. Customers coming in for service would more-or-less drive between two rows of new Studebakers on their way back to the service write-up area. This forced them to look at the new cars, but did cause the new cars to require more frequent dusting than in a more "sealed" showroom environment. There are pros and cons for either arrangement.
Anyway, I would talk to this gentleman from time to time as he always had something interesting to say. I was 17 at the time and I'm sure he was at least 60.
Sometime in September 1963, he was dusting the deck lid of a 1963 Lark on the showroom floor. We got to talking about the up-coming 1964 Studebaker line. Since he was at the rear of the '63 and indicated he had seen photos of the new '64s, I asked how he liked the new rear-end treatment on the '64 Studebakers.
He said, "Yeah, they look just like Oldsmobiles!"
I had to do some high-speed mental backing-up a few years on Oldsmobiles so I didn't say anything stupid and quickly figured out he was talking about 1960 Oldsmobiles; their sideways-mounted taillights with a horizontal division bar down the center [Super 88s and 98s] that came to a point defining the outer edge of the rear fenders. He was right, of course; there is a similarity.
'Couldn't help but think of the old gent and his comparing 1960 Oldsmobiles and 1964 Studebakers today, 48 years later, as I read the new Hemmings Classic Car.
(Geeze, why do such seemingly-small things "stick" with you but you can't remember what you did on Tuesday of last week?) <GGG> BP
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