My first car was a 1968 Mercury Montery that belonged to my Great Grandfather. He used to live in Detroit when I was very young, but moved to an assisted living place in Kalamazoo when he was 80-something. The car (I kid you not) had 26,000 miles on it when I got it in 1986. It was a huge thing and a tank to stop. I loved it and drove it often until my brother crashed it.
My next car was the 1979 Chevette I bought from my dad. It ran good until I got in a car wreck with it.
'62 Olds 98. What a monster. It had electric windows, electric seat, the works.
18 miles to the gallon on the highway 7 in town.
It was, and will probably remain the only car that had enough leg room for me.
Mine was a red Austin Sprite two seater sportster convertable.
Only weighed 600 lbs. and I was frightened every time I went on the freeway.
But it was one hell of a cool car to drive around a college town.
Johnny L.A.
This is pretty wild.
I had a '72 LT2 Yamaha, and I just sold my old 1976 DT250.
[start hijack]
I’m 6’3" and I can definitely relate to this. I cannot drive my friend’s RX-7; I can’t even get into the driver’s seat. Same with a Porsche Carrera (fairly recently). The only small car (which I prefer for other reasons) that had plenty of head/leg room was the Pontiac Fiero. That was the only sports car I’ve been in that I was comfortable in.
[end hijack]
Well, the car I truly owned first was a '75 Pontiac Astre SJ sportwagon I got for free from a friend of my dad’s. Think of a Chevy Vega with pretensions. It was fun to drive and sort of zippy but it had no reverse gear and was so rusty the seats rocked when you hit a bump. After about a month I happily sold it to a junkyard for $25.
Pooling my $25 with another $475 of grocery-store wages, I bought a '71 Ford Torino four-door, VIN 1A27F246197. Yes, I still remember the VIN. The Torino (dubbed “The Stratocruiser” by one of my friends) was light green with a black vinyl top outside, with black taxi-vinyl seats and rubber mat on the floor inside. It looked like a cop car. But it had A/C, power steering, an automatic and a two-barrel 302 that couldn’t be killed with a machine gun.
It always started. Even after standing for three sub 20-degree days under seven inches of snow, it started. That car never left me stranded even once, which was more than I could say for the three FIAT Stradas and two FIAT 124 sedans I had while I owned the Torino (but that’s for another thread).
After new seat covers, some carpet, and a decent stereo and speakers were installed it was actually a pretty decent ride. I only got rid of it because I decided to go to law school in a town about 150 miles away and my parents and GF went absolutely banannas over the thought of me driving the Strat home on weekends, even though she had nice highway legs and would cruise at 80 all day without even breaking a sweat. So I gave in and sold her, replacing her with a ten-month old '90 Mercury Sable.
sigh I miss the Strat.
Zap!
Little more hijack - It’s odd, some of the smallest cars (like the Fiero) have the best leg room. It seems that without a rear seat they will allow the front seats to go back farther. With true 4-5 passenger cars/SUV’s the seats don’t go back as far. I think it is so they can claim a certain amount of rear leg room. Drives me bonkers. Cruise control saves my life on long trips.
My first car was a 72 Olds Cutlass Supreme Sedan, which my friends and I re-christened “The Milennium Cutlass”. It had a 350 Rocket with a 4-barrel, and I got it up to about 120 mph on the local hwy. There were no roof pillars between the front and back doors, so when all the windows were down you could lay lengthwise and roll into it. The only fancy option that worked was the tilt-wheel. Best vehicle I’ve owned was a 65 Ford van that I bought at state auction for $40. The engine was between the driver and passenger seats. I hung cowboy curtains on it and put down some indoor outdoor carpeting. It had no seats so my friends would bring lawn furniture to sit on. I’d take a corner, they’d all fall over, and start throwing beer cans at me. In retrospect, my parents must have been horrified, it was obviously a death trap, but they were more horrified when I sold it for a tidy profit.
yet more hijack
sigh
Seen in the local paper. '88 Pontiac Fiero GT, 5 speed, 30,000 miles.
God, I want that car. Can’t afford it.
sigh
end hijack.
The first car I drove regularly, the Kids Car[sup]TM[/sup] at the time, was a '74 Chevy Nova, 350 ci. Not very maeuverable, the steering wandered all over the place, and stopping {in central IL winter} could be an adventure, but the engine was niiiice. Best of all, it was a four door, very vanilla, nice guy blue car so no cops ever paid attention to me. And it shrugged off being T barred by a school bus. I wouldn’t want it again, but Max was a lot of fun.
Yes, I name my cars.
My BROTHER!
I had a '72 Gremlin, as well. Dark green, the only option was an automatic transmission. I have to give it points for reliability, although it was definitely the ugliest and probably the most uncomfortable car I ever drove, let alone owned.
And my first car? I took over my mother’s “coral pink” 1962 Chrysler Newport. God, I loved that car, although it was rusting out on the outside and dying under the hood by the time I got it.
1977 Pontiac Sunbird.
Iron Duke inline four, 3sp auto.
No power brakes or steering, and only an AM radio.
One day, I threw a rod and the front of the motor broke and fell off.
I bought it from a neighbor for $1, and when the tow truck came, I told him to keep it.
A 1979 Chevy Impala, which was basically a Caprice Classic but with, um, actually, an badge that said Impala. Not like the Impalas of old, but a sturdy car.
In a snowstorm many years later I hit a tree at about 40 MPH. After replacing the bumper, fixing the hood, and straightening the forks that hold the bumper, it was good as new. Didn’t even hurt the radiator.
'65 Mustang. Plain-Jane white coupe with the straight-six and an automatic transmission, but it was a Mustang.
Second car was another '65 Mustang, this time a fastback with a 289 and manual transmission - much more fun.
And I’m currently shopping for yet another '65 Mustang, this time a convertible to complete the set. Although plnnr mentioned a '68 Galaxy 500 and that has me tempted - I’ve always had a weak spot for the Galaxy and Fairlanes from that era.
1976 or 77 Dodge Colt. I bought it from my sister in 1982, since she was moving to Hawaii and obviously couldn’t take it with her.
The interesting thing about this was that after I drove it to Rochester (where I was moving) I found a pen-and-ink drawing of hers in the trunk. I framed it and still have it hanging in my bedroom. I like to tell her that she sold me the drawing for $1000 and threw in the car for free.
Hee hee, the Ghetto Sled. I miss that car.
It got nicknamed the Ghetto Sled because, believe it or not, it was a pre-owned Lexus, but it was in such bad shape my friends used to tell me it was “pre-owned” because it was stolen and stripped out. (Actually, it was a bottom-of-the-line car to begin with, and my mom, the previous owner, is not kind to cars.) I had people get into my car and say “Dude, you gotta be kidding me. Did you GLUE the fucking L on the front of this thing?”
What was wrong with it?
Well, it had decomposed in the driveway for a couple of years, which allowed ample time for all three of our cats to puke in the back. There were stains on the (carpet fabric, not leather) seats that never came out. One of the speakers was busted, and the radio wouldn’t go any louder than a whisper. And no, it had a tape deck. This is a 10-year-old car here.
A couple of neighborhood kids had also used the hood as a trampoline. And for some reason, this car was a crud magnet. I’d wash it the night before and drive it to school. When I left the house the car would be green, but when I showed up at school it would be brown.
I also learned to drive in it. Which means that I ran it over a couple of cement rails in my evil school parking lot, blew out a tire, and fucked up the suspension so badly that the car never stopped pulling to the right, even after we tried to get it fixed. When I drove it, I always had to hold the steering wheel so it would turn the car slightly to the left.
The heater and the air conditioning broke every week. Eventually I just stopped leaking money to get them fixed and either wore my coat or rolled down the windows.
Nevertheless, I really liked that car. I liked how people who had never seen it would walk out to the parking lot with me, and they’d be saying “Dude! You own a Lexus? That’s so bad-ass! If I own - - WHAT THE FUCK?!?!?!” I really liked how the front window would roll all the way down if you pressed the button once. I liked the smooth ride. And I especially liked how the car always appeared to be going 10 mph slower than it really was, and how cops would never pull me over because it was a small, conservative car that you generally see middle-aged housewives driving. I liked this because I could drive home at one in the morning through neighborhoods with youth curfews. I was the only kid in my graduating class who had never been pulled over, and I think some credit goes to the Sled because I used to be just a godawful driver.
I’m embarassed to admit that I can’t recall the make of my first car, but I only owned it a week. Please feel free to identify it if you have any ideas.
It was white/rust, sorta boxy, and had a pushbutton transmission on the dash. It was possible to kill yourself by trying to change the radio station without looking. The headliner had so much mold and mildew that it was green and furry. The driver’s seat had a broken spring that stabbed the driver in the ass when driving over even the smallest pebble. The floor was rusted through in spots on the passenger side, giving my friends an interesting view - you could literally watch the road passing beneath us. No turn signals. Foam rubber on the back seat had rotted away. Driver’s seat permanently jammed in the farthest back position, so it couldn’t be driven by anyone under 5’8" or so. The muffler fell off the very first time I drove it.
After a week of aesthetic horror, the engine died and I gave it to the junkyard. Since I paid $5 and a six pack of Coors for the car, I’m pretty sure it was the best value for the money of any car I’ve ever owned.
My first car was a white and burgundy '72 Mercury Cougar.
My first new car was a light blue '83 Chevette.
Black 4-door 1986 Subaru GL, nicknamed The Bee (Subaru -> Subie -> Bee). Paid $50 cash for it. Did $100 worth of brake work on it before I could drive it back to my own house. No air, no heat, only one side-view mirror, no power in the motor, and the exhaust pipe was held on with baling wire, but I got more than what I paid for it: that car worked for almost a full year before the motor literally blew up, and I think I paid like ten bucks a week to keep it gassed up (having no power in the motor is good for some things, see?).
And as luck would have it, I had just purchased a 1988 Chevy Cavalier Z-24 (also black) a week before the Bee blew up. I think I went about four days without a vehicle while the paperwork for Kitt (that’s the Chevalier) went through. Things work out.
A POS 1983 Renault Alliance. No air conditioning.
Anything after that is an improvement.
Sheri
1973 Mustang. Turquoise blue, with a white interior and black carpet. I Loved that car, but I had NO chance of convincing people that wasn’t me they saw the other night. My closest high school friends drove a truck, an old LTD, and a 73 Plymouth Fury, so my Mustang always seemed like a small car. I passed one of the same make & model the other day in my Miata. In retrospect, that was one BIG Mustang.
Johnny L.A., my little brother’s first car was a 77 or 79 MGB. After he set it on fire (##@& side-draft carbs leaked onto the catalytic), his second car was another MGB (two partial cars into one). After he hit a deer with that one, his THIRD car was an MGB (Three partial cars into one). By then, he was 6’6", and about 290 lbs, so the MGB didn’t make so much sense any more. It was quite a sight to watch him tool around town in it, though.