Interference

When the engine was running, a ticking noise could be heard coming from under the valve covers. When the covers were removed, it became obvious that the rocker arms were hitting the top of the valve spring assembly. This was due to a combination of a unique (weird?) engine design and modifications which we made to the valve train to increase performance.



Unlike any other popular overhead valve engine, the ’53 to ’64 Buick engines had a rocker arrangement where the rockers met the pushrods on the outboard side of the head and the valves on the inboard side. Viewed from the side, the valve stem crossed the pushrod. This had several advantages: The valve placement was near the center of the head (like a Hemi), the engine was narrow for its displacement, and the engine had a lot of torque. Buick was so proud of the torque numbers that they used them to identify the engine instead of horsepower or displacement. The 340 horsepower 425 was called a Wildcat 465. The 360 horsepower two four barrel version was dubbed Super Wildcat 465.

However, the valve arrangement also had disadvantages. One of them is that the valve placement necessitated very small valves for the engine displacement, giving rise to the derisive term “Nailhead” to describe the engine. The rocker arms also have an angular configuration in two dimensions; viewed from the side and from above. There is very little clearance between the rocker arm and the valve spring assembly. In addition, the exhaust passages are long and tortuous, making these engines harder to cool than most.

Kenne-Bell used to be the go-to company for performance Buick parts. (They have since switched to Mustangs because very few performance Buicks are being built nowadays.)
Kenne-Bell valve springs for Buicks are larger in outside diameter than original Buick springs. This extra diameter exacerbates the rocker to spring clearance problem. The rocker arms must be hand filed to provide at least .030 clearance.

After the rocker arms were filed, the engine noise disappeared.

On March 16, 2001 the car was loaded on Passport Transport and shipped to Denver where I lived at that time. The car had spent four years and one day at Rustic.

Disengagement (Part 1)

Except for temporary transportation units, I have never owned a vehicle with an automatic transmission. I was determined not to build one.

I talked to Darrell Shepher at 4 Speeds by Darrell about building an M-22. Because new gears, especially second gear, were getting rare, the cost would be $2,475 (In 1997!). I could save $1000 by using Italian gears. I asked what the difference was and Darrell said the Italian gears were not as strong. What is the sense of a rock crusher with weak gears? You might as well use a Super T-10. I ordered the transmission with GM gears. Darrell said he had a Doug Nash cast iron case for an M-22. The purists didn’t want it because it wasn’t original. He would use the cast iron case for the same price. Sold!

We used TCI under floor pedals with a ¾” bore clutch master cylinder and a remote reservoir for the clutch master. Quartermaster supplied a hydraulic throwout bearing. The clutch is a Centerforce Dual Friction unit for a 427 Corvette.

It took a long time to bleed the clutch the first time. The master cylinder began to leak after a few cycles.

A new ¾” master cylinder was ordered from TCI and installed. It also leaked.

A 1” master cylinder was ordered from TCI and installed. It bled much faster than the ¾” cylinders. Due to the lack of a pedal stop, the increased fluid flow blew out the seals in the throwout bearing.

The engine and transmission were removed from the car and separated. The throwout bearing was rebuilt with new seals and reinstalled. The engine and transmission were put back in the car. We went back to a ¾” master cylinder. The throwout bearing still leaked.

The engine and trans were removed again. The throwout bearing was disassembled. The O-rings looked good and there was no apparent damage to the metal parts. The Quartermaster distributor supplied a new throwout bearing which was bench tested and worked OK.

The engine and trans were reinstalled. The clutch system bled well but started to leak after a couple of cycles. The engine and transmission were removed for the third time. The outer O-ring was broken clear through at the top. The throwout bearing was rebuilt with new seals and reinstalled. After engine installation, the system was bled and cycled. No leaks appeared. An adjustable pedal stop was installed.

We reused the Hurst shifter which was on the old transmission. Shifting without the engine running, the linkage felt “crunchy” in first and second gear and “rubbery” in third and fourth.
With the engine running, the transmission would only shift into fourth gear. Several tries at adjustment finally resulted in the ability to shift into all gears, but it was well short of shifting well. The car moved under its own power on June 29, 1999.

Rustic replaced the shift tower with another that they had. There was a slight improvement, but the shifter was still tight. Did I want to buy a new shifter? No, I wanted them to try the old one again. It worked and seemed to shift OK.

Decisions and Mistakes

Rustic Street Rods started to work on the car on February 4, 1997.

The first decision I had to make was whether to continue to use the existing modified ‘39 Ford frame or switch to a new aftermarket unit. Because the existing frame had independent suspension front and rear, Corvette disc brakes and engine mounts for the Buick, I decided to use it. I’m not sure that choice saved me any money or time. If I had it to do over, I would probably use a Fat Man frame.

Rustic modified the timing cover for a rubber crankshaft seal to replace the rope type and repaired a broken mounting tab on the water inlet manifold. They also removed rear sump oil pan from the engine in the car. The three pieces were sent to Jet-Hot coatings. The timing cover and water manifold received a high luster silver coating to reduce electrolysis between the aluminum casting and the cast iron block and improve appearance. The pan was coated with a black thermal dissipation coating applied to aid oil cooling.

I wanted to louver the hood for cooling also, but I wanted it to look like it was done in the ‘60s. Rustic found Nostalgia Motors in Boonton, NJ, who had a louver die made in 1951. Rustic had Nostalgia Motors punch 102 louvers in six rows. They also filled the holes for the lower hood spears and Ford Deluxe script. When the hood came back, I hated it.

Rather than remove the rear hood brace to start the rows closer to the cowl, they started each row forward of the brace. Worse yet, the rearmost louvers were straight across the hood so the shortcut was obvious.


I told Rustic that I wanted 24 more louvers punched; five in each outside row, then four in the next rows, and three in each inboard row. Nostalgia Motors said because of the punch design they couldn’t punch louvers behind a row. They suggested starting over on a different hood. The alternative would be to remove the brace, cut the hood at the rear louver line, punch the removed piece then weld the hood back together.
I knew that every time I drove or looked at the car, the louver design would piss me off, so I told Rustic to have Nostalgia Motors dissect the hood and add louvers. They did a nice job. It’s important to like your hood.
Rustic removed the much reworked firewall and replaced it with a Bitchin Products piece. They were able to use the small block model because the Nailhead Buick is quite narrow for a seven liter engine.
At my direction Rustic sent the speedometer and gauge cluster to United Speedometer for alteration. United was given the following parameters:
Speedometer – 140 mph
Battery – 16 volts
Oil pressure – 80 psi
Water temperature – 280 degrees
The alcohol thermometer tube in the temperature gauge was to be replaced with an LED stack which glowed green up to 240 degrees, then amber, then red.
When the instruments came back the speedometer was modified to 120 mph instead of 140.

Rustic sent it back.

It came back with a 140 mph face plate which didn’t match the instrument cluster.

Rustic sent the speedometer back again with the gauge cluster so United could match the two face plates. This time, it came back perfectly matched. United Speedometer was patient and responsive to our needs throughout this whole episode.

East is Neat

In my ninth year at Harris Graphics Systems, the company was taken over by AM Graphics. The new owners decided to reorganize the company. The Champlain operation was to be combined with Commercial Press and moved to their facility in Dayton, Ohio.

I ran the Technical Publications Department at Bindery Systems and my position was duplicated in Dayton. The company decided to retain my Dayton counterpart and try to find another position for me. They asked if I had any questions. Since I already had another job lined up, I said “How long do I have to stay to get severance pay?” I never saw anyone in such a hurry to break for lunch. When they resumed the meeting a half hour later, I was told I could leave the company in one month with a severance package. It wasn’t enough time for me to coordinate the Dayton move, but I agreed. The company was annoyed with me when I overstayed the deadline.

The new job was selling printing machinery rigging and installation. The office was in Moonachie, NJ. For several months I commuted 300 miles to New Jersey every Sunday night and 300 miles back to Sciota every Friday after work. When we started looking for a house, we realized that we could no longer afford to live in North Jersey. We looked at a lot of houses in Eastern Pennsylvania.

We finally found a ranch house in Tannersville, PA. It had an attached two car garage on the West end of the house. On the East side, the land dropped away about ten feet and there was a rollup single garage door to the basement. Two cars could be pulled in single file. Since we could garage four cars, we immediately bought a fifth so one could be parked outside. The only progress I made on the coupe in the two years we lived in Pennsylvania was the purchase and installation of Stainless steel sleeved Corvette calipers front and rear.

My next job was as a product manager on Long Island. We told the real estate agent that we had to have a two car garage. After we bought a house in a rural area of Eastern Suffolk County we found out that the agent did not show several homes with three or four garage spaces because we had to have a two car garage. Of course, the coupe occupied one half of the garage.

Now the problem with working on the car was not lack of time, it was lack of money due to the size of the mortgage payments. Another two years without progress.

Then I got downsized. The economic downturn included a concurrent fall in Long Island real estate prices. It took us a year to sell the house, and we lost about 40 grand.

My wife Nancy and I bought a general store and gas station in the Nevada desert. We formed Way Out West, Inc. and operated the store for two years without having a clue how to run a business. We then sold the store back to the guy we bought it from and had to sue him to make him pay for the inventory.

We moved to Sparks, NV where I drove for Auto Parts Club, a members only operation similar to Sam’s Club and Costco. Nancy died of diabetic complications in 1994. I felt far older than my age. A woman I worked with introduced me to her mother, Suzanne Bond. Suzanne made me feel young again. We dated for six months then married in a civil ceremony at John Asquaga’s Nugget Casino in Sparks. She saved my life.

I mailed a resume to Machine Design Service in Denver, CO. Seven months later they called and asked me to come to Denver for an interview. They described two jobs to me and asked which one I wanted. I chose, and was told the Project Manager position paid more money, so I changed my mind and took it.

The project was a $2 million installation at The New York Times new satellite plant in Queens, NY. I would have to live in Queens, but the company would pay my rent plus a per diem. There would be a bonus for bringing the job in on time. I wouldn’t have time to work on the car, but I should have enough money.

I called my old friend, Rich Schulz to find out how to contact Ralph Truppi about building an engine for the car. Rich told me that he had a shop called Rustic Street Rods and that there was an engine builder in the building complex that he owned. I agreed to have the work done there.

Rich observed that maybe I didn’t want the car too nice. He hit the Nailhead, so to speak. I’ve never seen any sense to show cars. To me, fun with cars involves driving, not vanity. I wanted a decent looking driver, one that a friend calls a 50-50 car. (One that looks good at 50 yards or 50 miles an hour.)

Rustic’s first task was to pick up a ’64 Buick Riviera in Stratford, CT. I looked at seven Buicks that the owner thought (or said) had 425 Nailheads, but that in fact had 401s. In one issue of The New York Times Sunday classified ads, there were two Rivieras. One in Shelton and the other in Stratford. I called about the Stratford car. The ad in the paper said it was a 430, but the owner said it was really a 425. I asked him if it ran (it did) and to get me the engine number (7K1082768) and code (KW31). Bingo. The K meant 1964, the W stood for 425 cubic inches. During a visit to hear it run, I negotiated the price down from $500 to $400 due to the fact that the bottom foot of the doors and body was rusted away.

The engine’s new life started with a two week bath at the bottom of a 55 gallon drum of diesel fuel to loosen up the gunk inside of it. Then it was bored .030”. The build generally followed the ten part article in Street Rodder magazine which ran from January to November, 1997, including the use of a Kenne-Bell MK-C-118 cam and a J&C double roller timing chain. (More on this later).

When in doubt, go bigger

While I was away at school, I told John to drain the water out of the radiator. He did, but he didn’t drain the block. The water froze and cracked the block. That’s how we learned that the ordinary laws of physics applied to us, not just everybody else. Hot Rod building axiom #2 – If anyone else is going to work on your car, run the risk of insulting him by giving explicit step by step instructions. Don’t assume that anyone knows anything.

I bought a seized ’57 364 Buick engine from Tony “Traffic Jam” Traficant’s Amoco station. I ruined a cylinder wall trying to remove the pistons and threw the engine away.

A bench racing acquaintance said he had a built ’60 Buick 401 engine that he would sell for $75. When I went to pick it up, I noticed a complete six two barrel log manifold in the garage. It had Rochesters instead of three bolt leakers. I knew the six twos setup was for a Buick, so I bought it for an extra twenty. I later discovered that although the engine was indeed a ’60 Buick as advertised, it came from a LeSabre which meant it was a 364, not a 401. Axiom #2A – Do your research. Don’t accept what you are told.

The 364 installed easily. The Hurst mounts were drilled for both early (264 & 322) and late (364, 401 & 425) Nailhead Buicks. The bell housing bolt pattern was different, so I had to buy a new adaptor. The ’60 water pump was way too long, so I used one from a ’57 Buick. I reused John’s T-10 transmission and the Olds rear.

The six Rochesters turned out to be small industrial engine units. I rebuilt them, modified the throttle bodies on the left three to move the throttle linkage to the inside, and used two sets of Eelco progressive linkage. The setup ran on the center carburetors except under acceleration, when the end four kicked in. The system looked great and ran almost as good as a four barrel. However, it took a hell of a strong right leg to operate it. There was so much linkage that I was not able to eliminate all of the binding.





The intent of New Jersey’s historic plate law is to register only original or restored cars as historic. Along with most of the street rodders in the state, my intent was different. I registered the car with New Jersey Historic plates. At least I didn’t surround them with frames that said “Support your local drag strip” like Rich did on his Model A.



The 364 Buick had enough torque to bend the control arms which positioned the Olds rear, which is exactly what it did the first time I launched it hard.

A passer-by saw the ’39 in my back yard and wanted to trade me straight up for a ’58 Chevy with a 348. I reluctantly agreed but he eventually backed out because he needed a running automobile. Close call.

The attached garage on our house had a steel girder supporting the second floor. I used it, along with a chain fall and a borrowed trolley to lift the coupe’s body off of the frame. I brush painted the frame and underside of the floorboard with black epoxy.

While I had the body off, I had a ’54 Chevy passenger car front crossmember and suspension installed. The owner of the junkyard where I bought it knew that ’53 – ’62 Corvettes used the identical front end and priced it accordingly at $50.00. I also had pads welded to the frame to mount a ’68 Corvette crossmember and IRS that my wife Nancy had given me for Christmas. The channels on which the control arms pivoted were welded too far inboard and gave the rear tires way to much toe-in. The tires rubbed the fenders because the rest of the geometry was off also. I put smaller 205/65R15 tires on the back to stop the tire rubbing. As soon as I could, I corrected the rear end geometry and went back to 225/70R15s. Next time – 235/70R15s.

I didn’t support the body well enough when I removed it. When I reinstalled the body, it looked OK, but the doors didn’t close as well as they used to.

In 1976, I took a job with Harris Bindery Systems in Champlain, NY. After looking in Vermont, I bought a house six miles from the Canadian border in Sciota, NY. The detached garage was larger than the house. It had a barrel stove, electricity and running water. The water stopped running when the temperature approached -40° F (or -40°C, it’s hard to tell.) We experienced that temperature at least once in each of the nine years we lived there. I registered the coupe in New York with year of manufacture plates.

I wouldn’t do that again because New York has transferable registrations instead of titles for vehicles built before 1972. I had to surrender my New Jersey title to register the car in New York. I didn’t know that you can title the car in one state and register it in another. I might have been able to keep my original title and registered the car with a non-transferable title like they used for the later cars. Live and learn.

Nailhead Power

My dad’s attitude was that if Henry Ford had wanted a Buick engine in the car, he would have put one in there. I didn’t remind him that Edsel was running the company in 1939, or that Henry was a racer and Edsel a customizer. For once, I kept my mouth shut and put the engine in anyway.

John Oganowski at Ogan Welding moved the steering box 1-1/4” outboard so the starter would clear. I adapted the Buick to the stock transmission and torque tube drive, installed a 12 volt battery, used a voltage dropping resistor to feed the instruments, changed the ground on the voltmeter from positive to negative, hooked up the exhaust system with a piece of rubber radiator hose, hooked up a rope and broom handle throttle and went for a ride. The rubber exhaust system melted before I got a block. I’m lucky it didn’t catch fire. I replaced the rubber with a piece of flex pipe, illegal in New Jersey, but way better than rubber.

The stock brake pedal was really close to hitting the Buick bell housing when the brakes were applied. As I was cruising past North Plainfield High School, a police car in front of me stopped. The brake pedal chose that moment to hit the bell housing. I had to pump the pedal to stop. I don’t think the cop noticed that I would have hit him in another inch or so. If he did, he didn’t pull me over. I would have had a good time explaining the broomstick throttle.

It wasn’t long before I started dropping transmissions. At the same time, Jim Zanowic let his Sunoco station employees chase parts in his ‘36 Ford pickup. They were also breaking wobble stick boxes. Between us, we used up the local supply pretty quickly. In honor of all the busted parts, I named the coupe Shif’less. My brother painted the name and a cartoon behind the door on each side. The cartoon showed a ’39 with the front wheels off the ground, a burley driver with his arm and the shift lever out the passenger window, and transmission parts scattering underneath.

I bought a Buick selector transmission which had a torque tube drive and adapted the Ford torque tube to fit it. It wasn’t the strongest transmission either, but I developed my first Hot Rod building axiom. Always alter the vehicle rather than the part. That way, you can use junk yard parts without modifying them.

John Ogan manufactured quick change rear ends for use in sprint cars. He modified stock steel center sections instead of using cast aluminum like Halibrand did. Halibrand gears and aluminum covers fit. We put the rear together with one gasket on each side to check the backlash. It was perfect. John said he never had one go together like that. It usually takes multiple gaskets (and disassembly and reassembly) to set the lash. The only gear set John had on hand was 20 and 28 teeth set which resulted in a 5.29:1 final ratio. This was a bit low for street use, but gas was cheap. Besides, no one could beat me off the line. Also, if I reversed the positions of the change gears, it gave me a 2.70:1 ratio and really good gas mileage. The modified center section hit the rear cross member, so I bought a Model A spring. I installed the spring without modifying the cross member, which raised the rear end of the car about a foot. Kids used the car for a backstop when they played stickball.

My brother John and I decided to go Chevy hunting in D Gas. We rebuilt the engine with 1/8” over Jahns 11:1 pistons, a Crane flat tappet cam, Gotha adjustable rockers, an Edmonds 2-4 bbl manifold and two Carter WCFB four barrels. The engine was now 282.7 cubic inches. We hated the number 283 like Ford fans do, so we called it a 282 Buick.

We used an Offenhauser adaptor to John’s ’63 Ford T-10 four speed, a shortened ‘57 Ford driveshaft, and a ’50 Olds rear. The Olds rear had 1” diameter cups on the U-joint, so we had 1” i.d. x 1-1/16” o.d. shims made to adapt it to the Ford shaft. If we had been smarter, we would have welded an Olds yoke on to the Ford shaft when it was shortened. The guy who cut the shaft was as at least as dumb as we were. He cut a piece out of the middle of the shaft and welded it back together rather than removing a piece from the end. It wound up being about ¼” from straight. Not easy to balance that way.

When I started college, I knew RPI had a silly rule about freshman not being allowed to have cars, but I decided that I needed one. I bought a ’50 Chevy for ten dollars. The car smoked, but no worse than a lot of ten year old cars. As I headed North on the Jersey Turnpike, the car began to smoke more. Finally a rod let go and punched a hole in the side of the block. I rolled over to the shoulder, took off the plates, hopped the fence, found the bus station and bought a ticket to Troy. A year after I forgot about the Turnpike incident, the State Troopers contacted me about the car. All they wanted was permission to scrap it.

My first attempt at college lasted only one semester. Home on break, I received a telegram that said “Academic record makes continuance impossible. Stop.” So I did.

Wild Rides

One Sunday, I drove the ’39 to the drag races at Great Meadows with Rich. There was a double row of cars on the way in, and the guys in the car along side of us were passing a bag of chips around. Rich conned them into passing the bag over to us, even though they didn’t know us. After we each took a handful, we gave the bag back to them. Rich is the only guy I ever met who could have gotten his hands on those chips without a fight. With a few words, he made friends with four strangers and made them feel like they had known him all their lives.

As we were pulling into the pits, the engine started to miss because the fuel pump push rod got too short. While we were asking around for a washer to shim the push rod, someone offered to tow us home with his pickup. We accepted, not batting an eye at the thought of being towed fifty miles on a nylon tow strap.

As soon as we cleared traffic on the way home, the guy picked up speed to 60 mph and stayed there with us four feet behind him. The roads were rural and traffic was light. I was almost used to the danger when his brake lights came on. I locked up my brakes to avoid rear ending him, then I saw why he used his. There was a six foot section of dirt road where some repairs had been made. He was already back on the gas and pulling me sideways. I let off the brake slowly and the car straightened out without pulling either his hitch or my bumper off. We got home without any more scares. He refused payment for gas and thrills, and left. I never saw him again, but he gave us the ride of our lives.

Instead of replacing the fuel pump and rod, I told my father that the engine would not run (technically true) and that I had to replace it (a whopper). Bob Best, a friend who lived in Watchung, had a couple of engines stored in his garage, a 331” Chrysler Hemi and a 264” Nailhead Buick from a ’55 Special. Since the Hemi was 8” wider across the valve covers, I decided to put the Buick in the coupe. I knew that Buick engines were bulletproof and plentiful. Most importantly, I also knew that they cost less than half of what a belly button motor or a Hemi cost. What I didn’t know was that the starter was high on the left side, right where the Ford steering box wants to be. Olds engines had the same problem, but the Olds starter is mounted in the flywheel cover and aftermarket covers were available to move it. The Buick starter mounted to the block.

Bob’s house was huge. It sat on a forty acre hillside lot with a lake and a field full of brush and small trees. His family employed an English butler who answered the phone “Are you there?” Rich answered “Yeah, I’m here. Are you there?”

Bob had a series of “field cars” which he would use to drive around a rutted trail through the field. As the cars got beat up from hitting trees, he would remove body parts and run the cars until they blew up. One of them was a ’50 Studebaker (a different one) with only the hood and front fender sheet metal left. It had a 4 by 8 sheet of plywood bolted to the bare frame, and a milk crate seat for the driver. The plywood got real slick with mud and there was nothing to hold on to. Bob would drive around the field with the rest of us trying to stay on board as the car bounced around the trail. Eventually one of the brakes locked up, so Bob cut the line with a pair of dikes.

One day the ‘Baker was parked at the top of the hill near the garage. Bob started it, got it rolling forward down the hill with the clutch in and the transmission in reverse. Halfway down the hill, he popped the clutch. Smoke boiled off the tires as the car continued down the hill, slowed and stopped with the tires still spinning backwards. It gradually started to inch back up the hill and gained momentum. About ten feet from the open garage door, Bob got a horrified look on his face as he stepped on the brake and the pedal went to the floor. There was a loud crash as the car hit the cement rear wall of the garage. Rich and I were literally rolling on the ground laughing, not knowing whether we had just witnessed the world’s funniest death. We were able to calm down when Bob staggered out of the garage laughing nearly as hard as we were. When we could stand up, we went into the garage to survey the damage. The top half of the steering wheel was bent 90° toward the back of the car, which started us laughing all over again.

The Cutting Game

Since applying ourselves to school work was unthinkably square, Matt Hines and I made up a game. The object was to skip as many class hours as possible. The winner would be the one who cut the most class hours for the year.

There was a penalty for getting caught. Not only did the cut not count, but one cut was subtracted from the previous total. The school day consisted of homeroom plus eight periods. Periods 4 and 5 were split periods. Underclassmen like Matt and me had a half period for lunch and a half period of study hall. A half period or more counted as a cut. Homeroom period did not count as a cut. Skipping a whole day was too easy, so you had to attend at least one class. The maximum number of cuts you could get in one day was six if you were a senior, seven if you were an underclassman.

My strategy for skipping seven classes in one day involved avoiding homeroom, so my name went on the absentee list. I showed up for gym class but didn’t call my number, thereby being marked absent even though I was there. Since I wasn’t a jock, the coaches never noticed if I was there or not. All I needed to do was get a girl to forge a note from my mother. In New Jersey, this was not a problem.

Unlike classes, study halls did not have a printed attendance list at the start of the year. The list was created by students signing a sheet on the first day. If you didn’t sign up, the proctors didn’t know you were supposed to be there. That meant that neither Matt nor I ever attended a study hall.

One day, Rich and I were seen cutting classes. Since I was supposed to have been in study hall, there was no record of my absence. To trap me, Vice Principal John Messer told Rich that his friend had said they cut class together. (A likely story, but Messer knew we weren’t as sophisticated as we thought we were.) Rich said, “OK, I was with Matt Hines.” Messer blurted out “Hines? We didn’t even know he was missing.”

The cut that required the biggest balls occurred during an assembly. Matt and I always cut assemblies. However, on this occasion, both of us got notices that we were to wear coats and ties, because we were in the program. Neither of us knew what it was about, but when the assembly began we were in attendance. Ed Gibbs, the principal, began the festivities by talking about the National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test. He said that only a few elite seniors got a letter of commendation. Fewer still qualified for the scholarship. He laid it on pretty thick. In our class of 212 students, there was one who qualified for a National Merit Scholarship and seven who received the “I played too” letter. Gibbs read the commendees’ names first, beginning with the serious and studious future minister, Ed Apgar. Then he called my name. Virtually every student in the auditorium said “Bollenbach?” under his breath. The result was a roar. I was barely able to control my amusement as I walked up onto the stage. Several names later he called Matthew Hines. There was no sound, but everyone’s mouth dropped open. Rich was clowning in the front row of the balcony, trying to break Matt and me up. It was hard to be cool.

When the presentation was over, Matt and I walked down the stairs at the left center of the stage, across the room in front of the assembled students and faculty and out the side door of the auditorium. When we got outside of the building, the basketball team was getting on a bus to go to a game. Coach Steck wagged his finger at us, but never turned us in.

On October 9, I planned to cut school to listen to the seventh game of the World Series, but the turncoat Dodgers finished my annual two weeks of baseball interest by ending the series in six. Then again, I saw no reason to waste a perfectly good plan just because the White Sox screwed up. Besides, it was Friday. Nobody goes to school on Friday.

Since some classes were held at Harrison School, it didn’t look strange if I headed that way. It got me a block away from the High School without arousing suspicion. I had stashed my bike under the Stony Brook Bridge on Rockview Avenue. Once I got that far, I was gone for the rest of the day.

My autumn ritual included checking out all the new cars. I was a week late seeing the Falcon, so I headed for F. Day Ford in Plainfield. I never get to the showroom because in the front row of the used car lot next door was an immaculate Dartmouth Green 1939 Ford Deluxe Coupe.

F.Day c. 1951 (Except for the cars, it looked the same in 1959)

 I opened the hood. The flathead was bone stock, but you could eat off of it. I walked around the car. There were no major dents, dings or scratches. The driver’s side door looked like it had been repainted so I opened it and looked at the edge. There was a seam at the edge of the chrome trim. The bottom half of the door had been re-skinned. While I had the door open, I looked at the odometer. 38,195 miles! The floor mats were perfect and the pedals weren’t worn, so I believed it. I crawled under the car and looked at the frame. It had been straightened beneath the door. Somebody had T-boned the car. I didn’t care. I was in love. The salesman said the price was $495.00. Pretty steep for a twenty year old car. Way more than I could afford.

I was busting at the seams, but I couldn’t say anything because my mother would figure out that I wasn’t in school. I went downtown again the next morning and rode by the lot to make sure the car was still there. When I got home I started telling my parents how nice the car was, and how much I wanted it. I kept it up for a week. I guess they figured I would never shut up about it unless they killed me or bought me the Ford. When I came home from school on the 19th, the coupe was in the driveway. My dad had traded in the ’50 Studebaker. The dealer gave him $95.00 on the trade in, but it must have been worth ten times that for him to get the Stude out of my mother’s sight.

 

Land Cruiser

My father always said he had been wrong once. He must have been referring to the huge mistake he made in December, 1949. He bought a ‘50 Studebaker as a surprise Christmas present for my mother. She never drove it. Her problem wasn’t that it was a Studebaker. With the exception of his first car, a Model A Ford, neither of them had ever owned anything else. She was used to standard shift and non-power steering. Her real objection was that he made a major purchase without talking it over with her first. After that incident, I don’t believe he ever bought a pack of Luckys without clearing it with her. My mother continued to drive her ’41 Studebaker with rust holes in the floor.

Dad taught me to drive on the bullet nose. We lived on a private gravel road, and I sprayed a lot of stone getting used to the clutch. When Mom thought I was ready, she let me drive about a mile down the hill to pick Dad up at the bus stop. I was 15. I started to mark off the 730 days until I could get a drivers license on the basement wall. It was a long two years. Good thing neither one was a leap year.

Our next-door neighbor had a decent ’36 Ford humpback Tudor which he used as his daily transportation. He kept it in a garage stall which he rented from us. One day, it couldn’t make it up the hill, so he had the compression checked. His mechanic said he was surprised that it moved on level ground, let alone uphill. If I had asked for the car, I think he would have given it to me. If not, I could have paid him what he got to scrap it, but I never brought it up.

In 1955, Mom took the family shopping for a station wagon. We looked at a DeSoto with an unfortunate olive and white paint job. Mom and I liked it anyway. Dad wouldn’t buy it because it cost over $4,000. It had a Hemi, but who knew? My brother John and I lobbied for a Nomad but Dad didn’t think a two door wagon made sense. Besides, he was wary of the new, unproven Chevy V-8 engine. Eventually, Mom picked out a two tone blue ’55 Dodge wagon with the 270 ci non-hemi V-8 and a two speed automatic. It was a slug.

I started looking for a car when I was 16. The first one I looked at was a ’36 Dodge coupe. I remember thinking how tiny the engine looked. I was already V-8 oriented. Next, I looked at a red ’39 Ford convertible. The rumble seat had been removed and the lid leaded shut. It had a ’49 Plymouth rear bumper and 6” shackles on the rear spring. I bought it for $150.00. I hand sanded off six layers of paint, sprayed it with rattle cans of gray primer, and installed fender skirts on the back. If I took a corner at more than 15 mph, the inside wheel hit the fender skirt and knocked it off. If the top was down, whoever was riding in the back seat would jump up, run down the rear deck and retrieve the skirt. Spectators must have been amused.

Some of my friends and I started a car club in Metuchen, NJ. With unintentioned irony, we called ourselves “The Saints”. The most memorable member was Celestin “Charles” Matteo, who had an old Pontiac with 20 feet of flex pipe wound through the frame (no mufflers). Charlie’s mother was inclined to throw heavy objects in Charlie’s direction for real or imagined infractions. When she missed him with a glass ashtray and dented the wall, she said “You’re in trouble now. I’monna tell your father you did that.” Charlie would’ve been better off if she hit him.

Charlie’s father was a professional boxer with a history of winning by knockouts. Because of the ashtray incident, he decided to teach Charlie the manly art of self defense. He said “Swing at me.” Charlie protested. His dad insisted. Charlie threw a right; his father blocked it and knocked him cold. He woke up ten minutes later. His father asked him “How many times I told you not to hit your old man?”

The Saints bought a ’35 Ford coupe body and frame for $25.00. We were going to build a stock car. We figured “Why not?” Looking back, I’d have to say that an abysmal lack of talent, money, desire, knowledge and probably driving ability were adequate reasons why not. I have no idea what ever happened to the car, but we never lifted a finger to work on it.

When I was working on the convertible, I drove the ’50 Studebaker. My friend Rich Schulz observed “It must be terrible to own a car and know that no matter what you to it, it will never be fast.” I had a job at Two Guys from Harrison, one of the first discount super store chains. The store, which had a grocery department, sat on a hill North of Route 22. Shopping carts rolled down the hill regularly, sometimes hitting cars on the highway. After the store closed, we had to collect the carts. We used the Studebaker to push them up the hill, through the doors and into the store. One night, we were pushing 150 carts up the hill when someone locked the doors to the store. The carts were rolling about 20 mph when they hit the locked doors. There was a loud crash, the aluminum door frames bent like a pretzel and glass flew everywhere. Time to look for a new job.

My next automotive purchase was a ten dollar ’39 Chevy coupe. It had faded black paint, a screeching throw out bearing and a huge dent in the right front fender. Since someone might miss the fact that the fender was dented, I took gold paint and painted ”6 DEAD” in the dent in four inch letters. A Plainfield cop told me “Get this piece of shit out of my town and never come back.”