CUSTOM CARS

IMG_0175 (Medium)CUSTOM CARS HAVE BEEN A FAVORITE OF OURS since before we could ride bicycles. Larry Rayl and my younger brother Mike and I used to chase the custom cars down our main street like we were a bunch of dogs. We rode our bikes hard and fast to get the “names” that were painted on the sides of those fascinating cars. We just loved cars. We would then record the “names” in Larry’s book that he kept. I guess it was his handy dandy notebook.

I am not talking about Fords, Chevies, Pontiacs, Plymouths and Dodges etc.; but the “nick names” that many of the guys and gals in the late fifties and early sixties used to paint on their personal rides of yesteryear.

Some of the “names” were based on songs we heard on the radio like, “White Lightning”, on the back fender of a white 57 Chevy. “My Blue Heaven” on the front fender of a blue ’54 Ford. Some “nicknames” were based on other things, such as ,”The Raven”, on the side of a ’58 Corvette which was lacquered black with white pin striping. “El Toro” was a favorite of Larry’s and mine. It was a  red ’58 Chevrolet Impala with white interior and a white stretched canvas tonneau cover snapped down over the back seat with the wildest full color canvas painting of a charging bull imaginable. One reason that red car was a favorite of ours was because it belonged to one of the baseball players on our local Semi-pro A- Minor league team. We got to check out the car every time he played at our municipal ball park stadium. That car must have made quite an impression on Larry, because years later he had his own “El Toro” red 58 Impala– only there was no wild tonneau cover painting stretched over his back seat, as I recall. He sold it a few years back. Those were great times chasing cars like mangy old hound dogs.

 

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