I spotted an (insert obscure car name here) classic car today!

berri · April 2013

I was always a big Leave it to Beaver fan. I think you are right about Ward's cars. However at the end during the credits I believe you could see a 59 DeSoto and maybe another car of that 58/59 vintage in the street scene. Now IRCC, the Beverly Hillbillies started out with 62 Mopars and ended with maybe 66's?

andre1969 · April 2013

I never really saw the similarities between a '60 Ford and '63 Plymouth until Lemko pointed it out. But, there always was something about the '63 Plymouth that seemed a little "Ford-ish" to me. And then, for 1964, it seemed faintly reminiscent of a '63 Chevy!

berri · April 2013

Yeah, I think the high point of those 64 Plymouth's (and Dodge's) was the C pillar treatment on the hardtop coupes. I thought it came out pretty sharp. Actually, the 64 Mopar's were kind of clean looking while in 64 I though Chevy tarted up the Impala a little. Now the full sized Chrysler, a bit unusual. But nowadays I'm mellowing and find that formal, quasi squared look somewhat attractive for some reason.

texases · April 2013

'For god's sake, why? I can barely think of a more anonymous car. "

Obviously not. Very clean, smooth design for the time, and all black with the polished alloy wheels was a very clean, modern look for '95. For it's class, the best looker of the bunch.

Not an exotic sports car, sure.

fintail · April 2013

I swear I saw an episode of Leave it to Beaver not long ago (local station still airs it) where Ward's car was a 63 Fury sedan - but it could have been a 62 I guess. Wally tries to push start Lumpy's car with it, and has a fender bender.

I think his 61 might have even been a 4 door HT, to add extra style to the goodness of a 61 Plymouth. Yes, I watch, or at least listen to the show now and then.

Mike Brady was an architect, of course - what did Ward do? They had a nice house, one income, he always had a decent enough late model car. Of course, a lot easier in those days.

fintail · April 2013

Saw a 90s exotic today - C140 S600 coupe. Not just the V12 car, but a Renntech car. Can't imagine what it costs to keep on the road, but it was something in its day - probably cost like 175K back then. Would be 94-96, I think.

berri · April 2013

Hmm, that 63 roof line is kind of unique to that year so maybe you did. I'm not sure how you'd check that out really? I do remember the more gussied up 61 HT, Ward must have gotten a promotion in whatever he did, besides buying a car after too much to drink. Maybe he smashed it up on a bender and after depreciation could only afford going back to the 62 sedan?

fintail · April 2013

IMCDB to the rescue

Aha, here it is

Long list of cars seen in the show

berri · April 2013

That's a neat website. I like the picture of the side by side 58 Merc and Impala. Maybe it's just the camera angle, but the Impala looks dwarfed. Somehow I thought their 62 was a sedan, but the website shows it too was a hardtop.

fintail · April 2013

58 Mercury is a big car too, I think.

It's a fun site useful for killing a little time.

The page for my favorite show of the era - no doubt sponsored by Ford

uplanderguy · April 2013

Every neighborhood had a "Mr. Wilson", didn't they? In ours, it was Mr. Myers.

Elderly couple, no kids, immaculate house, yard, and car, grumpy husband, kindly wife.

Sadly, since harder times have hit my beloved old hometown in the post-NAFTA period, last time I drove by their house, it looked like a shack. If Mr. Myers weren't already gone, it'd kill him.

uplanderguy · April 2013

Ah yes, Cosmopolitan Motors.....well, one's asking price is good exercise for your First Amendment rights.

I think Cosmopolitan Motors was the one that paid $15,601 for it.

I got an email back that said they'd get me the serial number, but he didn't offer the price in that first email.

As a Studebaker buff, I would just love that car, assuming it's solid where you can't see, but I'd have to do that laundry list of smallish stuff I mentioned earlier, to get it to looking factory-authentic. If it's an R2 stuck in a wagon that wasn't built as an R2, I'm not interested.

lemko · April 2013

Don't forget, Mrs. Brady also had that goldish 1971 Satellite wagon, so the Bradys were a three car family!

I think Mr. Cleaver must've done really well for himself because his house was really nice, even in a booming 1950s economy. He was just a cheapskate when it came to cars. I'm sure Mr. Cleaver could've at least afforded a Mercury or maybe even a DeSoto. :P

lemko · April 2013

I remember that episode! He busted the headlamp cluster, parking light, and crimped the hood. The repair was only $18! Even factoring inflation, that's still super cheap for all that work! Scuffing a bumper these days often results in a $500 repair job.

lemko · April 2013

Ours was Mr. and Mrs. Rudewick. He drove this black 1961 Ford Falcon with a red interior. I found our later, that Mr. Rudewick was a pro football player in the 1920s! Mr. Rudewick was still strong enough to lift several sheets of drywall when he was 89! Fortunately, their house didn't befall such a fate. My parents bought it as a rental after the couple had passed.

uplanderguy · April 2013

Mr. Myers drove a light turquoise metallic '67 Dodge Coronet 440 4-door sedan with white painted top. It looked showroom-new at all times. I'm thinking he had a '60 or '61 Rambler Classic before that, and I'm thinking he had a '73 Satellite Custom 4-door after that (he was cranky; wonder if the Dodge dealer p***ed him off?!). But again, his yard and house and car always looked perfect. The house is a shame now.

On the front of that Coronet, he had a license plate that said "Pennsylvania, The Land of Taxes". My buddy thought it said "Pennsylvania, the Land of Texas"!

fintail · April 2013

Funny thing, you can kind of see it in the link too - the car wasn't actually damaged, it looks like it was just disassembled and covered with tape a little. I suppose no point back then in damaging a new car for a TV gag. Scuffing bumpers back then wasn't as big of an issue - took a lot of work.

Mr_Shiftright · April 2013

If you'd love to have the car you should go for it regardless of its authenticity IMO--if the price reflects the discrepancy in numbers. This isn't a Duesenberg and you're not opening a Station Wagon museum, right? It's a car to drive and enjoy. Who cares is somebody runs up to your car (you know the type, right?) and points to the ID plate and jumps with glee and goes "aha! non-matching numbers!"

texases · April 2013

Speaking of a 'wagon museum' the WSJ had an article on luxury garages, including one belonging to a a 1971-72 Charger fanatic (slide 1)

Never seen such a model/year specific collection before.

lemko · April 2013

Spotted something like this on the SE corner of Tyson and Rising Sun Avenue in NE Philly. Looks like a late 1960s-early 1970s VW van crew-cab pickup kind of thingy. The one I saw had thin chrome bumpers, so I'd say it's pre-1973. Same color.

uplanderguy · April 2013

If you'd love to have the car you should go for it regardless of its authenticity IMO--if the price reflects the discrepancy in numbers. This isn't a Duesenberg and you're not opening a Station Wagon museum, right? It's a car to drive and enjoy. Who cares is somebody runs up to your car (you know the type, right?) and points to the ID plate and jumps with glee and goes "aha! non-matching numbers!"

All three of my Studebakers were matching-number cars, and my first one, the one I had a restoration shop spend two years on, I was fussy about authenticity. Believe it or not, in Studebaker circles, 'matching numbers' bring extra bucks because it's one of the few marques where you can actually verify that to a build sheet. My guess is that dealer is asking in the $20's if they paid $15.6K for it. No mention of rust in either ad though...hmmmm.

The rarity is a huge part of the appeal to me...if it's the real deal.

I gotta say, the fender 'supercharged' emblems being three or so inches too low just slaps me in the face. That's a real pet peeve of mine. I've seen really beautiful paint jobs on cars, and the shop couldn't be bothered with checking to see where the nameplates or emblems were supposed to be. It's not rocket science! And on this Lark, the fenders were probably replaced; why wouldn't you just use the old fender emblem location for a template? Unless...the car didn't have the emblems (i.e., not an R2 car).

ateixeira · April 2013

They made those as Kombis in Brazil until, oh, roughly last week, so you see all sorts of variations, including home-made Franken-cars with lumber beds.

andre1969 · April 2013

I suppose no point back then in damaging a new car for a TV gag.

There was an episode of I Love Lucy where they ran their '55 Pontiac into the back of a 1923 or so Cadillac. I never really noticed it as a kid, but watching it today, you can see cables pulling the Pontiac forward into the Cadillac, and the way the cars fall apart when they hit, you can tell they rigged them up that way.

They also took the windshields out of the cars...most likely so there would be no reflections from studio lights and such?

I like the fact that some shows like Leave it to Beaver, Bewitched, Dennis the Menace, etc actually did a lot of outdoor shooting, as opposed to doing everything on an indoor set. Gave a bit more realism to the overall experience (despite some of the plot lines!). And, as classic television, it lets us see a lot more old cars!

fintail · April 2013

They would also matte paint the chrome to ward off reflections. I've noticed the windshield thing too - on I Love Lucy and Leave it to Beaver - in the latter, I noticed a rear windshield was missing on Ward's car.

I know that show, along with Dennis the Menace and others, were filmed on a now Universal Studios lot, where "The Burbs" was also filmed, among others. Dennis and Beaver had a lot of cars in the background, if not directly in the plot. I saw a Beaver episode not long ago where Wally and Eddie have jobs parking cars at a wedding - lots of sights there.

uplanderguy · April 2013

There was an episode of I Love Lucy where they ran their '55 Pontiac into the back of a 1923 or so Cadillac.

That has to be the one where they're all going to California and Lucy kept saying she wanted a 'Cadillac Convertible'. Fred called and said, "Lucy, I found a Cadillac convertible" and it was that old beater!

The character of Fred Mertz was a pretty funny character, wasn't he? Cheapskate, talked about his old vaudeville days, and never missed a chance to rib Ethel about her weight!

andre1969 · April 2013

Yeah, Leave it to Beaver was filmed at Universal Studios. However, if you go on the tour there, the house and street will look slightly different, because at some point they re-did the whole area, and ended up re-constructing the Beaver house and some of the others, but not all of them.

Dennis the Menace was filmed on the same lot as Bewitched, I dream of Jeannie, Hazel, Gidget etc. Back then I think it was owned by Screen Gems but now they call it the Warner Brothers Ranch. National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation was also filmed there...the house the Yuppies next door lived into was also where Gidget and Hazel lived! And more recently, I've seen the Warner Bros Ranch used in an episode of 2 1/2 Men, where Jake had his first day of high school. You could see the Gidget/Hazel house and the Bewitched house in the background.

Those locations pop up quite often in tv commercials and as bit spots in various shows, it seems. Drives my friends crazy when we're watching tv and suddenly I blurt out "ooh, look, it's Sam and Darrin's house" or something like that!

A lot of Alfred Hitchcock Presents episodes were filmed at Universal, and from time to time the Beaver house pops up. In fact, in the earlier episodes, the first Beaver house even shows up from time to time. I guess Hitchcock must have switched studios around the same time Beaver did. I think the first studio was called Shamley...not sure what ever became of it.

fintail · April 2013

I'm also kind of a geek for filming locations - been meaning to take a trip down there and do some studio tours. Maybe this year. I know many of the Burbs houses have been renovated too - but I see "Walter's" house in commercials, and Desperate Housewives was filmed there too. I'd get a laugh out of seeing the Vacation house, too.

I hear Jonathan Winters passed on - This all time classic film he appeared in has a great host of cars

uplanderguy · April 2013

We went on the WB Studio tour last summer, and I assume it's different than the "Warner Bros. Ranch". There were scenes my daughters loved, but the only place I could relate to was the Baldwin Sisters' house from the Waltons.

I asked our tour guide about the house from "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?", as that was a WB film, but she said it was filmed on location, off-studio and I guess that should have been obvious to me from the movie.

I know this sounds curmudgeonly, but is there anyone online anymore who writes, that's over, say, 35 years old? My AOL had a picture of Jonathan Winters and the headline was "Mork and Mindy Star Dies". I'm thinking, 'you gotta be kiddin' me'.

fintail · April 2013

I'll have to do some research. I have some time off to burn later in the year, and have also wanted to visit some off-studio filming locations. Some studio tours would be a good use of a couple days too. Gotta see it once.

Funny, 35 is my age group, and to me, Mork and Mindy is a dorky 70s kind of thing that I never found particularly funny - where IAMMMMW is hilarious.

andre1969 · April 2013

We went on the WB Studio tour last summer, and I assume it's different than the "Warner Bros. Ranch". There were scenes my daughters loved, but the only place I could relate to was the Baldwin Sisters' house from the Waltons.

Actually, I think the Baldwin Sisters' house IS at the Warner Brother's Ranch. It was also used as the house for Sheila Sommers, Darrin's ex-girlfriend, in an episode of Bewitched. And in the final season of Hazel, after they got rid of everybody except Hazel, little Harold, and Smiley the dog and they moved in with Mr. B's brother, they used that house.

Maybe there's a double for it at the Warner Bros studio though, where they do the tours? I know the house they used for Boss Hogg's house in the Dukes of Hazzard, which was also Mrs. Brenner's boarding house in the Waltons, etc, it at that location. And the building they used for Boatright University, where John-Boy attended college, which also doubled as the Hazzard county jail, was there. The Walton's house, alas, was replaced by a parking garage. It was moved though, or a replica was built, at the Warner Bros Ranch, and has been used in "Gilmore Girls" or something like that.

Short attention span moment...I just looked out the window, just in time to see an old Benz go past. I forget the series name, but late 60's/early 70's, whatever replaced the Fintail.

Back to the Waltons...if anybody remembers "V: The Series" (the '84-85 version, not the one that recently surfaced), well the Waltons had been canceled by that point, but a lot of the sets were still around. In one episode, there was a fight-out on the porch of the house, and part of the railing got kicked out. I'm sure that Olivia would've made those boys memorize some bible verses if she'd caught them in the act! And, in another episode, there was another fight where they messed up Ike Godsey's general store a bit. And, the Midwest Town set, which was used in the Dukes of Hazzard, the Waltons, and God-knows-what else, was all dressed up to look post-apocalyptic. Main thing I remember about it, was a 1973 or so blue LeMans sitting, listing to one side, as it was missing a tire.

fintail · April 2013

I've been to the actual Hazzard County town - Covington, GA. A friend used to live there, I visited him a few times. It is seen in the first several episodes of Dukes, and looks very similar today. The courthouse building is identical to this day. Much of Smokey and the Bandit was filmed in the same general area, too. Not too many old cars around that area - I think the hot summer weather hurts them.

The MB was probably a W108.

andre1969 · April 2013

You and I are an awful lot alike! I've never been down to that area, but I've looked it up on Google Maps and done the street view. And yeah, it's amazing how much that area has NOT changed! IIRC, the original Boar's Nest is still there, but serves duty as a church now. And I think the area around that little used car lot that was shown in the episode where Boss Hogg wanted to buy a stolen Rolls Royce for LuLu looks pretty much the same.

I thought the Dukes of Hazzard really lost a lot of its charm when they left Georgia and started shooting in California.

And yeah, I just googled W108 and that's it!

fintail · April 2013

I'm a filming location geek of sorts, cool that you are too :shades:

The town square is pretty uncanny, and the courthouse is easily recognizable. The town has been well preserved, which helps. Also, the "In the Heat of the Night" TV series was filmed there, I remember seeing some locations. I remember my friend taking me to the Boar's Nest - I had no idea what it was until he broke the news. Fun times. Makes me want to take that CA trip.

W108s sold much more than fintails, later cars could be had with V8s.

uplanderguy · April 2013

You mentioned 'Gilmore Girls'. My daughters loved that show. The 'Stars Hollow Town Hall' from the show was on the WB tour we went on, and the opposite end of the building was the school from "Pretty Little Liars", which our girls love too.

All the talk of the Waltons reminds me...anybody ever see the pilot for the Waltons? It was a made-for-TV Christmas movie called "The Homecoming". Most of the kids were the same, but Patricia Neal was the mother (IMHO far more believable as a country mom than Michael Learned), the Dad was only in the last five minutes or so but was somewhat forgettable, and Edgar Bergen was Grandpa, who didn't play the part comically at all as did Will Geer. Ellen Corby was still "Grandma". A different guy played Ike Godsey and one of the Baldwin sisters was a different actress than in the show. But I just loved the movie, which I saw when it first aired. My coworker said he remembered people at work talking about it the next day...they'd not seen anything like that on TV. Of course, the show started the next season and ran I think nine years.

BTW, the house in the movie was little more than a log cabin, compared to the sprawling place in the TV show!

uplanderguy · April 2013

..but my family isn't interested (not a beach nearby, sigh):

http://www.houmashouse.com/index.htm

It's where 'Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte' was filmed. On top of that, it's a beautiful place.

I'd like to do a New Orleans vacations some time, as I've never been there and I also understand the National World War II Museum is there. Houmas House, where '..Charlotte' was filmed, is near there.

I'd like to get back and visit the Sixth Floor Museum and Dealey Plaza in Dallas, too. I was there extensively in 1994 and spent hours there. My family? Not interested!

andre1969 · April 2013

I was out in California in 1992 and 1999, and found a lot of the area where they filmed "Duel". In fact, I parked my '91 Civic rental car in many of the same places that Dennis Weaver's '71 Valiant was! I took a some pics. One of these days, I'll have to scan them in, and do some side-by side shots of my trip, versus some screen captures from the movie.

When I went back in 1999, things were a little different. The railroad crossing where the truck tries to push Dennis Weaver into the train was gone, replaced with a tunnel that goes under the tracks.

I'll have to find those pics. Not sure where they ended up. In 1999 when I went back out, I had an Alero rental. I took a couple pics of it by the tunnel, which was also used in "It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World".

Kinda wild to think that, in 1992 when I went out there, "Duel" was 21 years old. Yet now, in 2013, it's been yet ANOTHER 21 years since I've taken those pics. Damn the time goes by too fast!

bhill2 · April 2013

I agree that IAMMMMW is a great movie. Looking at the pictures, though, demonstrates one of my favorite peeves about many driving scenes in movies and on TV. If you look at the several pictures of Don Knotts and Phil Silvers driving on the highway, the gear selector of the car is in 'Park'. This happens all the time (for instance, in 'King of Queens'. Doug never took his delivery truck out of Park). You'd think that someone associated with these productions would eventually pick up on this. It's pretty obvious.

ab348 · April 2013

My favorite show of the era is "The F.B.I.", starring Efrem Zimbalist Jr. I remember watching it when I was about 10, and through the late '60s it was a staple.

It was sponsored by Ford, and was one of the shows Iacocca wrote about in his book when talking about how he was able to place Ford products in TV productions. It has recently come out on DVD and I have the first 4 seasons. The closing credits were always fun, with Zimbalist exiting FBI H.Q., getting into his Mustang convertible, and driving through the streets of Washington. He got a new one each year. They must have shot those scenes using pre-production models, since the show would start its run in September and those credits would need to have been shot in the summer.

Of course, the episodes themselves use Fords almost exclusively too. The FBI agents use Ford Custom sedans with 390s in them for the most part. The bad guys and other characters also use Fords of various vintages. It seems station wagons and Ford pickups are particularly popular in the show. Ford must have bought a fleet of used Fords for use in the show, since I saw ones from the late 50s on up used.

lemko · April 2013

I thought Jack Lord's 1968 Mercury Park Lane in Hawaii Five-O was the coolest Ford product on TV.

stickguy · April 2013

cruising around my neighborhood this evening in the drizzle was a nice looking (well, in the dark) dark Brown Benz. Maybe a '72 or so? Think bumpers. sounds nice. Certainly smelled like an old car. Long after it passed by.

fintail · April 2013

The older you get, the faster it goes by. I am getting to that point too :shades:

There are a couple sites out there that show then and now views of filming locations for IAMMMMW and Back to the Future. I would like to get some pics from a few of those spots too. I see there really is a "Plaster City".

toomanyfumes · April 2013

I notice that all the time, vehicle being driven in park. It's a pet peeve of mine, I always point it out to the wife, who I'm sure is sick of hearing it.

I agree though, all the work that's done on a movie or TV show, and nobody notices the shifter in park?

fintail · April 2013

I saw a very nice looking W123 300D out in the rain today, had bundts, I would wager a later (maybe 82+) car.

And for an oddity, a pristine looking first gen Integra 2-door. Looked almost new, a pleasant light-medium blue, so small and airy compared to a modern car.

stickguy · April 2013

when I drove my Integra, I feel dwarfed by everything. Even a new Elantra towers over it.

berri · April 2013

I think Hawaii Five-O may be the neatest intro to any show I've watched (and this comes from someone who was never really all that fond of DC-8's). IAMMMMW was a great comedy movie and a fun vehicle watch.

Mr_Shiftright · April 2013

speaking of Bundts, I got 4 chrome ones if you know anybody.... :P

andre1969 · April 2013

I agree though, all the work that's done on a movie or TV show, and nobody notices the shifter in park?

It's amazing how much stuff that gets overlooked on tv shows and movies. Back in 2006, my LeMans was used in a movie called "Talk to Me." Good movie, and a lot of neat old cars in it, as it spanned a timeframe from the late 1960's to early 1980's. But the part that my car was involved in was so brief, and you could only barely see the rear of it for a split second, and you had to know what to look for.

But anyway, to dress our cars up to make them look more period correct, they had us put older style license plates on our cars. The plates that went on my car were Virginia plates from 1973. When I said that my car was a 1976, they were like, it doesn't matter; nobody will notice.

Well, it almost caused a goof, because at one point, a guy came out and said "I want this car, that car, that car, etc", and mine was one of the cars they wanted for the scene. Well, a buddy of mine, who has a 1978 Mark V, asked them why they didn't use his. since it was close in year. They told him that the scene was set in 1973 and his car was too new. I was already driving out to the location by this time, when my friend called my cell and told me that the production company wanted me to come back.

So, if my friend hadn't said anything, my '76 LeMans might have shown up as one of those anachronism goofs on the IMDB!

I think I got paid something like $275 to put my car in that movie. It was fun to do it, once. But I don't think I'll ever do it again. The weather was brutal on that hot summer day, and they had us there from before sunrise and kept us until we ran out of daylight. They kept re-shooting scenes over and over again, moving parked cars around, deciding on the fly to do something totally different, etc. They had no idea at first what cars were going to be closeups, which ones would be backups, etc. They also lent out 70's shirts for us to wear, in case any of us were filmed driving our cars.

fintail · April 2013

Maybe the LeMans lucked out because the basic shape dates back to 73, even if it has a newer front end. The Lincoln could only be as old as 77.

It'd be cool to have a car in a movie - have never heard of any casting calls for old cars in my area though, rare that anything set in the past is filmed here.

berri · April 2013

Seattle may be too cloudy for movie filming, at least outside of Jul-Aug. I think it would be difficult to film any period films in Seattle because it has changed so drastically over the past 20 or so years. Heck, even Bellevue has skyscrapers now. Still a beautiful area though.

fintail · April 2013

That's the problem - there's really not a lot of "old" here, especially in terms of city streets. So much has been updated and removed, and places like downtown Bellevue are hugely different than a mere 25-30 years ago. There are many preserved residential areas, but not a lot commercial. The weather could be doable - especially if set here to begin with. Quite a few 90s era productions set in Seattle were filmed in Vancouver, similar weather.

I spotted an (insert obscure car name here) classic car today!

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