The family car growing up

[SlaveToTheGrind]

The family car growing up.

While writing a response to the "Witnessing Upwardly Mobile in Action" thread, I was inspired for this thread. What was your car you remember most growing up? This is mine. When I was a kid, we always traveled on vacation every summer in our station wagon. We ineracted, talked, and assiciated with each other. Okay, us kids fought a lot too. But we were a family. Put in tv/dvd and might as well keep the kids home. This is a 1978 Ford Country Squire. We had the LTD version. Same car only we did not have the fancy flip up headlight covers or fake wood paneling. Good times. I then used this car in high school. I was known to have the "grocery getter" or "dragon wagon." Please google for a picture, if you can. This could be fun and interesting.

This Ford is 1977. A year earlier than mine, but closely resembles the beast I had.

 

[Zoning Goddess]

We, too, had an LTD wagon that took us on many family trips (including 6 weeks around the U.S. one year). I had to take my drivers license exam in it.

 

[mendelman]

STTG:

I, too, spent many hours on long trips in the 'way back' seat in my parents' 1976 Ford Country Squire. It looked exactly like the first pic you posted, except it was white.

I wish I could have one today!!

Other great family cars we had/have:

1985 Ford Country Squire

1992 Chevy Caprice (not same as pic)

Red 1998 Volvo V70 turbo (pic is silver)

The above are my fav. cars my parents had or have!

 

[Cardinal]

1970 Ford Country Squire. I always had to sit in the "way-back."

 

[nerudite]

We had an LTD sedan when I was growing up... it's funny, because we were just reminiscing today at break about family trips in the old gas guzzlers. My brother and I used to call the car 'the landspeeder", because it felt like it floated.

 

[Gedunker]

I found a picture of a similar vehicle but, rrrrrrr, I am still not image-literate. Anyway, it was a 1949 Willys two door panel truck (the station-wagon platform). Flat, drab green color. I learned how to drive a manual transmission (three speed on the column) in that truck.

It was destroyed when an elderly woman fell asleep at the wheel and crashed into it while it was parked in front of my parents home in 1979. :-# RIP Willys.

 

[SlaveToTheGrind]

The LTD seems enjoy some popularity. I hated the car in High School, although you could put 12 people in the thing. I would actually like to have it now so I can save it for my boys to drive and let them experience what I had to.

Mendelman: My brother and I used the "way back" jump seat is the trip was not too long. Six people and ocasionally one dog made for some interesting times.

 

[El Feo]

What is it with the COuntry Squires?

The first car I remember, was a 1968 Country Squire:

It was exactly like this one, except no doubt in worse shape.

Like everyone else - shared the wayback seat with one of my (then) two brothers. First family vacation memory? Riding backwards. Through the twisty, rolly mountain roads of West Virginia. To visit relatives.

Didn't take long for my folks to figure out that letting a kid fill himself up with grape Nehi, then forcing him to ride backwards through mountains, only resulted in a fold-down seatwell and spare tire full of puke.

 

[El Feo]

The LTD seems enjoy some popularity. I hated the car in High School, although you could put 12 people in the thing. I would actually like to have it now so I can save it for my boys to drive and let them experience what I had to.

STTG,

We had a 1978 LTD SW when I was in high school. I hated it - until I realized that the 460 in it would smoke most beater "muscle" cars high school job money could throw together, even if it was loaded with friends.

I can tell you from sweet experience that nothing wilts the manhood of a blowhard punk with a junked pony car more than getting his ass handed to him by a geek and 6 friends in a station wagon...

 

[SlaveToTheGrind]

STTG,

We had a 1978 LTD SW when I was in high school. I hated it - until I realized that the 460 in it would smoke most beater "muscle" cars high school job money could throw together, even if it was loaded with friends.

I can tell you from sweet experience that nothing wilts the manhood of a blowhard punk with a junked pony car more than getting his ass handed to him by a geek and 6 friends in a station wagon...

I did that more than once, too. It was ugly, but a fast car.

 

[BKM]

No photos, thank god. My father only bought American Motors cars (sorry, Wisconsin). I learned to drive in an AMC Matador Station Wagon. Then we had a horrible, horrible car called the AMC Spirit. It had the awful high center of gravity of a bad SUV with none of the purported benefits of an SUV.

RIP, American Motors.

 

[Tranplanner]

Oops!

:-$

I went searching for a nice picture of a 1972 Chevelle but the first site I got referred to had pictures of a naked lady hanging of said car. I think I'll go on a site visit before the IT gestapo come calling...

and I'll have a better look tonight from home

 

[BKM]

Off Topic: Love your sig line, El Feo

 

[martini]

Too many station wagons! Not that there's anything wrong with Station wagons...

I grew up in one of these:

It was MUCH uglier though. I fell inlove with mountains in that thing on a trip to the Black Hills. On that same trip, I also got my first taste of 'hot girls' as I was trapizing about on freaky rock formations. Man, she was sooo hot!

Since the other pic is from AOL, it probably won't post. Here's another one.

 

[biscuit]

The one car that stands out to me was a 198(4or5) Mercury Grand Marquis station wagon. It had a brown interior and this unholy sparkly, metallic green paint job. I was perhaps six or seven years old and thought it was the coolest thing in the world to fold down the back seat and play in the extended cargo area. Which was fine because, as everyone knows, it was perfectly safe for children to not wear seatbelts until around 1990 or so.

I wanted to post a picture so you could all bask in the majestic ugliness that was this car but I couldn't find anything on Google.
Damn, to ugly for the internet...

 

[donk]

First car I remember as a kid was a sky blue didge colt station wagon. I have no idea how the family and dogs fit in it to go camping. (Sorry can't find an image)

We also had a huge dodge van.

 

[martini]

on the cool side of things though...my dad had one of these.

Loved the car. Was a convertable and brown. Big engine that went fast, but only in a straight line.

 

[Tranplanner]

I dared to search again. My parents had one of these for a while:

It wasn't tricked out at all - a plain jane early '70s mini. We lived at the top of a big hill and every time there was a big snowfall, my brother and I would have to go meet my dad at the bottom of the hill and shovel him up as the mini was decidedly narrower than most cars and wouldn't fit the ruts made by previous cars that had gone up the hill. Fun stuff.

My mum painted it black. With a roller. With housepaint. A short while after that, a bunch of neighbourhood no-gooders tipped it on its side, causing all the engine fluids to combine and screw up the motor. Dad sold it for scrap - I think he got $50.

 

[SkeLeton]

Lovely, ain't it? Ok... My parents had it until before we went to the US but still...

 

[Gedunker]

Tranplanner your mum and my dad must have been cut from the same cloth -- when my brother passed down his "safety green" read "LIME Green" VW Rabbit to my dad, he painted it battleship grey with a roller and housepaint. As the paint peeled away the original green was revealed. My mom was so beside herself that she bought him a new Mistubishi pick-up truck. Maybe he wasn't so dumb after all :-D)

 

[mendelman]

Lovely, ain't it? Ok... My parents had it until before we went to the US but still...

If i'm correct, that's a Renault. Man, you gotta love pre-1990 French cars - ie: Citroen DS 19, almost any Puegoet(sp?)

 

[kms]

1962 Ford Fairlane, then a 1972 4 door Chevy Impala that the kids drove. My dad always had late model company cars that we could drive. I learned to drive in a 1976 Monte Carlo.

 

[JNL]

We had one of these for a long time, a Morris Minor Traveller (but in creamy white). Inherited from my grandfather.

 

[SkeLeton]

No, mendelman, it is Citroen, not a Renault... And if I remember correctly it was the same color... and given the year... the one that my dad had was probably made in Chile. Citroen HAD a factory here in those days, but the buisness ended being unprofitable so the took teh factory out..

 

[Miles Ignatius]

...and I lived to talk about it.

My father was a devotee of the early VW Microbuses. You'll recall they were notoriously underpowered deathtraps
and literally disentegrated into rolling rustbuckets
from the salt on the roads in NW Pennsylvania where I grew up.
Dreadful machines, really although I understand they command high $$ from the collector crowd these days

 

[donk]

We had one of these for a long time, a Morris Minor Traveller (but in creamy white). Inherited from my grandfather.

That car is really cool.

Friends lived in NZ for awhile and said that there is a huge demand for muscle cars of the early 70's. True?

 

[JNL]

That car is really cool.

Yeah it is. When I was about 10 Mum was helping with transport for a school trip and I was really embarassed about the car, because it was old and everyone else's parents had shiny new cars (or so it seemed). But when she arrived, everyone thought it was really cool and fought over who got to ride in it!!

Friends lived in NZ for awhile and said that there is a huge demand for muscle cars of the early 70's. True?

Possibly... not something I know a lot about, but we definitely love our big cars here - V8s old and new are very popular.

 

[el Guapo]

Lovely, ain't it? Ok... My parents had it until before we went to the US but still...

I LIKE it! It has a Volvoeskness about it.

 

[Gedunker]

Does anybody know whether it was Citroen or Peugeot that had the headlights that turned with the steeering wheel so you could see where you were going in a nightime turn? I always thought that was cool :-D

 

[Trail Nazi]

We had a VW Bug, appropriately named Herbie, for a number of years then a VW Dasher Diesel. Herbie was my brother's and my favorite car, but my brother was well over 6 feet tall and could not fit into the car well. The cars only had pick-up when they were going downhill. The Dasher kept breaking down so often that my mom bought a Subaru Wagon GL.

 

[Zoning Goddess]

My dad had one of these

http://www.musclecarclub.com/musclecars/oldsmobile-toronado/images/oldsmobile-toronado-1967a.jpg

when I was a kid. Complete with a "car phone" WAY before cell phones were around. My mom thought he was an idiot for buying it. All of us kids thought it was really cool.

 

[Tranplanner]

We had one of these for a long time, a Morris Minor Traveller (but in creamy white). Inherited from my grandfather.

One of my uncles in the UK had one of those - that same colour too, I think. We all called it the "woody wagon" (no comments, please).

 

[Jessie-J]

ooooh, we had the ever-popular bomb on wheels. Also known as the Ford Pinto. It was olive green with poo brown interior. I remember my grandfater had to install seatbelts in the back seat so my little brother's car seat could be used.

 

[Super Amputee Cat]

My dad bought a 1968 Ford Station Wagon brand new around Septeber of 1968. It looked just like this except it was turquoise throughout.

It only lasted 10 years...we junked it in 1978. I cried the day we took it to the junkyard.

In 1972 my dad purchased this car new to replace his old Pontiac Tempest. Its a 1972 Toyota Carina. This is the car I learned to drive on. Don't remember exactly when we got rid of it, perhaps 1984.

 

[Cardinal]

Hmmm... Did every planner grow up with a Ford station wagon?

 

[Super Amputee Cat]

Hmmm... Did every planner grow up with a Ford station wagon?

Ironically, I have one right now! A 1995 Ford Taurus Wagon

Edit: I just saw your car. I can't remember if ours was a Country Squire or a Country Sedan.

 

[Super Amputee Cat]

No photos, thank god. My father only bought American Motors cars (sorry, Wisconsin). I learned to drive in an AMC Matador Station Wagon.

Did it look like this?

or perhaps one of these...

 

[el Guapo]

1979 Ford Grand Torino - 351C

I'll post the others as I find them.

 

[Jen]

OMG what a thread cruising down memory lane!
on chronological order:

The first car i remember my family having was a rusted out chevy station wagon, early 60's, followed by another used car, this one a maroon ford station wagon (4 dr)with a column shift.

Five kids we needed big cars. The first new car was a Ford Grand Torino station wagon, like eG's, but without mag wheels, in baby blue. The car I learned to drive was really stylin' a late 70'sChrysler Cordoba, silver with wine interior, opera lights and air conditioning! Then I got my own car to drive, a 1979 v8 chevy monza spyder remember those?

Then the folks had another sedan, a buick which they hated. Then it was conversion van-dom for their early retirement. Now they drive a Jeep Cherokee.

Im back in a station wagon now!

 

[Cardinal]

Re: 1979 Ford Grand Torino - 351C

I'll post the others as I find them.

EG - Is that a typo? This is a 1972 Torino. It is the only year that they made the deep oval grille, and the body style was modified in 1973 so that the rear quarter panels were less flared, and the front end is much more squared off.

Those look like aftermarket side mirrors, and the rims are certainly replacements, but overall, a very nice car.

 

[Super Amputee Cat]

Re: Re: 1979 Ford Grand Torino - 351C

EG - Is that a typo? This is a 1972 Torino. It is the only year that they made the deep oval grille, and the body style was modified in 1973 so that the rear quarter panels were less flared, and the front end is much more squared off.

Those look like aftermarket side mirrors, and the rims are certainly replacements, but overall, a very nice car.

Maybe it was made in Argentina. They have a lot of cars down there that were made in the 1980s that look like 1960s. Ford used to sell the old dyes to them when production of certain models ended in the United States.

 

[el Guapo]

Cardinal That is indeed a 1972. Those were also the factory mirrors

However that is one I found on the net. Ours had standard hubcaps, a deep metalic gray pewter paint with a black interior. I loved that car.

This is the POS that replaced my beloved Torino - not the impact of the Volvoish boxiness of this wagon during the time I passed into manhood. Freud?

BTW - Ours came without the packing crate.

That 1979 Chevy Malibu Station Wagon is why I will go to my grave having never purchased another Chevy.

 

[yaff]

Memories

I remember the Dodge Caravan of my teen years ......
My sister and I learned to drive in that thing. Friends called it the "baby maker"

 

[ilikefish0]

Toyota corolla tercel. It was orange with a brown interior.
We also had an 84 Ranger pickup with a 4-cylinder (never worked too well).
We sold the truck in '89 and got a new vw jetta.
We sold the toyota in '90 and got a new vw fox.

 

[SlaveToTheGrind]

A few mentions of the AMC cars brought back chilliing memories of my grandparents AMC Hornet. The only stinging this car did was the vinyl interior in the summer. No AC. Ouch.

At the time we had the 78 LTD, we also had one of these. I refer to it as the II. It was not worthy to carry the Mustang name, only it did, the Mustang II. Green with white vinyl seats and black carpet.

 

[el Guapo]

This was my most favorite car I ever owned, well, not this exact one...

1989 Dodge Colt Wagon DL - (Not the Vista wagon - that's a different car entirely)

 

[mendelman]

This was my most favorite car I ever owned, well, not this exact one...

1989 Dodge Colt Wagon DL - (Not the Vista wagon - that's a different car entirely)

Holy crap!!

My first car was a 1987 Plymouth Colt two-door with a hatch-back. It was cool until the engine decided to throw a rod while going 70 mph. :-C

 

[H]

1984 Starcraft Custom Conversion GMC Van was the family roadster.

It later became my brother’s personal traveling keg party / hook up lounge / motel during high school.

 

[MayDay]

I think my family car from back in the day wins the "everyone but me thought it was cool" award. I hated these cars and resented being seen in them - of course, all the kids at school thought they were "Cool!!!".

Pop, being the first-generation American son of German immigrants was quite the fan of Volkswagen. He really liked the fact that he could work on them (and indeed, you COULD use a pair of panty hose to temporarily fix the belt!). So the first car (I was too young to really remember) was a tomato-red old-school Beetle. Who *didn't* have one back in the day?

When it finally died around 1977 (I was 5) - he decided to buy not one, but two other VWs - one white, one yellow. Ladies and gentleman, I bring you the horror that is "The Thing":

In addition to the lovely features standard to the Beetle (the heating element on the floor that melted your shoe sole, the engine in the back that gave you the ambiance of sitting next to a lawnmower...), the Thing featured - convertible top, doors that were removable, plastic windows that lifted out, and a windshield that flipped down. Dad "tricked" his (the yellow one) out with a happening 8-track deck.

This might explain a LOT about me.

 

[BIH80]

'86 Chevy Celebrity Eurosport Stationwagon!