Where does your nostalgia lie?

[Greg Myers]

Started on cars in the early '60's in Tucson AZ. First car a Model A Ford. All my friends had hot rods,I remember a hot flathead '34 coupe, a '53 Studebaker with a sbc with six twos, a '34 twodoor sedan with a 303 Olds, and my two best friends both had '41 Fords with full race flathead Merc's.Another friend that always traded up started out with an orange '47 Ford coupe. He married Linda Ronstats sister. The odd man out had a '62 Corvette.

One day my brother came home, yelling come quick, Dad found you a neat car. Turned out to be a "56 Chevy Bel-Air 265 Power Pac ( Four barrel, dual exhaust). First things first, get those full wheel covers off, paint the wheels black and a set of Baby Moons.My Dad was good at finding good stuff. He seemed to have a nack for what was hot. The last one he dug up for me was a cherry '62 SS Impala 327.

Gotta say thanks Dad.

[thatz4u]

in the 50's Hot Rod mag & Rod and Custom were less than a buck and fit in the back pocket of my jeans...the neighbor down the street had a 32 Ford 3 window with a hemi...I love the muscle cars from the 60's...70's were ok too

[Mark Crowel]

Born in the 1950's. Liked it so well, I decided to stay there.

Seriously, I was born in 1952, and our family's first car was a 1951 Pontiac (straight 8) that Dad bought in 1954. Dark green. Yes, I DO remember it. We traded up for our first new car in 1956, a Pontiac Chieftan 4-door hardtop, red and white, with a red and black interior, and wide whites. Jazziest looking car our family ever had. It was a showroom model, and our whole family was there when Dad bought it.

In the fifties, everybody got excited at new car introduction time. I remember when our whole family went to see the new 1958 Edsels. There were a lot of people in the showroom.

I notice that I have used the word family five times in this post. Maybe that's where my nostalgia lies.

[Modelmartin]

Not especially.

Where do you see a connection?

They are named after the same thing. Sorry. It was a bad attempt at humor.

[Harry P.]

You're a very bad boy...

[Danny Lectro]

I grew up in the 80s, but many of those are not very fond memories for me. I was a real outcast. The closest thing around to "rock" was the hair bands, and they just didn't speak to me. Because of that, I gravitated to rap and hip-hop, when it wasn't quite so accepted for a white kid to like it. My dad had gotten me a subscription to Car Craft magazine when I started expressing an interest in that kind of thing. Almost every single car was a bright, day-glo thing, but back then I ate it up.

I guess the nineties would be the time that hold the most nostalgia for me. It wasn't until the early part of the decade, when I entered college, that I started to find myself (still haven't finished yet, LOL). I didn't like the direction hip hop was going at the time. I was introduced to grunge music, like Nirvana, Pearl Jam and Stone Temple Pilots, which I thought was much more real and honest than the stuff the hair bands had been doing. That was also the time I learned of industrial music, via bands like Nine Inch Nails.

In sophomore year, I met the woman I would fall in love with and eventually marry. She introduced me to thrash metal. I started learning to play bass, and by the late nineties I started writing and recording my own music.

I just wish I knew some of the things back then that I know now.

[charlie8575]

My nostalgia...

Growing up in the 1980s and 1990s, I miss a lot of things. Like having respect for others, one or two quiet days a week that were all but gauranteed still, and not worrying too much about the world because that's what kids didn't do. I miss my days in DeMolay, my high school friends, and many of my teachers, most of whom were fine people and whose company I enjoyed.

Although I look back at many of them now with a somewhat kinder eye, I'm not particularly nostalgic for most of the cars of my youth, except for GM B/RWD C/D-bodies and K-cars because we had one. Although compared to what we have now, at least style and comfort-wise, I'll take almost any of them anyday over today's products, which are largely soulless appliances with (for me) uncomfortable seats and interior design.

I grew up in a family of mostly retirees. When I was born, most of my relatives had already retired, or would be before I finished grammar school. This, I think, is one of the reasons I tend to look at the world quite differently than most of my peers. I find myself nostalgic, I suppose, for my family, most of which is now gone.

But, that experience also shaped what I like. Big-band music, Art Deco, and the cars that go along with those things. As well as the cars of the Jazz Age and Depression, and the ones from my parents' youth in the 1950s and '60s. It also shaped who I am- thrifty, loyal, responsible, honest, and place integrity above all else. It gave me a perspective of the mental and emotional toughness needed to survive hard times; and it's one of the reasons, I think, I've been able to survive what for me has been a very bad last several years.

I find myself, to a great degree, re-living a life I was too young to appreciate or understand in my childhood and youth, and before. I have become so horrified at what the world has become that I don't really care to be that big a part of it. I've found myself playing more and more in my own corner- an odd mix of new, old, and in-between.

And it's the way I like it.

Charlie Larkin

[Draggon]

Born in 54, so the 60's and early 70's are what I miss. A half dozen hobby shops in my town, 2 slot car tracks, the original oakland roadster show, sprint cars, indoor midgets, an auto cross track, cruising the "strip" ( E. 14th street in San Leandro, it lasted for decades and was one of the only places cruise night was 7 days a week ) a couple airports ( i had a private pilots license ) but perhaps most of all was the Fremont Drag Strip. I spent many a Sunday watching the match races. Best memory ever was a match race between Brutus, Samson, The hairy Canary and a couple others. After dark the hairy canary came thru the lights, crossed up, rear wheels in the dirt shooting a rooster tail, without lifting at 160+. Never will forget that!

[mickey1938]

Back in my day, Hot Rodding in a 1941 Chevrolet Deluxe 2 Door, Six Cylinder with no Air Cleaner, Poping a hole in the Muffler, so we had Sound, no Air Conditioner, AM Radio, no Tape Player, Painted White Wall Tires, Gasoline 25 Cents a Gallon, Bulk Oil 25 Cents a Quart, Painted Dash Board Light Bulbs, Spinner Knobs, no Power Steering, no Power Brakes, a simple Engine to work on,no Computers at all, Drive Inn's Car Hops, Poodle Skrits, DA Hair Cuts, Squared off Shoes, Levis, T- Shirts, Smokes rolled up in your Sleve, need I say more?

Hot Rods were Flat Headed Fords, Big Boats, Cruzing Around, verey Happy Times for me!

mickey1938

[Guest]

For me, the "good ol' days" were in the late '70s to early '80s. The biggest influence on me were the pro street cars of the '80s. For some reason lately, I have a soft spot for the old '70s street machines with the jacked up rearends,M50-15s and all of the other godies of that time period. I'm actually in the process of building a kit from each manufacturor in the '70s style. I've already built a '71 'Cuda and in the finishing stages of a '70 GSX. Future builds will be the '70 Boss Mustang, '70 Chevelle SS and a '69 GTO Judge. When all are completed, I'm going to make a "parking lot" and display all of them together.

[charlie8575]

Born in 54, so the 60's and early 70's are what I miss. A half dozen hobby shops in my town, 2 slot car tracks, the original oakland roadster show, sprint cars, indoor midgets, an auto cross track, cruising the "strip" ( E. 14th street in San Leandro, it lasted for decades and was one of the only places cruise night was 7 days a week ) a couple airports ( i had a private pilots license ) but perhaps most of all was the Fremont Drag Strip. I spent many a Sunday watching the match races. Best memory ever was a match race between Brutus, Samson, The hairy Canary and a couple others. After dark the hairy canary came thru the lights, crossed up, rear wheels in the dirt shooting a rooster tail, without lifting at 160+. Never will forget that!

Man, that's one hot Slant Six!

Charlie Larkin

['08SEAL]

As being a 12 year old, I think,IMO, the good ol' days were 50's and 60's. The cars were more muscle than economic. I always thought the cars were better then. But I never lived then so, I guess it's just me.

[Von Don Koolkat]

Since I was born just a few months after the end of WWII, my nostalgic interests are anything between the depression era (like dry lakes and ending @ 1965-ish. I had muscle cars - but am not nostalgic for them. The Viet Nam era was tough for a lot of us in that time.

I remember the sixties and WAS there. Having a choice between the greaser era and the hippie era, I made the right life choice - to stay in the greaser era.and be nostalgic about that.

[Harry P.]

As being a 12 year old...

A 12 year old can't have any nostalgia. You haven't lived long enough yet!

nos·tal·gia [no-stal-juh, -jee-uh, nuh-]

noun 1. a wistful desire to return in thought or in fact to a former time in one's life.

[Matt Bacon]

The Seventies took me from the age of 5 to 15; from Matchbox cars to my first girlfriend; from Ribena to my first beer. As for cars, they were a dead loss. Ain't NOTHING to wax nostalgic about among the British cars of the 1970s, when the cold, clammy hand of British Leyland lay across the car industry, and nothing remotely cool was designed or driven by my friends' Dads ('cos obviously, only Dads drove, then....). The Morris Marina? The Austin Princess? The Austin Allegro? The best you could aspire too was a Rover SD1 or Jaguar XJ-S, and they are only now being appreciated for actually being quite good; at the time, they got a pretty bad press! There was a bit of European exotica to get excited about, especially if you played Top Trumps, where the Countach swept all before it (as did the Huey Cobra in my Helicopters pack, and the SR-71 in the planes one... I also had the world's most pointless Top Trumps set, mostly Group C and Le Mans cars, which since all the cars were built to a set of rules were almost always a draw when you called out the figures on the card!) I had a Countach and an F40 on my wall, alongside Bo Derek and Debbie Harry, but that was about it.

So, I guess I'm not nostalgic for any period of car design that I actually lived through. I love 50s-60s European sports cars because they are beautifully designed objects, and I like a lot of today's "Exotics" from around the world (although the Hennessey Venom and new Viper are about the only American "Sports Cars" I have any time for) because they are amazing pieces of engineering and form follows function sculpture, even if they aren't as beautiful as an XK120.

So in my case, nostalgia ain't what it used to be!

bestest,

M.

Edited May 8, 2012 by Matt Bacon

[Draggon]

"The cold clammy hand of British Leyland" thats too funny Matt, but so true!

[Modelmartin]

A 12 year old can't have any nostalgia. You haven't lived long enough yet!

nos·tal·gia [no-stal-juh, -jee-uh, nuh-]

noun 1. a wistful desire to return in thought or in fact to a former time in one's life.

It's possible, Harry. Technically. If 6th grade is getting kind of hairy, one could get nostalgic abou those carefree tender months of 1st grade.

[Guest Johnny]

nos·tal·gia [no-stal-juh, -jee-uh, nuh-]

noun 1. a wistful desire to return in thought or in fact to a former time in one's life.

While there is a lot of things in the past I like to fondly remember and lots of things from the past I like to see, I have no want to return to it!

There is a large piece of the past I would rather not see again nor remember let along return to it.

[Rob Hall]

I can't be nostalgic about a period of time before my own lifetime, but I do have fond memories of my own lifetime (people, places, events, cars I've owned) between the late '80s and 2008, esp. the '90s, but do live in the here and now and look forward to the future.

As far as modeling subjects, I'm fond of a lot of '60s-70s cars because I've seen a lot of them over the years and can appreciate the designs...cars from the '50s and before I really can't relate to, but there are some that I find interesting. Mostly I prefer modern car subjects in 1:1 and scale..

Edited May 8, 2012 by Rob Hall

[mr moto]

Where does my nostalgia lie? It mostly lies about my age!!

[Harry P.]

I can't be nostalgic about a period of time before my own lifetime...

Exactly my point. That's why a 12 year-old can't be nostalgic about cars from the '60s...

[Harry P.]

people spend too much time looking back, guess what? It's over and done with, time to start looking at the future.

You can look back because the past happened. Looking at the future is impossible. It hasn't come yet. What is there to look at?

[Rob Hall]

You can look back because the past happened. Looking at the future is impossible. It hasn't come yet. What is there to look at?

Maybe not looking at, but preparing and planning for the future...I spend plenty of time analysing my data and preparing for the next move, the next house, the next job, etc...

[Harry P.]

Planning for the future and appreciating the past isn't mutually exclusive. In fact, the past can be a very useful tool to help you plan your future.

[mickey1938]

I feel as though I'm the Oldest on this Forum, having been born in 1938, I remember those 1940's and vey early 50's, Bobby Socks, DOO WOP! Dancing with a Girl and Holding her through the whole Song, 5 Cent Pop, Gasoline 25 Cents a Gallon, Cars costing in the Hundreds of Dollars, the First Willy's Car, the Brand New Tucker,

The Poodle Shirts, the First Pony Tail, Elvis, my goodness the first Plastic Air Plane Model, if I remember it was a P-38 Shooting Star, my very frist Plastic Car we bought at Walgreens, a early Ford T Model, I had to melt the end of the Axel to hold the wheels on, I don't remember the Company Name, it costed 15 cents.

Going to the Movies and paying Pennies, and getting to see Roy Rodgers in person, seeing Gene Autry, & Champion do his Tricks, the Lone Ranger as well.

I always looked to the future, and now that I'm going on 74, the Future is coming so very fast, and I've found out that Life is much to Short, planning is fun, but doing something on the spare of the moment, really is much more fun, because you won't be diappointed if your plans go wrong, but if you plan for years, and it goes wrong that really hurts.

I saw the V8 come to life in the 55 Chevrolet The Straight Eight, the V12, and so many Wonderful Cars go by the way side, and now there Collectors Cars worth unbelieveable Prices, and I seen the birth of the Hot Rod, but time passes on, and I'm now living my future, and these aren't the Golden Years, believe me,I'm Tired, Old, a lot of Health problems, so my Friends, Live Today, and don't worry about your Future, a last word, don't think about Tomorrow for when t gets here it's Today.

mickey1938