47-55.1 Memories, wow how a picture can fire them up.

[MARTINSR]

For my birthday my brother gave me a few goodies including a poster with this photo. It really means a lot to me because it has both of the ONLY chopped trucks like mine that existed when I first got mine in the seventies. There were ZERO customized trucks like these, they were an outcast, a junkyard truck at best. For some reason these "AD" (47-55) Chevy trucks were NOT well liked. We are talking the mid 70's if you aren't at least 60 years old you wouldn't understand, they were shunned like a friggin 4 door back then. And unless you are at least 60, you wouldn't understand that! If someone would have put a spoiler on the trunk of a 4 door back then like you see today in every parking lot, the car would have been stoned. You would have been the talk of the town, and it wouldn't have been good talk. It was VERY different then and these trucks were an outcast for sure. If someone would have said someday they would be making reproduction cabs out of steel OMG I would laughed until I choked. I am blown away at how often I see them now, my son got me that pillow with one on it, it's wild how different it is.

This poster will be framed and put up on my new garage wall in Boise (maybe on the wall in the house even.) I am not joking, this is serious memory stuff for me, more so than first day at school stuff, these two trucks were my world, they were two of the three chopped AD trucks, mine being the third that I had ever seen! And I bought a lot of old magazines at swap meets looking!

In looking at this link which has almost every car in the photo named there was a link to the truck on the left which I never knew a thing about until now.

https://www.customcarchronicle.com/h.../#.XCj-YyMrJGE

In the link you see that the truck was a body shop work truck, like mine would become a few years later for me.

https://www.customcarchronicle.com/c.../#.XCj_VSMrJGE

It's also funny how it had flames, my thing, my nickname ("The Flame") from high school. They are without at doubt the WORSE flames in the history of man, but they are flames. Maybe they were the birth of flames on cars? I don't know the history or when they got popular but they most certainly look like the first time anyone ever tried it. LOL

It's funny I never put them on my truck, personally, for some reason I never thought they could be put on these trucks right. I have seen a few that look pretty good, but still it doesn't work real well for me.

Anyway, reading through these pages is such a trip, wow, what cool into on the truck on the left, wow.

Check out the links for some very cool stuff.

Brian

[8man]

You sir are correct! Shunned as grandad's work truck and not worth upgrading the 6 volt system. I would never have thought I'd have one, but here we are today and they are cool. What else did we miss that will become cool in the future?

[MARTINSR]

Originally Posted by 8man

You sir are correct! Shunned as grandad's work truck and not worth upgrading the 6 volt system. I would never have thought I'd have one, but here we are today and they are cool. What else did we miss that will become cool in the future?

Being able to walk I am thinking!

Brian

[PDW HOTRODS]

In the 70's my uncle built a chopped 53 Chevy truck with a Nova subframe and a Hemi. He had that up to the mid 90's and everyone loved it. That"s probably why I got my first 53 in 1989.

[nvrdone]

brian - where was that picture taken ? looks like the R & C dream truck on the right.

[1project2many]

Anyone else getting 403 errors at the links Brian posted?

The AD trucks were disliked in this area because you couldn't put a Chevy smallblock into one without work. When I was a kid and was searching for project trucks I was warned away from them by several guys who had been rodders as kids. Weak front ends, bad brakes, need a pile of money to make 'em good. The biggest difference today seems to be people have that pile of money!

[MARTINSR]

Originally Posted by 1project2many

Anyone else getting 403 errors at the links Brian posted?

The AD trucks were disliked in this area because you couldn't put a Chevy smallblock into one without work. When I was a kid and was searching for project trucks I was warned away from them by several guys who had been rodders as kids. Weak front ends, bad brakes, need a pile of money to make 'em good. The biggest difference today seems to be people have that pile of money!

Wow, I just clicked on them and yes, they went to an error, wild.

They go to google and search:

sears parking lot custom chronicle

If you don't see it first as it is on my list, click on images you will see this one. Click on it and you can go there. It's a great story and click on the name of the truck "Gils auto body shop truck" and it will take you to the story on that truck. I am not kidding, reading that story is one of the nicest things I have done on the weekend, what a great story.

Brian

[MARTINSR]

Originally Posted by nvrdone

brian - where was that picture taken ? looks like the R & C dream truck on the right.

Yes, that is the Rod and Custom Dream Truck, sorry for not laying that out. A lot of people don't know that's the Dream truck because it was further customized by the time it "died" in the roll over crash going to a show in I believe 1958. It had many different lives with different colors.





Brian

[mr48chev]

I'm lucky enough to have had my truck at events with both of those trucks over the years.

The Rod and Custom Dream truck at the 1982 Chevy GMC truckin Nationals in Ogden that Seth Dalton put on in 1982. I have a load of photos of it somewhere. They cropped the photo and cut my truck out of the photo of the trucks in the ball field in the magazines .

I got to know Bruce Geisler in the mid 80's when we had mutual friends we attended rod runs together with as a group. He was driving the GMC then and it was his daily driver for a lot of years. The truck changed hands after that and someone is "restoring" it to the original build by Gil Ayala https://www.customcarchronicle.com/c.../#.XCmb3lxKjn0

I ran into Bruce at the 1998 Bonneville speed week as I was standing close to the starting line and he hollered at me.

[MARTINSR]

Originally Posted by mr48chev

I'm lucky enough to have had my truck at events with both of those trucks over the years.

The Rod and Custom Dream truck at the 1982 Chevy GMC truckin Nationals in Ogden that Seth Dalton put on in 1982. I have a load of photos of it somewhere. They cropped the photo and cut my truck out of the photo of the trucks in the ball field in the magazines .

I got to know Bruce Geisler in the mid 80's when we had mutual friends we attended rod runs together with as a group. He was driving the GMC then and it was his daily driver for a lot of years. The truck changed hands after that and someone is "restoring" it to the original build by Gil Ayala https://www.customcarchronicle.com/c.../#.XCmb3lxKjn0

I ran into Bruce at the 1998 Bonneville speed week as I was standing close to the starting line and he hollered at me.

Good stuff there, thanks for sharing.

Brian

[Daze57]

ala cart --- so cool

[MARTINSR]

Oh hell yeah, the Ala Cart was awesome, damaged in the Barris Shop fire.



It's funny, it looks like an engine fire, but my understanding is it was damaged in the Barris shop fire which destroyed a number of cars.



Yep, many 65ish year old dudes have memories of building the model AMT put out.



There was a local builder who built a clone of it in the mid eighties.

Brian

[mr48chev]

I'm going to have to go out and dig through the file cabinet in the shed and dig out the box of photos. I have an album from the Ogden show in 1982 somewhere but haven't seen it for years and think it is in a box with several other albums.

[MARTINSR]

Originally Posted by mr48chev

I'm going to have to go out and dig through the file cabinet in the shed and dig out the box of photos. I have an album from the Ogden show in 1982 somewhere but haven't seen it for years and think it is in a box with several other albums.

Mr48, I am still blown out of my ever loving mind looking at this photo. The Dream truck at my brothers shop and you can see my truck in the back ground and I didn't know it was there until my brother gave me this photo a month ago! I had my shop down where my truck is parked. The only thing I can think of is this was during a funky time in my life getting a divorce or just the simple fact that my wife was a manipulator that controlled me, or I was wrapped up wild in trying to get something done so I could pay the rent, I don't know, but it is WILD that I didn't know this was there! I could have sat in it and made vrrrm vrrrrrm sounds, I could have gotten a photo with my truck next to it, I just can't believe it! A few years before I went to a car show in San Francisco JUST TO SEE that truck. I heard it was there and the rest of the cars could have been on fire, I would have only seen that truck. I wish the photo was taken a little more to the right so I could see if my back door was open.

This photo just blows me away!

Brian

[Softpatch]

So True This is the only Picture Of My First and only AD
.
My HS Car was a 54 GMC Hydro I sold it Running in 78 for $300 took me 5 month and was Happy to get it...
Back in the day Everyone thought these truck were crap
we drove beater Chevelle and Novas and camaros
First gen cougars /Mustangs
.
I would love to Have just one more crack at that ol truck or one similar to it today
But I'm dreaming
.
.
[IMG][/IMG]
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