My posts may give you the impression that Classic Cars have an everlasting stay of execution in the Bay Area. It can even seem that way to me. However, I’ve stumbled across one of what may be many places where the dreams of yesteryear find themselves without a stay of execution.
A 1959 Lincoln Premiere is a site to behold itself. One straddled precariously on top of some nondescript van on the side of a Parkway is bound to make me pull over. On a Sunday afternoon drive back from Point Pinole, I found this random junkyard with acres of former road worthy finery slowly settling into the marsh.
Granted I was parked on the side of a Parkway with a 50 mph speed limit, so I didn’t get out of my car to really hunt around the yard (maybe another day) but there was some impressively rare cars that made me wonder what lead to their fate here. There’s quite a few, this Lincoln included, that don’t look that far gone.
The lead 1957 Century looked a little bit more “rust in the doors, rust in the floors.” Maybe that means in certain places the frame doesn’t exist or is seriously compromised. When I posted this to Facebook, a friend responded immediately “That’s Criminal.” I can’t say I disagree. Unloved in ’57, Unloved in 2013. So goes the 1957 Buick. The Dodge A-100 van looked pretty good too. Not so much the 1965 Dynamic Eighty Eight. You can’t see the completely missing front end from here.
Then there was this dynamic and dull duo. It’s hard to believe any 1949 Buick Roadmaster Convertible would still be sitting in a junkyard. It’s a very either or situation. It would have been turned into a Toaster by 1970 or be a prize winner at Buick meets across the country. But here it sits above a rather lovely 1963 Lark that looks one paint job away from joining me and my 260E on the Parkway.
I think the Lark was more painful to look at versus the Roadmaster since it wouldn’t take as much of an effort to bring it back to the world (if my surface observations are accurate). It also rubs me that another car that I passed on when considering a classic last time was a lovable 1963 Cruiser, with “Studebaker Rust” along the lower doors. Honestly, that Cruiser and this Lark are probably one head gasket away in fate. Sigh.
I’m saving the absolute killers for the end. So there’s this pretty 1968 DeVille Convertible. A little tired looking, with 70’s spec wire wheelcovers. Maybe it’s missing the top?
Then there was this rather fabulous 1967 Ninety Eight Convertible. Scrub the graffiti right off, clean up the rust spots, fold the top and you have at least a condition 4 car ready to go. Sure the 425 might have finally seized. Otherwise there’s so little here to convince me it’s too far gone. Perhaps next weekend I’ll find out what. I’ll just have to make sure I leave my checkbook at home.
If only cars could talk!
If these pix had been taken in the Northeast, I’d have dated them from 1970-75.
In Central Indiana, people put cars looking no better than these on Craigslist and ask $4k for them. Not saying that they get it (and they would certainly be overpriced for that kind of asking price), but something that old with a good body out here is definitely something noteworthy.
Similar thing happens ever year here in Reno around the time of Hot August Nights. All of the local car bubbas start asking Barrett-Jackson Prices for their rough, barely running old cars.
It happens here too. And when they don’t actually fetch the money the delusional want, this is where they end up. But like said below, there’s not a Tri-Five or a Mustang in this front “advertising row.” Here’s where you find your redheaded stepchildren: Two Oldsmobiles and a Studebaker….
Maybe we ought to run an “Overpriced Heap of the Week” contest. (Curbside Cookoo?) Everyone who peruses CL or other internet sites could make nominations. I’ll be we would get some dandys. 🙂
Well that could go two ways. Outlandish junkers or overpriced dull restoration jobs. My latest point of jest to the Freewheelers club was a 1962 Falcon Futura Tudor Sedan someone wanted $12K for.
I find Falcon’s adorable, but for that money you can get so much more.
Jalopnick had the “Nice Price or Crack Pipe” series.
Nothing Last Forever – I think Laurence just wrote the title of the next James Bond film. 😛
The 1949 Buick convertible looks like it’s a four-door sedan with the roof chopped off — look at the door shut lines and the right front window frame. Still the Olds and Caddy convertibles, as well as the Studey, all look too nice to be moldering in a boneyard.
I wonder how these cars, especially that Buick, look on the inside. It appears relatively solid outside, so there must be a good reason it is where it is.
I used to work in Point Richmond, I know that yard. You can see it in Google streetview. Those cars (and many, many more) haven’t moved in YEARS. I’d take the Lincoln.
Yeah, a friend found the name and address for me, so chances are I’ll be venturing back Saturday afternoon to have a better look:
http://www.merchantcircle.com/business/Deal.Auto.Wrecking.LLC.510-232-0197
That 1959 Lincoln looks a lot better than this 1957 Premiere that was offered for $10,000 on Virginia’s Eastern Shore — no joke! The sign in the window has an unintentionally (I think) funny line — “ran when parked in 1983” ?!?
I guess by the time another 30 years goes by, the car will be a pile of iron ore.
BTW, the red car in the right background is a 1959 Pontiac Catalina 4-door hardtop (flat roof) that’s only in marginally better condition.
Well there’s a sucker born every minute so maybe he got the $10,000 eventually, but it wouldn’t have been from me! I’ve gotten involved in some money pits over the years but I can’t even imagine how much money and time it would take to get that back on the road.
If you notice these cars are along the edge of the yard, visible to street traffic as a type of advertisement of the goods inside. This not an uncommon practice, my favorite yard in Southern California does the same thing.
Here is a secret that I will share: Palm Springs CA is the final destination of many retirees and their retired cars. Well preserved in the warm dry climate, it is possible to snap up lovely old cars in driving condition at estate sales for peanuts.
Shame. None of those are big dollar cars likely any restoration costs would exceed the finished product values. That said the Lark looks like it could be pretty easy and cheap to revive.
The only problem with the Lark is if it is a 6, as is likely on a strippo 2 door sedan like this. They had a half-assed OHV conversion that had a tendency to crack heads. From 61 on, the V8s are the ones to have.
Like Horopito yard here they scrap nothing cars simply vanish into the earth once fully harvested which suits me I got a heater control switch last week for $25 the lady said they are hard to get, she’s right theyve been hard to get for decades but with winter coming on I want the heater working.
Painful. Reminds me of the only demolition derby I’ve ever seen, in Rawlins, WY in 1995. One contender was an apparently rust-free Connie Mk III that was absolutely trashed by the end of the afternoon. Broke my salt-encrusted heart.
Ever seen Steelyard Blues (1973)? Donald Sutherland is an ex-con, ex-demo-derby driver now driving an ambulance. Before he quit he’d nailed every car from 1940-1960, except one, a ’50 Stude. They go out in his ambulance to watch a derby, and what should appear on the field……
(Sorry, Jim)
The poor little thing looked so happy, too. 🙁
+1
You don’t want to see Charlie Varrick (especially Imperial fans) which classiic car destruction apart was a good film
As far as I am concerned demolition derbys are a total waste of time and perfectly good old iron.
Totally agree.
Thank you Tom C!
I remember seeing a Lark post coupe much like that in a yard in central PA around 1998-1999 ish, in similar condition, except for having suffered a right front fender bender. Inside the glovebox there were still papers suggesting the car was last on the road in 1968. The body damage was quite fixable. My suspicion was that the orphan car had depreciated so much by ’68 that the insurance company totaled it rather than find a right front fender.
I always thought LJ’s style of melancholy photography would work well in a junkyard. That Buick is so beautiful and at the same time so sad.
just drove by…all the carsb along the fence are gone,only 30 or 40 newer cars left amid bulldozed areas,one 57 hudson left ot interest