shot and posted by canadiancatgreen
These aren’t cars anymore; they have been liberated from the assumptions, expectations and demands placed on them by their makers and owners. No more! They’re finally free to express themselves, to reveal long-hidden facets of their personalities, to mock their designers and builders, to dance and make merry, to levitate and soar towards the heavens, to contort, shape-shift and morph into something altogether new.
Look what I’ve turned into! But you won’t see it and appreciate it unless you discard your fixed notions of what I should be or was, your identification and rigid image of the make and model you once knew. See me for what I truly have become.
That old Ford pickup should be rescued. I’ve seen sadder examples still on the road doing their thing.
And the @sstec! Don’t let Fugly Rest in Piece!
The “individual sculptures” are OK, but I’m more of a “collage” person. There’s something about seeing a gigantic pile of junked cars from the ’50s & ’60s–they were all amazing, beautiful, and loved when new. Now they’re thrown out like an old shoe. They’re all unceremoniously piled on top of each other–doomed, damned, damaged beyond repair. There’s something really sad about that (to me).
Great photo for a rainy October morning. So many stories, lives, and dreams attached to each one, now all forgotten.
‘Sic transit gloria mundi’. Or in the words of Joni Mitchell, “It’s life’s illusions I recall; I really don’t know life at all”. 🙂
Sick transit, the glory’s all muddy. 🙂
Lots of cool old iron. Too bad that Scout is beyond saving. And I’m mystified how the mid 70s New Yorker and Mercury escaped serious rust. The steel of both companies in those years sermed to rust from just dry air or rain, like my Moms Aspen wagon did far inland in S Florida.
Also here in South Florida,, any car made before 2000 is supper rare in our junyards that are mainly a sea of Kia,/Hyundai, Stellantis, VAG, Gm, and Fords.
Just for the heck of it I looked up all the Pick & Pulls around me. Five locations and did a manufacturer search. Usually there is nothing beyond 1985 if even any 80’s cars. Well one 1967 Galaxie showed up dating to September. I’m sure if I went to look at it the first thing missing will be the carb even if a 4300. Only nothing I need off that car for my 67 Parklane especially with the block coming home tomorrow. Yea!
I love your opening narrative.
Some may have picked up on here that I like to see older cars well cared for and loved. There’s been some discussion about just that and how it looks to me vs. others. What often gets me is when you see a nice old car that’s been left to sit next to a garage or on the street with no care to keep it protected and my thought goes to how I’m sure someone out there would love to buy it and keep it from rotting into nothing. I’ve voiced my opinion and others on here have given theirs. To each their own I guess.
However, I’m not sure why, but when I see old scrap yards like this it takes on an entirely different perspective for me. I haven’t been to one in many years, but I’ve always loved roaming through them while thinking about who owned them. Where they have been. What stories they could tell us. Being in these scrap yards isn’t much different from the owner leaving them sit to rot on the side of the barn. And yet, for me the scrap yard takes on an entirely different meaning. It’s like these cars have seen enough and said make me into an organ donor. Use me and my parts to make your dream a reality. And while I sit and wait, feel free to look at me now for what I am.
So thanks for this article and keep them coming Paul.
You write a poignant narrative yourself, Dan. Nice job, and thx to you, too.
Thanks.
These pics make me think of dinosaurs in many ways.
Random thoughts. The opening Eldorado or the 68 Oldsmobile could be the sculpture equivalent of The Picture of Dorian Gray. The car becomes a hideous wreck while it’s owner lives the high life almost unchanged, like Dick Clark or George Hamilton. OK, the cars could only work so long for those guys.
The little 61 Lark is awfully nice for that locale. And the Mercury Marquis – I can just hear someone’s friend saying “Don’t worry, I have some green touch-up spray.”
As always, great articles here.
I have a passion for cars, especially orphaned and old ones.
Seeing a junkyard, even virtually, is always a pleasure.
The problem is that the best ones are a long way away, so they can only be seen virtually.
I’ve said it before, but while I absolutely love living in New England, one of the things I really do NOT like about the area is that I have no local access to the sorts of junkyards pictured in this post. Land is too expensive and zoning regulations are generally too restrictive to allow any tract of land to be devoted to holding scrap cars. Those facilities that do exist are inevitably the ones where workers strip off most parts of the new-ish cars that arrive and immediately crush the rest. If you want to find a VW beetle around here, go to a museum, ’cause you’re not going to find one in a scrap yard. Same goes for most of the vehicles shown here.
I really really miss junkyards.
A zombie car movie has to be in the works…
The Lark looks pretty good .
I’d like to save that old Chevy were it a two door .
I am well pleased to see some body panels cut out of various oldies, I cannot imagine anyone crapping a vintage Chevy Sedan Delivery but that’s me .
Up until 10 ~ 20 years ago our local outlying So. Cal. LKQ self – service yards got relics like this in on a regular basis .
More than a few were “grandpa’s cars” that no one wanted after he died and they’d sat in the garage untouched for decades, full of mouse poop .
-Nate