Easy enough, right? A few rules though lest you get confused otherwise. A) Let’s define “immediate family” as you, your significant other, your parents, and your kids. No grandparents, cousins, uncles, etc. Or perhaps you’re one of the likely few to never have partaken of the otherworldly goods, that’s okay too. B) We’ll also define “foreign” as from a different country than wherever you were/are. In my case I believe we always had German cars (VW, DKW, Audi, Ford) in Germany until we moved to the States and then there was a Pontiac Ventura that was replaced around 1983 by a 1979 Mazda 626 coupe that eventually became mine. That Mazda 626 would be my answer I suppose as my Dad bought it and it was his first non-domestic vehicle based on where we lived. (Note that Ford can be considered domestic by Americans, Germans and Brits, it’s a bit weird that way and adds a wrinkle). And if your home country doesn’t have a local auto industry, then just whatever was well outside of the norm back then.
The ’04 Camry above, although significantly more “American” than plenty of what we’d call American cars, would be considered foreign for these here purposes to anyone living anywhere but Japan. The brand’s origin is what matters in this QOTD, not place of manufacture. (I’ve really just needed a place for the last two years to share this ghastly picture, it has no other significance.)
A second hand Fiat 1500 in 1965. Before that, the Websters were Hillman families. Both paternal and maternal grandparents had Hillmans. .
Sounds similar to mine, a Fiat 1500 Cabriolet I bought with $750 of my own summer job money in 1968. I wish I still had that car! No previous furrin’ cars in my immediate family, though I was impressed with my cousin’s Volvo. Though I’d been privileged to learn to drive in my Mom’s Mustang, I yearned for something different.
Mom had a ’65 Anglia with repaired front-end damage for her first car in 1966, but the real first ‘foreign’ car was my sister’s 2002 Subaru Impreza, followed by Dad’s first 2003 Avalon, and my 2003 Legacy. My youngest sister got a Corolla to replace her 1991 Grand Prix n 2006, and my mother junked her 1995 Caprice for another Avalon in 2009..
That was a lot of business for Detroit to lose over the course of that decade.
My paternal grandfather purchased a VW Bus in 1959 to run his mail route. After that it was a long dry spell until my sister purchased a mildly used ’09 Passat wagon which she still has, along with a 2019 or 2020 Jetta she has since added to her arsenal.
As for me, it was the 2014 Passat we still have. I did have a ’92 Crown Vic which was technically an import, but that doesn’t quite follow your rules!!!
Does a powertrain built elsewhere count? If so, we could include the ’88 Dodge Dynasty my maternal grandparents bought as it had the 3.0 Mitsubishi engine.
I cousin of mine purchased a Kia Sephia in 1995. He was so impressed by that little ride so he traded it for a ’97 and years later purchased a Kia Optima (Magentis down here in Brazil). I also had a ’95 Sephia from 2009 to 2010. Excellent little ride. Thrifty on gas. No issues during my usage.
In the late 90s I had a Sephia, a 95 I think, as a ” loaner ” while my Honda Civic was being worked on. I was quite impressed and had it been possible I would have tried to trade my Civic for the Kia. Of course, Kia was still kind of new to the U.S. and I was concerned about the brand’s and the car’s longevity. But in nearly every other area the Sephia seemed to have the Civic beaten.
My father had a Daimler DR450 in the states.
Unfortunately after he passed it was moved around and stored for many years, ultimately the engine was locked up and it was sold for parts…
Hopefully the new owner can get it going or drop in a Chevy motor. The interior was near perfect
From Denmark: The car we had when I was born was an Alfasud. While not exotic in Denmark, these were not the common choice either. After that we had a Rover P6 V8 which my dad rolled on black ice after 12 days. People said he was lucky to survive. So then he went and bought soomething a bit more common due to its safety reputation: a Volvo 242 DL.
Befor ethey met, my mom had an Austin Allegro. So the first common/obvious choice for its class car they had was the Volvo I would say. So it’s perhaps more the other way around.
Every car in Denmark is foreign made, as far as I know!😏(As in Norway..)
What’s the most “common” or considered the “domestic” or normal thing to buy? I would have imagined Saab and Volvo, no?
My parents got swept up in the original import boom of the late 1950s with both a Karmann Ghia and an “English Ford” Anglia – I am not sure which came first, but both would have been from around 1959. Both were gone by 1961, the Ghia remembered fondly and the Anglia not so much. What is odd is that each parent died without ever driving another non-US car.
In the “modern era” (whatever that is) the first was my sister and her new husband who bought a used 1977-ish VW Rabbit in about 1983. I would have been next with the 1985 VW GTI bought new.
Actually, my GTI was a Westmoreland VW, so the 1988 Honda Accord that I married into might have been it.
And I am loving your photo! Nothing shows how the Camry has cemented its status as the most Buick-ish of foreign brands than the carriage roof treatment. You did not take any interior shots to show if there were any leftover Jerry Vale cassette tapes or AAA stickers on the visor. 🙂
I couldn’t get closer than that, the Repellent Force Field was strong in this one. One pic is all I got, the camera warned me it might break otherwise. The vinyl roof with gold package combo is a strong one, and not to be trifled with. No doubt there were Cracker Barrel and Perkins receipts scattered about too.
I have never thought about this, actually. My family members were so far flung by the ’70s that I have no clue what cars my brothers owned. So, I have to answer, “Fiat 131 Mirafiori”. My Dad and I bought it together new in 1975 (well, he bought it for both of us) to commute from our home in Orange County, NY to Nyack. He had rented a FIAT 130 to scuttle around Europe in with Mom when I was studying in Rome several years earlier, and it had been a revelation to him. So when the 131 was introduced, he rounded me up and we made a deal on a white one with a cordovan interior.
It was a beautiful package. Nimble and comfortable, but it began eating breaker points almost immediately, and had to be towed with a fizzled fuel pump within months. I drove it 200 miles up to Boston that winter to meet friends and there was so much cold air rushing in through the firewall after installation of air conditioning by the dealer that I had to wrap a blanket around my feet to keep my toes from freezing. Chastened by our first foreign foray, we ordered a ’76 Dodge Aspen with a Slant 6 and the 4-speed stick. That car, strangled by mandated emissions controls was a complete dog, and Dad traded it in on a comfy New ’77 LeBaron sedan with a 318 that needed a new engine top-end right out of the factory, but proved comfortable and reliable afterward.
I found a 9-year-old Chysler 300 coupe, in the mean time.
Dad also owned our family’s second and 3rd foreign cars– a ’59 Mercedes 190-SL, and a ’78 Audi 5000, which he lamented selling when assigned a disappointig ’80 Chevy Citation by his employers.
I live in England and while I was growing up, my father only ever had British cars.
Through the 1950’s, 60’s and 70’s there were many Rootes offerings along with the odd Jaguar and Wolsley. Even his company/business cars in the early 70’s were BMC.
One day in 1978 (after another Hillman Avenger had bitten the dust) he bought a very second-hand Fiat 128 Rally. A foreign car.
Why dad, why? – ‘It was cheap and different’. It was very different. The fuel, oil, and temperature gauges were marked in Italian, the engine revved like crazy, it was not just another car.
It finally stopped working and was replaced by a Datsun120Y coupe (as I was working at a Datsun dealer at the time), and then a Peugeot 504.
He never bought a British car again.
On the other hand, a 128 “first car” would put him in league with Jerry Seinfeld, who recalls his fondly😁
My (future) B-I-L bought a new Fiat 131 in 1980. It was a piece of crap that he replaced with a Toyota pickup truck in 1984.
I popped the family cherry with a new Toyota Corolla sport coupe in 1981. It was a just-introduced model and I thought I was hot stuff. It was a great car that I (and finally my dad) took to 180k miles until it was stolen and stripped in 1993.
Have been Japanese-centric since then as my main driver with an occasional wander off the path (Volvo, Saab, Ford Edge). I work too hard for my money to tolerate engineering or reliability nonsense.
Heartening to see another disappointment in the FIAT 131 dept. That way, one feels oddly vindicated. When Dad and I had our new one for only a few months, he told me he went into a rest room at work, and, noticing that the door latch had “Fiat” cast into it, worried that he might not able to get out of the stall.
Hmm well if there’s no grandparents or cousins the first foreign vehicle in my family was a 1983 Subaru GL Coupe. Dad bought it for his commuter and it was also the first vehicle I drove with a manual transmission.
It was a very fun car to drive, despite only being 2WD I recall it being quite good in the snow too. Sadly we only had it about a year, my sister got rear ended at a stoplight and the Subaru was written off.
Don’t have a picture of it but it looked a lot like this, except the paint was a light silver-blue.
A 1960 Renault 4CV in 1960.Came with a 750cc engine. Later rebuilt using a 850cc JC Whitney kit, a hotter cam and shaved head. Gave the Volkswagens fits. Followed by a long string of foreign cars. I now drive a 1998 Ford E-350 Econoline with a Chinook conversion.
I never really thought of this before, and realizing the answer is kind of surprising. Dad was first, with a 1973 Datsun 240Z. Only one personal car of his after that was American, a 1995 Ford Econoline conversion van. His company cars sometimes, but most were Geo/Chevy Prizms, so do they blur the line being American made Toyota designs? Or his ‘05 Acura TL, an American made car from a Japanese company with no rest-of-world equivalent or market?
Mom went about it different. Tired of her 1969 Plymouth Road Runner being broken into while at work, she moved on to a 1976 Honda CD175, and only had Honda bikes from then on for some time. Her last American vehicle was an ‘85 Chevrolet Cavalier Type 10.
Between my sister and I, only one vehicle that wasn’t an import; my 2001 Ford Focus ZX3.
Used 79 Ford Fiesta S, bought in 1984. Under no conditions would my father ever consider owning a ‘furrin’ car, to the point of turning down an offer from Volkswagen of America to open a new dealership in a nearby college town after he left the Chevrolet dealership.
This attitude was why my first three modern cars were all Chevy Vegas/Monzas. They were the closest I could buy to what I really wanted to own.
Dad got a used celery green Volvo 122 (Amazon) wagon in 68 69. Had a used valiant wagon and I think a friend or a friend of a friend pitched him on the technical merits of the Volvo. Apparently it worked because he bought a brand new 1970 Volvo 145. I was 5 at the time and I think I imprinted heavy on it. Actually was a pretty bitching car in its day twin carb ,header style manifold 4 wh l disc with dual triangle circuit,rear wash wipe defroster infinite seat back adjustment with an adjustment mechanism I have only seen in this car. It was a simple 90 degree rotating lever that would lock the seatback at your desired angle. rotating it would slowly disengage what must have been a friction collar/plate. You simply push back or pull forward on the back of the seat while releasing the lever as needed and then relooking . Add to that stalk mounted hi beam awesome nylon weave Sears shoulder belts cool under floor storage amber turn signals And probably some thing else I forgotten. Sorry for the run-on but like I said I am printed heavily on it and even at that age were impressed with all the things that it had that contemporary American cars didn’t.
That question takes me back to Germany and my youth. My parents never had a domestic car. Car 1 was a 1971 Renault 4 TL. Car 2 was a late 70’s Renault 4 TL. Car 3 was a FIAT UNO. Car 4 was a FIAT Punto. Car number 1 we loved and appreciated the most.
1979. When my brother bought a 1970 Toyota Corolla Sprinter. Or does my 1970 Honda CT70 count?
New ’84 Honda Accord, for which we traded in a very problematic ’76 Chrysler Cordoba. (nicknamed “the Cordoba from hell”. I swear that car knew when payday was and would crap out a part on that very day. It got so bad that that my wife and I would not discuss finances in the car lest it hear us.) But I digress… The Honda was everything the Chrysler was not, well built, reliable and economical. We’ve only owned Japanese since then, other than the unfortunate ’95 Mazda 626 which made the Cordoba look like a Camry in terms of reliability, but that’s a story for another time.
I was born into a Foreign Car Family, so my parents’ first foreign car came along long before I did.
Dad bought a Karmann Ghia in about 1960. That was followed by a Peugeot 404, which in turn was followed by a Triumph TR-4, pictured below outside my folks’ Philadelphia apartment.
These foreign cars were interspersed with American cars occasionally too, and the first foreign car that I actually remember was Dad’s 1975 Scirocco.
Of course, I rebelled, and developed an affection for big American cars, much to Dad’s dismay. The first two cars I bought on my own were Fords.
My wife, on the other hand, followed a much different course. She acquired her first foreign-branded car in 2010 when we purchased our Honda Odyssey (her grandfather worked for Ford, and foreign cars weren’t exactly welcomed in her family).
My wife had almost the exact opposite experience of yours. She has driven nothing but Japanese cars. Her dad is a Ford man but he bought her a Camry as her first car. When we met she was driving her ’99 Civic. We kept it for sometime as it was still pretty new and low mileage, but it has since been replaced by a couple of Japanese cars. I am looking at replacing her Outback at some point and will probably get a Rav4 Hybrid.
I, on the other hand, have almost exclusively driven American V8 powered RWD cars and trucks. That was until about a decade ago when driving old Iron as a daily driver became too impractical, so I bought my first foreign brand vehicle, my Tundra. That said, being US built and designed, maybe I am still driving sn American V8 RWD (4×4) vehicle? 10 years on I have no regrets and likely will stick with Toyota trucks in the future. Despite my experience, I have long recommend Japanese cars to family and friends.
Eric,
That apartment wouldn’t happen to be Drexelbrook, in the Drexel Hill neighborhood just outside the city? That’s where I lived from age 0-3.
Similar-looking apartments, but on the other side of town. These apartments are on Blue Grass Rd. in Northeast Philadelphia.
Original early 1960s artists rendering below… featuring typically anonymous cars:
My Dad bought a ’71 Mazda 1200 around 1973 to replace his rusted out ’65 Impala. It was an okay car, but wasn’t particularly well suited to winter climate and ran poorly in the cold. Overall he wasn’t happy with the Mazda and stuck with American cars until 2007 when he bought a new Honda Civic. Now all of my immediate family drives Japanese branded cars, other than the old cars or specialty cars (Corvette, Camaro).
1978 Datsun Z, right from the show floor in April of that year. Still have it.
My late father buying a VW Beetle in the mid-late 1960s. (The purchase happened before I was born, so I don’t know the exact year) It passed on to my ham-fisted sister as transportation to college and her first job. She eventually killed it. 😞
Long before I was born, my parents replaced a problematic Rambler American with a 73-ish Toyota Corolla. Not sure if it had a 1.2 or a 1.6, but either way it was handicapped by a 2-speed automatic, so it would’ve been very punishing to drive up any incline during their weekend trips around the mountains of Colorado.
My parents bought a brand new Datsun 510 4-door sedan in 1970—and it seems that several of my aunts and uncles were pretty intrigued by the little car, as well. They knew a good thing when they saw one, and by the end of the model run in ’73, there were four other 510s owned by members of my extended family. Aside from I think one VW Beetle purchased by an aunt in the ’60s, it would have been the first foreign car for all of them.
I sold my 1978 Bonneville in 1980 because of the coming gas shortage and bought my first “furrin” car, a 1980 Datsun 510 wagon with a 4sp. Great gas mileage, but rust? oh boy! Paid $6258 for it.
My parents did something similar, they traded in a couple year old Buick Estate wagon for a 510 wagon with a manual (ordered in blue but they ended up with a brown one). I’m pretty sure they traded it to the same dealer they had bought it from at a huge loss. That car lasted until the early to mid 90’s (with a fair amount of rust despite rusty jones treatment and warranty) when my sister rolled it into a ditch.
I was told to leave my phone number and when a wagon came in, they would call me and….yes or no. I said yes for the blue one. Speaking of rust treatments, I paid a bunch of money for them to drill holes in the door jambs, spray some gook in there and stick in a rubber plug. Only problem was a couple of years later, it started to rust badly right around where they drilled the holes!
My father bought his (he still has it ) 1959 TR-3 around 1966-67 I think. I would say that it was a toy but it was his daily driver until around 1980. My Grandmother bought a Corolla new in 72. I think on my fathers side he was first with a foreign car. Interestingly my father’s side is Swedish, but it was my mothers parents who owned Volvo’s and Saabs in the 50’s and 60’s. This might more be demographics as my father had high-school educated working class parents and my mothers were college educated, and working in education (my grandfather was superintendent of schools). I have heard very few stories of either sets of grandparents (my parents have never talked about family that much) but I do recall my dad saying my mom was driving my grandfathers old 2 stroke 96 when they met.
Not a lot of ‘furrin’ cars in the GTXcellent family.
Parents bought a brand new Opel Manta Rallye in 1971, traded that in on a new Volvo 242GT in 1975 (my first car ride home from the hospital). They kept that for 4 years until my little brother came along and they traded that in on a Pontiac Bonneville and haven’t had a foreign car since. My in-laws have NEVER owned a foreign car (although my FIL does have a Fiat diesel powered White Field-Boss tractor).
As for me personally, the first foreign car was our ’03 Miata (although the MiSSus bought a new Mitsubishi Galant before we were married) and our only other foreign ride was the ’06 Saab Aero.
Here’s a wild swap. In 1980, mother traded in her 1976 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham for a new 1980 Volvo 244GL! After she was done with that, she got the most “foreign” American car of the era, a 1988 Eagle Premier LX.
This question is interesting and so far the answers are earlier then I would have guessed. I actually still know a few families that have never owned a foreign car. Most have a deep connection with one brand or another. GM families Ford families etc.
In my immediate family, my sister bought a Toyota Matrix in 2007 (she now drives a Renegade, which is basically a FIAT), and her husband currently has a VW Tiguan. My father-in-law has an Outback, but my parents, wife, and I have only ever driven American.
Always surrounded by foreign cars. My father’s first was an Opel in 1959. He replaced it after an accident with a 1959 VW Beetle convertible. Then he fell in love with a SAAB, but couldn’t decide if he wanted the uniqueness of it during long distant vacations, so he settled for a 1964 Beetle with a crank sunroof. During this time, our family cars were a Buick LeSabre, Oldsmobile Dynamic 88, a Pontiac Tempest and then a Ford Galaxie – my mother drove those.
As for me, I drove Valiants until I got Fords. I ended up with a need for an inexpensive pick up, and had a 1972 Toyota HiLux. I only drive US brands today. It is good for the environment and good for our economy.
Oh, man. In my dad’s retirement, my parents traded the most “American” of all cars on the road at that time, a ’92 Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera, for a new Nissan Altima. If the Ciera wasn’t my favorite, I hated the Altima for being smaller and even more boring than the Ciera. It was dead reliable, though, and they liked it. So it grew on me a little.
I almost wrote “1974 Toyota Hilux longbed”…my dad bought one new and in many ways it was impressive – even though the engine lasted less than two years!
ACTUALLY, our family’s first import came eight years before.
It was a 1965 Volkswagen Beetle. Dad owned it for a year, it got great gas mileage which helped with the 100-mile round trip to work that he was taking in those days. We owned it for a year and then it was traded for a ’65 Mercury Park Lane. By then dad had a company-furnished truck for that 100-mile drive.
BUT HERE’S THE POINT…
By 1966, at least in our neck of the woods north of Pittsburgh, Volkswagen – while we ALL KNEW its German origins and import status – had nevertheless so ingrained itself into the fabric of American Pop Culture that it seemed almost American. Even though it was so clearly different from everything else that was American.
In fact, VW seems more like an import to me today than it did back then.
A 1961 red Renault Dauphin supplied to my Dad by his job. He never seemed to keep jobs so this didn’t last long. It’s great advantage according to Mum was to warm up an apple pie on the rear shelf over the engine.
Given the tight circle drawn, I’ve got nothin’. Zip, zero, nada. If my siblings were drawn in, the ‘furrin invasion would be on.
My folks came close, to the point that I’ve actually had my body in the package shelf well of a VW Bug when my parents did a test drive. It would have been a first second car for my parents, but they didn’t pull the trigger. Oddly, for that brief pursuit of economy, their first second car was a Caprice that joined our LTD. Throw in my father’s frequent use of a company Delta 88, and we had a fleet of Shermans holding the battle line.
I’ve flirted with an Accord for one of my kids, and an Accord Sport for my wife and I, but the stars never quite aligned. I’m likely a bit of a unicorn at this point.
Edit: Opps, need a judgement call here; my folks briefly owned an Opel in Germany when my dad was in the service 1960-1961. Hmm, American car company – it was a ‘furrin car in Germany! And in the US!
Nope. Opel in Germany was absolutely considered a player on the home team!
Mom and Dad’s only new car was the 1958 VW Beetle in which I was brought home from hospital:
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/cars-of-a-lifetime/coal-1958-volkswagen-type-i-deluxe-my-first-ride-in-a-beetle/
Mom drive the Chevy that replaced the Beetle in my post, and Dad bought a Very Used Hillman Husky for his DD.
1969 VW Beetle (w/autostick) in 1969. Fond memories of reversing the windshield washer, pumping up the spare tire (which powered the washer) and having fun with unsuspecting pedestrians in crosswalks at traffic lights.
Wow, this thread really took off!
My mother bought an ugly lemony Subaru in 1977 or ’78. She got an Accord in 1989 after her divorce from Satan.
She currently has an ancient but clean Toyota pickup. (Wyoming; no rust)
My wife and I started with nothing (and have most of it left) so in the beginning we got whatever we could. We got an Accord in ’94. An Accord in ’98, a Geo Metro in ’03. A Tercel in ’04. An Avalon around 2016.
My wife and I traded our spotless, but trouble-engine-prone 250 ci 6 cylinder ’69 Nova for a new ’71 VW Super Bug at Downtown LA Volkswagen. The VW had far better front seats than any of the few cars I’d owned at the time, altho that also included many new Oldsmobubbles and used cars I had sold by then.
My wife fell in love with that Super Bug, it was “personal” to her. We drove it all over L.A. and southern CA with “good” gas mileage for 1971. It was so loaded it even had a AM-FM stereo with cassette deck: the dealer had added everything they could to increa$e the VW’s limited gro$$.
Looking back on that already obsolete VW design, the also stagnant USA car designs certainly showed through with their 1940s vintage origins holding forth. No wonder VW Bugs sold like they did given their perceived quality over Detroit’s iron
It was the Japanese invasion that really managed to move the American market products forward; however Detroit seemed to fight better products every step of the way. It wasn’t until I bought my first Civic in 1988 that the dramatic differences in quality and driving dynamics really penetrated my awareness! OK….I’m a slow learner, despite RIDING Hondas since 1964! DFO
My Dad went temporarily foreign with a 1957 Volkswagen Beetle, after some older Chevrolets and a couple of Studebakers. For some reason I remember the VW’s license plate: California MFN368!! It was gold in colour, the “Gold Bug.” Gold was prestigious to that generation Chinese-American, along with outward appearance, which did not apply to that VW, but which we would see later.
Then followed Chevrolets as he aspired to climb the Sloan ladder, which he leapfrogged with a 1963 Cadillac, a splendid car followed by other Cadillacs, each more Chevrolet-like.
His next foreigner: a Mercedes-Benz W126 300SD Turbodiesel.
After decades of being a General Motors man he was turned off by a 1980 Chevrolet Citation and a 1979 Cadillac Eldorado Diesel. No more GM for him, and the Chinese-American in him placed value in “face,” or outward appearance. So he got a Mercedes, the big Diesel sedan…and he had not been put off Diesels, only the GM one.
His next “foreign” make vehicle: a 1998 Nissan Quest minivan, built in USA by Ford. He bought no more vehicles after that.
My brother bought a Honda Odyssey minivan to replace a Plymouth Voyager…it promptly ate its transmission, and it was not the first one; then to supplement it, a used Toyota Sienna on which the air conditioning never worked through a summer season. He went back to American after that, a fourth generation Ford Taurus.
Great QOTD!
For my family, it was a Datsun/Nissan 810 Maxima around 1981. It replaced a 79 Toronado. My father was an Oldsmobile man for at least a half dozen years before that. I can’t recall any real issues with the Toro, other than the low gas mileage. He had a daily drive from Livonia to downtown Detroit and his car was our routine errant car too. My mother’s Olds 98 was used much less.
The 810 was nice, and it talked! Quite a novelty in the neighborhood at the time. It was a good car but it was RWD which was a drawback in the winter, especially compared to the FWD Toro that it replaced.
My father bought a 1951 Morris Minor convertible used in about 1955. It was troublesome. It was his only foreign car. He kidded that it was his only car that ran on petrol. Our family being of English descent and England being on our side during the war made it seem not so foreign. A much more reliable 1952 Nash took its place.
Pretty sure it was this Renault 4CV around 1954. My parents were looking for something that used less gas than their 1950 Buick, and it did that. Who knows where they found a Renault in Tennessee, but it looks quite snazzy with the two-tone paint and yellow wheels.
It was the first of a long series of imports for my folks, who would not buy another domestic car until 1994.
My sister and I have no idea who it is in the picture.
Love that picture, and that two-tone paint job is fab.
Très belle! Quelles couleurs! I’m into tiny cars, and would love to have that one.
My dad got a brand new ’70 VW Beetle, white with a red interior. I hated that car because I was stuck in the back seat with no heat on those cold winter days, and the battery leaked acid all over the floor in the back with a constant, acrid nose-burning odor. He traded that in for a ’72 Vega, in which he and I both thought was a major upgrade, but promptly wrecked and totaled it before it had a chance to self-destruct. Then he got a Pinto which provided years of reliable, if very uncomfortable service. He bought only American cars from then on.
My parents shook their heads when I bought a ’80 Renault LeCar (my P6 Ford Taunus didn’t count as I was in Germany when I had it). For such a small (really small) car she rode like a dream. Later moving up to a Renault 18i, somewhat disappointing but still comfortable, and then on to several Alfa-Romeos, then Hyundais.
My dad had always owned American. Chevys, Buicks, Pontiacs, Plymouths, and an AMX that I remember. I figured it was curtains for the US auto industry whey my dad bought a ’90 or ’91 Honda Accord. He couldn’t believe the quality – something his trade in, a Pontiac 6000 sorely lacked – and went on to own Honda’s for the rest of his life. My daughter still has his last one, a ’99 Accord V6 coupe – still looking good and running well. Currently, if you would have told me I’d own two Chevys – a Spark and a Bolt – both electric I have told you that you were crazy but I do and I love ’em.
Imports entered our lives when Dad bought a ’60 Mercedes 190Db in 1966, replacing a ’52 Cadillac Series 62 sedan. What an about-face! But owning a Mercedes diesel had been a dream of his. The car had lots of good points–comfortable, great handling, put together well. On the other hand, there was that diesel, 1.9 liters of smoky, incredibly noisy sluggishness. I learned to drive in that thing.
When we met decades ago, my husband-to-be had a ’72 VW. It was a fun car, his first car, with an unpredictable electrical system that could leave one stranded. He never did figure out why it would fail suddenly. (He did have another car, a ’71 Impala Custom, given to him by his parents.) At the time, I had my first import, a ’77 Honda Accord. It followed a ’70 Torino Brougham.
In 1986, we bought an ’84 Mazda 626 to replace the Impala, which at about 150,000 miles decided to kill a cylinder.
1978 Volvo 242 DL purchased in 1980 to replace a 1977 Chevy Impala. My dad treated himself to a premium paint job (burgundy). As a gesture of goodwill, the guy who painted put a full tank in it. He thought DL meant “diesel.” Needed new engine.
Dad was a WWII vet, so Detroit iron was always in the driveway till he got burned with a 1984 Mercury Comet. Best of 12 MPG, interlock, warped brake discs, etc, etc, etc.
Replaced with a Toyota Corolla because he was duly impressed with his company car which was a Corolla as well as my Corolla (see below). Next car was a Nissan Maxima, then he settled back to Detroit with a Buick Century before he passed away.
I’m the flip of above: First a ’63 Beetle (so loved that car and the 1st in the family with a “foreign car”); ’69 Beetle (POS); ’75 Corolla (got me thru college); ’83 Cutlass (very nice with bucket seats); ’97 Camry (31 MPG @ 70 MPH on I-55); ’05 Escape AWD (great in the NY snow belt); ’12 Escape (Ok, but the ’05 was better).
TYPO above: Should been a “1974” Mercury Comet….it was still a POS…
A 1965 Opel Kadett A that my father bought that year as he needed a commuter car for his drive to Johns Hopkins. It was replaced in 1968 by a Dodge Dart, so we can assume he wasn’t overly happy with it, especially after it needed a valve job when it was less than three years old.
Minty fresh, though!
I was the first. in 1974, a new Audi Fox saloon