https://www.yahoo.com/autos/texas-time-capsule-five-pre-war-classics-found-in-118285976497.html
For all you car buffs, this sounds like a choice collection in great condition.
Marnet
…still reading still learning…
Unique cars, but it isn’t clear what condition they are in from the sales video. Lots of fun to see them, though.
Excellent!
Thank you, Marnet.
It’ll be very interesting to see what they sell for - ‘barn find’/unrestored helps, as does the Caddys being V12s and a V16, but pre-WWII cars are less in demand by younger buyers at the same time that more come on the market as their owners want to sell. We’ll see…
It’s stated that several have already run and the others will be running before the auction.
My hope would be that the cars be left as they are other than cleaning. As they sit they’re rolling pieces of history from a time gone by. Once restored (and quite often over-restored) that history is eliminated forever.
Yep. They’re only original once.
On “Chasing Classic Cars” often times, Wayne Carini, the show’s “star” doesn’t wash them. He’ll take them to auction “as is.”
Wow, just wow!
Those were some beautiful cars.
I’ve been unlucky in “Barn Finds”, I usually just find an old nail and it’s in my tire.
I think I remember back in the 80s when someone bought an estate with what they thought were junkers, in the barn and out. Turned out the old gentleman would buy a car, bring it home and park it. Then just let it sit and some had trees growing under the hoods and such. Every car had less than 100 miles on them.
Yosemite
There was a defunct small town Chevy dealer west of me about 110 miles. When the heirs sold the building and contents, they had no idea what was stored at the top of the concrete ramp used to drive cars to the upper story. There was a black '54 Corvette, a '64 427 4-speed Corvette, and a '62 Corvette. All of them needed complete restoration. I went to THAT auction, about 12 years ago, but there we no bargains.
Amazing to think what might still be out there.
Many years ago when my daughter was still in HS, she and I went to a town in NH full of antique shops. While walking around exploring the town, we walked down a dead end street lined on one side with a long line of strung-together buildings that were deteriorated and falling down. The street itself was long past repair. At the end of the street was a large overgrown field in which I noticed what looked like car roofs just barely reaching over the tops of the weeds.
The story I was told was that the field was a dealership lot before WWII, and its owner went off to war and never returned. The field has been growing wild ever since. Lord only knows what’s in that field.
The field has been growing wild ever since. Lord only knows what's in that field.
In NH? - Rust.
You may be right. But I’d still like to get in there and see.
" Lord only knows what’s in that field. " After 60-70 years outdoors in a field, the only thing there is a lot of rusted-out junk,
I wouldn’t expect to find any treasures. But it would be fun to see what a car lot looked like just before WWII broke out. Call it idle curiosity.
While hiking a couple of years ago in a secluded section of one of the state parks near my home, this is what I found. This land had originally been part of a farm, and apparently the Fiat was abandoned there ~30 years ago, before the property became a part of the state park.
What I found most surprising was that there wasn’t more rust damage on this old Fiat.
Cool. Somebody is a good shot. There’s a grouping in the left door that shows a grouping of five that anybody could be proud of. It looks like whoever he was competing with wasn’t as good… more like what I’d shoot.
Even that old Fiat is not a total loss. If someone needed some repair parts there’s stuff there that could be invaluable on one that is being fixed up. Sections of body panels, steering wheel, front bumper, and who knows what in the dash and doors; assuming the bullets didn’t take out everything inside the doors…
For the age and condition it doesn’t look bad at all. Just a couple of years ago there was a public auction here for several hundred old cars and mountains of parts that a deceased gentleman had stockpiled. Cars were mostly 30s-early 50s and had been lined up outdoors for 50 years. There was even a couple of mid 30s Cords in the lot.
One of the original storage lots was next door to a farm implement dealer where a good friend of mine is the shop manager. We’ve walked over there and eyeballed some of that stuff through the fence and most of the cars were in good shape all things considered; mostly surface rust.
Note. When those cars were eventually moved to another lot to be combined with all the others my buddy walked over there looking around the debris and found a stack of rusted corrugated tin. Digging under it he found several old automotive signs including a large 30s/40s era Ford dealer sign which he took home and hung in the garage.
There’s a Caddy dealer in Andover MA that has a bottom floor show room of old caddy’s. They look in mint condition. About 10 total. I don’t know the condition or the history…But that’s the way a dealer should keep old vehicles.
“If someone needed some repair parts there’s stuff there that could be invaluable on one that is being fixed up”
Yup!
In addition to being surprised that there was relatively little rust on the car after ~30 years, when I peered inside I recall my amazement at seeing that some of the vinyl interior parts were still intact. I know that I saw intact sun visors, and–IIRC–there were some other interior plastic parts that were still in relatively decent condition.