Thursday, August 23, 2007

Wanna Drag Race?

Photo of guy and car at link.

84 Years Old and Still Driving His First Car - New York Times: "TO keep a car running for many years, change the oil every 3,000 miles, says Clarence Cleveland Curtiss. His advice is not new, especially for anybody who owns a 1990 Buick, a 1980 Chevy or even a 1964 Volkswagen.

But Mr. Curtiss, 84, of Shelton, has followed the advice with the first car he ever owned, a 1929 Ford Model A; it has 200,000 miles on it and still runs.

Mr. Curtiss said he was 15 in 1938 when he bought the car, which sold for $400 when new, from a Derby man for $10. It was during the Depression. “He was out of work, and he was hungry,” Mr. Curtiss said. “I drove it for a year with no license, and the day I turned 16, I got my license with this car.”

Mr. Curtiss has made one major upgrade, installing a Hudson Terraplane engine in 1940, because, he said, “I raced kids home from high school with it, but there were a couple of cars I couldn’t beat.” That allowed it to go more than 80 miles an hour, compared with 55 m.p.h for a standard Model A. “Then I could beat them all,” he said."

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow - great story.

And I thought driving my 1971 VW Beetle for 16 years was a long time!

Unknown said...

You did pretty well, but compared to this guy, you're a piker.