Courtesy
Growing up in Madison Park, the streets were our kingdom, where we’d race each other on wobbly wheels or dare the tallest kid to jump that one suspiciously uneven curb. Every corner was a new opportunity for glory — or a scraped knee. Half of what we built probably wouldn’t pass a safety inspection today, but hey, who needs OSHA when you’ve got imagination?
Back in the late 1940s, the Madison Park crew had a sort of rite of passage — graduating from wobbly bicycles and rickety soapbox racers to the grease-clad world of automobiles. We’d hang out at the local gas stations, pretending we knew what we were doing while poking at engines and asking questions. It was like a crash course in car anatomy, minus the textbooks and a lot of elbow grease. Turns out, cars back then needed grease in just about every nook and cranny — seriously, it was like they were held together by sheer determination and a tub of lard.
It was cool that car hood ornaments and decals displayed the car names. A friend’s dad took us to a new car show on Broadway and Union that featured the debut of a Hudson. We read car magazines with previews of the vehicles that would be displayed. On the walk to school, students would see a car and call out, “Chevy!” “Ford!” We salivated over all vehicles but were barely old or rich enough to own any.
Young car owners around age 15 in Madison Park would gather in Canterbury Woods on Saturdays to wax and detail their cars. Bottles of coke were placed atop cars, while a case of Oly was hidden behind bushes, out of sight from cops like Gordy Sacket.
The car was a status symbol and a step into adulthood. How to afford one, was the question. Some kids found jobs at the Seattle Tennis Club as ball boys or Broadmoor Golf Club as caddies. I worked downtown at Bob Dunn’s Used Cars on 7th and Aurora, next to the first Shucks Auto parts, which stocked everything from mufflers to carburetor stacks — all for looks and power!
My day started at sunup, ending eight hours later. In three days, I washed 107 cars faster than anyone they’d seen. I wanted that first car and earned as much as possible that summer. My uncles worked in the car painting industry, where I learned to use a buffer. This hand-operated disk applied wax to restore an oxidized finish to a nearly new luster.
Before “Kelly Blue Book,” now “Autotrader,” car sales ads were all exaggerations. Kelly established vehicle pricing standards. At Bob Dunn’s, I learned to estimate car damage. When a car was sold, I processed it by driving to John and 11th (now I-5 entry) for new plates and title agreements.
For trade-ins, my job was to bring life into the formerly owned elderly beasts. Here’s where surgery came in. Remove the seat covers to show the original fabric. Take out the brake and clutch pedals showing wear and tear. Clean the interior removing anything resembling the car’s age. Tires! The new siping machine cut grooves into the almost bald surface. The last process to this face lift was the speedo speedometer store. The trade in was now hanging with the best. The used car lots auctioned off groups of cars to have a better chance of selling in other Seattle lots.
My uncle discovered my first car — a 1942 four-door Dodge. This vehicle, painted in AG44 Army color with a star on the bumper, was formerly used by a General. It drew considerable attention at Garfield High School serving as an excellent means for students to locate areas away from school grounds.
Uncle Max, Herman, and I applied three gallons of midnight blue lacquer to paint the Little General. We enhanced it with full fender skirts, dual exhaust pipes, lowered suspension blocks, and dual spotlights. The Little General was significantly improved in appearance. It was even well-received among the esteemed ‘34, ‘36, and ‘39 coupes that had been converted into hotrods.
The innovation of customizing cars into hotrods did not go unnoticed by the automakers. The Tucker was designed with six tail pipes and a low profile. The Ford featured a hard top that folded into the trunk. This invention had a limitation if the alignment was off by a few degrees, it would stop midway. The Chrysler model included a large wrap-around windshield, providing a wider field of vision. An issue arose when jacking up the car, a vertical crack could appear due to the way the car was torqued.
Before Shucks, we had to drive north with a screwdriver and wrench in hand to the many wrecking yards on Aurora around 125th. There you would tell the counterperson that you needed a ’40 Ford generator. After checking the inventory map, he sent you to say the 3rd row, Ford aisle. Voila’ there was a crumpled ’40 Ford station wagon to simply remove the generator and give the counter man $12. Today’s identical job replacing the defective part with a new one requires reconfiguring and a commission of approximately $270 or more.
A fun find at Shucks were blue filters for the rear lights and also under the car frame—quite sexy, actually. The law said, “No!” Blue lights are for snowplows and would be ticketed. A better find was the Bermuda Bell installed under the floorboard by the brake pedal. While cruising wanting to greet a friend, simply press the striker and “Bing Bong!” So loud and so cool.
I was cruising in my ’50 Ford convertible on 19th and Madison and came across some dude waving his arms forcing me to the curb. He was a civilian cop going to work and had to remark on my bell and says, “Remove it or I’ll write you a ticket!” With the wrench I installed the bell I removed it. He retorted, “And keep it off!” Fat chance, I just checked my surroundings after that event.
One friend had a ’40 two-door Nash and like the Tucker, there were six tailpipes installed from the manifold back. If you could hear the Nash at Garfield, you could hear the Nash at Franklin! Once again, John Law made him reduce it to two mufflers.
A Friday night date and the want for the car to be at its best called for a car tune-up: plugs, points, and condenser for $14, a tire recap at 12th and Cherry, $11 each. Filling the tank cost $6 at $.22 per gallon. To top it off, a pipeful of Mixture 69 was called for to saturate the car to impress said date. Next, cruise east to the Sunset Drive-in to park in the back row to meet friends who were enjoying a pre-movie classic: chase the red dot on the screen with spotlights.
A good trip was to go all the way to Tacoma to Bush’s Drive-in restaurant—it was like a car fashion show—who knew cars could strike a pose? And let’s not forget our very own Madison Park in Seattle, the place where you could socialize, network, and maybe even meet someone who would pretend to be interested in your endless stories about carburetors!