As long as I can remember I've always wanted a Corvette. From the first time I saw one I thought they were the most magnificient work of art available to the masses. The very first Corvette I remember seeing was a '57 or '58. It belonged to Bobbie Nell Smith (nee Conrad) and it was white with a silver inset and lipstick red interior. It was a 283 4-bbl. with a four speed transmission, white sidewall tires and (gasp!) spinner hubcaps. It shined like new money and to this fourth grader it was pure "heaven" to dream about owning one.
Corvettes cost about $3,000 in those days, an unimagineable amount. Only the privileged could afford them. I was looking through an old box of stuff we had stored in a closet the other day and one item happened to be the last edition of the 1964 CCHS "High Times," our school newspaper. In it, they interviewed the seniors about their favorite sayings, pet peeves, etc. One of the questions was "what is your ambition?"
My answer was short and sweet....."to own a Corvette."
Life being what it is, my ambition changed (many times) throughout the years and somehow "owning a Corvette" kept getting put on the "back burner" enough until it finally was taken completely off the stove. When I was young and foolish, I couldn't afford it and as life progressed (marriage, kids, home ownership, etc.) it became completely impractical to even think about such things. Besides, how can you haul a wife, three kids and a dog in a car that only seats two people?
I was fortunate and still had my share of "big boy's toys" throughout the years but the Corvette still eluded me (or was I actually eluding it?) I spent several years in the automobile industry (sales) and it afforded me the opportunity to get to drive some pretty neat cars at the expense of others. Most of those years were spent selling Fords (Chevys were our enemies back then anyway) so the Corvette became even lower on my list of "must haves."
I had a few friends over the years who always liked to own and drive the two-seaters though. Jimmy Tyson always had one. Andy Swansey always had several (he still does). Glenn Adkins had a '66 stingray. He used to let me drive it occasionally and it made you feel you were "riding tall in the saddle." I actually owned a car in the sixties that was as fast as most of these Corvettes but it just didn't "hug the road" like a Vette. It was a Dodge Super Bee and it had a Hemi engine with 4 speed transmission and would run 150 mph easily. Take away that powertrain however, and it was a six-passenger family sedan. It was pretty neat but it still wasn't a Corvette.
I remember one year my old buddy Larry Vincent and I got jobs in Evansville and moved over there. We lived in an apartment in the industrial section of town (probably wouldn't want to be in there after dark now) and we had a spare bedroom. Jimmy Dillingham was going to school over there and needed a place to stay for a few weeks so we invited him to move into the extra bedroom we had. At the time, he had a '63 Corvette Coupe (I believe it was a "split-window", very rare and worth several thousand bucks today). One evening he was studying and I decided to make a "supper run" for some burgers to bring back to the apartment. My personal car at this time was an old Plymouth Valiant, not exactly a sexy machine. We had a single driveway and had to park our cars "end to end" in it. Jimmy's Corvette happened to be the one in the back (first out), so he threw me his keys and told me to pick up the food in his car.
I decided to go to Jerry's Restaurant, a franchise over on Washington Avenue that operated as both a "sit down" restaurant and also one similar to today's "Sonic Drive In" complete with stalls equipped with two-way speakers to place your order that was later delivered by a carhop. A lot of the "younger set" liked to hang out back there. This particular night (it was summer) a lot of kids were "grooving" back there when I arrived in Jimmy's Corvette. I pulled into a stall and placed my order which usually took about 15-20 minutes to get. While I was sitting in the car listening to the radio, it didn't take long for some pretty attactive girls to "meander" over by the 'Vette and strike up a conversation. In fact, by the time they brought my order, there were probably five or six of them back there talking to me (I was out of the car by this time). I paid for my order and asked them if they'd still be around later and they flirtingly replied "Sure will...c'mon back out!" Man, I thought I had died and gone to heaven.
I loaded up my order and headed back over to Governor Street to our apartment. I pulled into the driveway and told "Vince" and Jimmy about my good fortune and that I had finally discovered where all the good-lookin' girls in Evansville hung out. Jimmy had a night class that evening so he couldn't come back out but Larry and I would be sure to head back out there. We ate our burgers and fries and made plans to go out.
We cleaned up and put on about half a bottle of "English Leather." Of course, when Jimmy left for his class, he drove his Corvette. The next car in line was my old "Valiant." I remember getting in it and was so eager to get back to Jerry's that I "peeled out" on the street and the rear wheels "hopped" up and down (Valiants were notorious for that). We zipped across town back to Jerry's and "chicks" were everywhere. There were at least two girls for every boy. We found a stall, parked our car, got out and sit on the hood and waited......and waited......and waited.
Something was amiss here. Seems the girls, even the ones we spoke to earlier preferred us when I was driving the Corvette. That's when I learned a lesson in humility. I don't care if you were a cyclops. It doesn't matter if you have body odor. Girls don't care if you have a double layer of acne.....If you're in a Corvette, they don't notice anything but the Corvette. We sat out there about an hour before "tucking our tails between our legs" and heading home.
Lots have happened since that night. I met and fell in love with a beautiful young lady. We raised three sons. We've owned four homes. We spent vacations camping and doing outdoor things like that. We had a mortgage (several of 'em) and car payments and television payments.
Both of us worked full time all of our adult lives. In other words, we were an average couple in every sense of the word. I wouldn't trade any of it for anything though.
Several men go through a phase pundits like to call "mid life crisis." Somehow this evaded me. I owned a Harley-Davidson in 1975 (I was 29 years old, so technically that wasn't "mid life" (I hope). Besides I only had it about a month and I was afraid I was going to die young so I traded it for a camper (that was about 50 campers ago).
After the kids became grown, we had a case of "empty nest" syndrome. The nest was empty (sort of...they all come back home at least once) and it seemed large so we sold it and built a smaller nest. We decided to build another small nest at Lake Malone to insure the kids would keep coming back to see us (it worked). I ended up buying a pontoon but if you're going to stay at the Lake you might as well get on the Lake;
This made the boat a "necessity" rather than a "luxury."
I finally decided at 56 years old to do something bold and crazy. I got on ebay and purchased a 1980 MGB roadster. It was bright yellow and was a lot of fun to drive (it would only run about 65 mph and sounded like it was going to blow up at any minute). Yeah, it was fun but it was "no Vette." I sold it after a couple of years and purchased a '94 Mustang GT convertible. This was a lot more bold and I even customized it some including a $1,200 set of wheels (they were used....I didn't pay that much for them). This car had lots of power and a set of straight pipes that gave it a great sound. Pat & I would pull up to a stop light and a carload of teenage girls would pull up beside us in the other lane. You can imagine their disappointment to see an "old couple" grooving in such a sharp car. Our radio was blirting "House of the Rising Sun" by Eric Burden and the Animals. They couldn't help but laugh. That car was a blast but still, it was "no Vette."
Finally last year at the ripe old age of 60, we managed to scrape together a few bucks and bought us a Corvette. It wasn't a new one. In fact, next year I can purchase a "historical tag" for it if I choose. It's an '89 but to me, it might as well be the last one coming off the assembly line in Bowling Green (birthplace of the 'Vette and home of the National Corvette Museum, the "Mother of all Shrines for 'Vette owners).
I had to drive to Wisconsin to get it but she was a "beaut," bright white with lipstick read interior. It has a powerful V-8 and only has 41,000 miles on it. When I went to pick it up, my youngest son, J. P. took me up there in his Volvo and let me drive it home. My thoughts raced back to those early days when I dreamed of owning one of these marvelous machines.
Something funny happened on the way to the forum though. I only owned it about three days when I discovered how over-rated it really was. It was simply a car.....'glass and glass (Corvettes bodies for you "greenhorns" are made of fiberglass rather than steel). I drove it out to Sonic. No "babes" even gave it a second look. There were probably three or four others out there all newer and sharper than mine. I'll never know how fast it'll run because I'm not about to drive it past seventy-five. I used to dream of driving it out highway 62 towards Beaver Dam as fast as I could around those sharp curves. Now I don't even like to drive it on a two-lane. What changed? Well the cars are pretty much the same so it must have been me.
Pat & I belong to a club of convertible owners called the "Topless Cruisers." Our average age is well past fifty and we have everything from Corvettes (there are at least five of these), Mustangs, Sebrings, a Plymouth Prowler and the like. We enjoy getting together on Monday nights during the spring/summer/fall and driving about an hour to some restaurant and eating dinner together. It's fun but not exactly what I had in mind forty years ago when I dreamed of owning a Corvette.
The funny thing about owning one of these is the same as owning a Harley-Davidson. The vehicle is only the beginning. You have to own lots of regalia such as Corvette Caps, Shirts, Watches, Hat Pins, Earrings, Beach Bags, Jackets, Gloves and anything else with their logo on it. It gets kinda expensive. Doesn't matter. I have no intention of selling mine for now. I'm having a good time in it and it doesn't matter to me that my "snow white" hair blows in the breeze when I have the top down. I don't care if it takes me five minutes to get into it and ten more minutes to get out of it due to my old arthritic bones. I'm proud that the radio/cassette tape player will never produce a "hip-hop" song through it's speakers again (Oldies or Country for me, please).
So the next time you're in our county and see a bunch of old "geezers" sporting Corvettes, Mustangs, Prowlers and the like, give us a tip of your hat. We may look odd but you can bet we're living again in days bygone. Everything old is New Again!
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