Yesterday's Weapons Forums

My dad was always interested in old cars. In 1969, one of his customers told him that he might have a car he'd be interested in. It was a 1941 Lincoln Zephyr sedan. After some negotiation, my dad bought the car. It wasn't running; the bolt that held the fan blade in place had broken and tossed the fan into the radiator. The owner had the radiator repaired, but never got around to taking the broken bolt stub out of the crankshaft. That was in 1948, the last year the car had been currently licensed. After that, the car sat in a steel barn in the desert up to 1969.

My dad towed the car home. He drilled a hole in the broken bolt shaft, hammered a broken screwdriver into the hole, and screwed the bolt stub on out. He got a bolt and a fan somewhere and put them on the car, then reinstalled the already-rebuilt radiator. This car had a V-12 engine in it. He changed the engine oil, pulled each spark plug and shot a bit of oil in each cylinder, installed coolant, put a battery in it and it fired up fairly easily. It was far from perfect, as the original owner had driven it hard all through the war years, back and forth from Lucerne Valley, CA in the desert, up to his business at Big Bear Lake in the mountains. It still had the crappy WW2 recapped tires on it. During the war, civilians couldn't easily get brand-new tires.

These Lincoln Zephyrs were the basis for the Lincoln Continental which first came out in 1940. Note the flat windshield, rather than a Vee shape on other models of the era. I've told people before that when we drove these old Lincolns, it seemed like our fingers on the steering wheel were only inches from the glass. Look at the steering wheel in relation to the windshield.

Always neat to look at old cars.

Back when I was a teenager I tried to buy a 41 or 42, don't remember which now, ford coupe and that would have been around1957.

Rad

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always neat to look at one you actually road in - i had a great uncle that had one of those , he was an interesting character in more ways than one but i remember being impressed with this car as a kid - in 69 ???? not so much , a 57 chevy with a 327 , 4brl , hurst shift , i think would have caught my eye

Yeah, oxidized paint and safety glass with failed laminate around the edges giving the frosted effect. My '72 Ford Custom 500 sedan has a frosted corner in the windshield and I wouldn't replace it for anything. That stupid failed laminate reminds me too much of my dad and those older times with cars.