by Brian Chartier

Created on: June 19, 2008   Last Updated: April 25, 2009

OOOOOOO...My own car!

My first car was a 1969 Mercury Meteor four-door sedan. It had holes in the door big enough to put my arm through. Great when you needed to get the empties off the back-seat. It was lime green with a black roof and a greed cloth interior. It had power steering, power brakes, a rear radio speaker and flow-though ventilation just about everywhere.

In 1969, there were many great vehicles. The '69 Chrysler Newport was a magnificent land-yaght that floated ominously down the highway. The '69 Oldsmobile Delta 88 was a car of class and prestige. The '69 Olds Cutlass SS was a beast to be reckoned with and perhaps one of the greatest muscle cars was the 1969 Pontiac Judge. This was more a less a Lemans with the Judge package which included wider tires, high performance V8 and little-else.

Back to the '69 Mercury. It was massive. Room for 6 adults who could fit in without having their knees under their chins.

Fond memories? Well I recall that in the dead of winter I would usually need a battery boost in order to get the massive V8 to turn-over. Once started it hummed very nicely and since it had so little in the way of options, it moved when you hit the accelerator.

Saturday night was social night. Since I drove a car, I would make the rounds and pick-up all my friends and their cases of beer. The trunk was huge! I am sure that I have had close to 10 cases of 24 bottles of beer in there.

The best story though is the night I got pulled-over for a random inspection by the local police. He looked at the car front to back and paused occasionally to look at the former holes in the body which I plastered with body-filler. He asked about the brakes and the exhaust, both which worked. Then he asked if girls would really get in a car that looked like mine. I told him that when it is bellow zero and the heater is blaring, girls are not fussy about how the car looks. He agreed with the logic. Then he shook his head, waved me on and slowly walked back to his cruiser, a modified Plymouth. It was nearly 2:00am, He rolled his widow down and asked if my car burned rubber? I told him it could. He said, "Well go for it, I really want to see if it moves, don't worry, this is a freebie." I burned about 20 feet of rubber and never saw the officer again.

To me, the 1960's had some great automobiles. The 1970's brought catalytic converters and other anti-pollution devices which essentially changed motoring for years to come. I love to read other stories about people's favourite cars as they usually are from the 1950's or 1960's. Write soon, many of us want to read your story!

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