Editor's Choice

Jack Baruth
by Jack Baruth

Running the show here at TTAC has a few privileges. One of them is that on a relatively slow news day I can take the site over to put up pictures of General Motors “box” B/C-body cars from the Seventies and Eighties. These shots were found by The Brougham Society’s Kevin Campbell and they showcase one of my favorite Boxes. With its cliff-face front end and stately finlets, the ’77 Oldsmobile Ninety-Eight positively exudes natural dignity. To a generation that had no trouble remembering the dismal interiors of the Model T, the C-47, and the Navy LCVP, the all-green velour salon must have been cheering and impressive in equal measure.

At the age of eleven or so, your humble author was driven around quite a bit in a blue ’77 Regency; my father’s business partner had one. Some time in 1982, both of the old men (age of my father in 1982: 36. Age of your author today: 41) went to the Lincoln dealer and joined the Church of The Panther by purchasing a pair of blue Town Car Signatures. I missed the Ninety-Eight. I thought it was better-looking and had a nicer dashboard. Little did I know that GM would cut the legs out from under the full-sized car before I made it into my teens.

Oh well. What’s past is prologue, but these magnificently proportioned sedans will never return.








Jack Baruth
Jack Baruth

More by Jack Baruth

Comments
Join the conversation
2 of 227 comments
  • ToolGuy This is the kind of thing you get when you give people faster internet.
  • ToolGuy North America is already the greatest country on the planet, and I have learned to be careful about what I wish for in terms of making changes. I mean, if Greenland wants to buy JDM vehicles, isn't that for the Danes to decide?
  • ToolGuy Once again my home did not catch on fire and my fire extinguisher(s) stayed in the closet, unused. I guess I threw my money away on fire extinguishers.(And by fire extinguishers I mean nuclear missiles.)
  • Carson D The UAW has succeeded in organizing a US VW plant before. There's a reason they don't teach history in the schools any longer. People wouldn't make the same mistakes.
  • B-BodyBuick84 Mitsubishi Pajero Sport of course, a 7 seater, 2.4 turbo-diesel I4 BOF SUV with Super-Select 4WD, centre and rear locking diffs standard of course.
Next