Seven Classics Reissued for Today
By Paul NiedermeyerJune 29, 2008 - 30 views
For the third time, a dramatic oil price spike has thrown the auto industry a curve ball. And once again, after years of supersizing, manufacturers are lacking the right-sized, economical products for which the market is desperate. Instead of spending three to five years developing new cars from scratch, it’s time to dust off the best from the past and put them back into production. An air bag here and some updated engines and technology there, and these seven classics are ready to save the day in each of the major categories:
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Posted in Auto-biography | Editorials | Sales and Marketing | 89 comments 
Auto-Biography: In Search of… The East Glows
By Paul NiedermeyerMay 10, 2008 - 2,570 views
In 1971, I committed a crime, the repercussions of which still affect me today. I was a bored eighteen year-old whose over-developed automotive memory banks craved stimulus. In those pre-web dark ages, the information gap between monthly car magazines was excruciating. Desperate, I plied the 629.22 rack of the Iowa City Public Library, and found the font of automotive history. I slipped the heavy Rosetta stone under my baggy Army surplus jacket and walked out. I’ve been guiltily absorbing its contents ever since.
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Posted in Auto-biography | Editorials | 11 comments
Road Trip to Wenatchee Part 2: The Honda Lucerne and Other Roadside Attractions
By Paul NiedermeyerApril 5, 2008 - 14,374 views
Spontaneous road trips are a like a treasure hunt without the clues. The prizes always appear unexpectedly. Like Goldendale’s night-shift police officer. “No, Mr. Niedermeyer, your speed was just fine. But you seem to have your high-beams on. That’s against the law within city limits. But… you’re free to go.” With those words of affirmation, our road trip to Wenatchee resumed. Adrenalin flowing, we were alert to the next roadside attraction.
Posted in Auto-biography | Editorials | 24 comments
Road Trip to Wenatchee
By Paul NiedermeyerMarch 29, 2008 - 11,167 views
“You’re free to go.” With those hackneyed words, the Goldendale police officer returned my license. They were the very same words I’d heard in my head just a few hours earlier. At one-thirty last Sunday, my older son Ted called: “If you can drop Will [(his brother) here by three, we can take him back with us to Portland for a few days.” Cabin fever was at 103. The ninety minute deadline to pick a destination and pack the xB was just the tonic I needed. Time to head for… (flings open the atlas)… Wenatchee!
Road Trip to Wenatchee editorial continued »
Posted in Auto-biography | Editorials | Nostalgia | 20 comments
Corolla Memories
By Paul NiedermeyerMarch 8, 2008 - 16,084 views
For me, driving bliss is all about the setting. Give me an empty road, spectacular scenery, good company and the freedom to explore without an itinerary or time constraints, and I’m in Heaven. Sure, a nice set of wheels enhances the pleasure. But if it came down to it, I’d take an inexpensive reliable car and an endless open road over a garage full of under-used toys that never really get off their leash. I knew the basic formula intuitively in my youth.
Corolla Memories editorial continued »
Posted in Auto-biography | Editorials | Nostalgia | 38 comments
The Great American Anti-Towing Conspiracy
By Paul NiedermeyerFebruary 23, 2008 - 28,913 views
“Scion does not recommend towing a trailer… your vehicle was not designed for towing." Welcome to the great American anti-towing conspiracy. Manufacturers of anything less than a big SUV or pick-up are trying to take away our God-given right to tow with our cars. For a guy who’s towed everything from a Radio Flyer wagon behind a pedal-powered John Deere sidewalk tractor, to a three-bedroom house, I feel like I’m being singled out. Of course, there’s a possibility that I’m the cause as well as the target of this jihad. A lot of lawyers do drive the Ventura Freeway, and one of them may well have seen my spectacular stunt with a trailer.
The Great American Anti-Towing Conspiracy editorial continued »
Posted in Auto-biography | Editorials | 59 comments
Plymouth Fury
By Paul NiedermeyerFebruary 16, 2008 - 24,409 views
Somewhere west of Ogallala, rocketing across the plains at ninety-six in a sixty-nine Plymouth Fury, a twangy voice lectured us with the old song: “love and marriage, love and marriage, go together like a horse and carriage.” My two female traveling companions and I exchanged glances, laughed and sang along. “…you can’t have one without the other.” In that precious moment, everything crystallized: what it meant to be nineteen in 1972, free as a bird, barreling down the freeway in a powerful American sedan.
Plymouth Fury editorial continued »
Posted in Auto-biography | Editorials | 35 comments
Bodacious Tatras
By Paul NiedermeyerJanuary 5, 2008 - 22,615 views
The dorsal fin is what put it over the top for me, literally. When I was a tyke of six in Austria, I ogled cars like a fifteen year old with X-ray vision at a cheerleading camp. But the most tataliscous bod my eyes could never get enough of was the Tatra down the street. Its radical aerodynamic form was already twenty years old, but with its dorsal fin, tear-drop shape, rear engine and uncompromising fluid lines, the Tatra positively screamed “futuristic” to me then. Hell, it’s still ahead of the times today.
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Posted in Auto-biography | Editorials | 18 comments
The Game of Foxes
By Paul NiedermeyerDecember 29, 2007 - 38,356 views
They say the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Of course that was NEVER going to apply to me and my nerdy, car-clueless Father. He drove boxy Detroit stripper sedans. I drove VW’s and Peugeots. He’s a world-renowned neurologist-- but totally impractical. I never finished high school-- but rebuild cars. I grew-up in the time when political pundits pronounced our cultural chasm a “generation gap.” Except ours was more like the Grand Canyon. Or so I thought...
The Game of Foxes editorial continued »
Posted in Auto-biography | Editorials | 43 comments
I’ll Be Home for Christmas
By Paul NiedermeyerDecember 24, 2007 - 26,911 views
Santa came early in 1972. My older brother had taken a civilian job on a military base in Greenland. Out of the blue, he gave me his 1963 Corvair. It was my very first set of wheels. Instead of bracing myself for the thousand mile-long hitchhike from Iowa to Baltimore in freezing weather, I was driving home for Christmas in comfort. But there was a catch: Santa had deputized me. I had a present to deliver, and deliver I would, come hell or high snow.
I’ll Be Home for Christmas editorial continued »
Posted in Auto-biography | Editorials | 21 comments
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