This Curbside Classic took the same trajectory as the Blazer. It started as a legitimate nod of acknowledgment to the S-10 Blazer as the trailblazer of the compact SUV market. But as I got further along, I realized just how badly GM bungled the huge opportunity for the baby Blazer in a segment that became a monster money machine for Jeep and Ford. With the mistakes being all so prototypical GM, I just had to re-write it as a Deadly Sin, even though it would have been easier to just leave it as it was. Which is exactly what GM’s Deadly Sin was: leave it as it was, forever. Well I’m not ready just yet to have someone document my Deadly Journalistic Sins, so here goes: Blazer, take Two.

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No one’s going to accuse me of not having a nostalgic streak, especially when it comes to cars. That’s what motivated me to write the Auto-biography, my time travel through words. How about the real thing, in steel, glass, rubber and wool? One of my main motivations for starting Curbside Classics was to document and re-experience the cars from those early years, and few were as influential as the original Olds 88. Most of the time, the reliving is somewhat vicarious, but once in a while, I get lucky, and it’s the real thing. So let’s literally open the door to the past, and hop in for a ride with me in this beautiful 1951 Super 88. And if it gets a bit crowded, good; that’ll make it all the more authentic. (Read More…)

Oregonians have long treasured the random little collectable objects that Japan’s artisans inadvertently send our way. Usually that takes the form of beautiful hand-blown glass fishing floats that spend years or decades bobbing in the Pacific before a storm washes them on our shores. But occasionally another form of distinctly Japanese objet d’art finds its way ashore, like this Nissan Pao. (Read More…)

Look at this car and what do you see: Eleanor, star of the original 1974 “Gone in 60 Seconds” movie? All the worst excess and ugliness of the early seventies folded up into one bloated pile? A long stripe of black rubber burned into a country road? The destruction of an American icon? Nostalgia for a simpler and more innocent time? Nothing at all, if you’re trying to look out the back window? Put me down for all of the above, as well as a couple of lasting lessons this Mustang taught me.

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Hybrids are big in Eugene, but some are just plain huge. The Prius is the official new car here, having dethroned Subaru. But here’s a hybrid of a different color: instead of a marriage of two drive systems, it’s a cross between two brands, the engine of one transplanted into another. Back in the day, when these were popular, the goal was speed, not better mileage. And the resulting names of these cross-species hybrids were more colorful than Prius or Insight: Fordillac, Studillac, Fordick, Fordolet. Well, here’s a new one: a Chevmobile. (Read More…)

How exactly did the Volvo 122 Amazon achieve its mythological stature? Naming it after the eponymous nation of all-female warriors was a good start. Legendary ruggedness and durability solidified its status. Sporty performance burnished it further. Then there’s the magic belt: one of the twelve labors of Hercules was to secure the girdle of Hippolyta, the queen of the Amazons. Giving up her belt ended up costing Hippolyta her life. But it was a worthy sacrifice, because the Amazon’s first-ever three point seat belt has saved untold others theirs, and established the Volvo safety myth. That may now have run its course, but the Amazon’s status on the automotive Mt. Olympus is secure. (Read More…)

While the human Seven Deadly Sins – lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy and pride – clearly play a part in any automaker’s fall from grace, Detroit cultivated its own favorite deadly transgressions. Chrysler’s recurring dirty little habit was premature ejection: spurting cars out of the factory door before they were ready. The shoddily built 1957s devastated the company’s hard earned rep for solid, well-engineered cars. Chrysler only barely absolved itself through the penance of hard work along with the blessing of the sacred A-Body. But in 1976, Chrysler fell from grace again, and this time it took the intercession of the Great White Father in Washington to keep it from eternal damnation. And not for the last time, either.

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Somewhere deep in the comments to last week’s oft-misunderstood Datsun 210 CC was this: “With all the beautiful cars in the world, why do you insist on picking shit boxes all the time?” Well, it’s not like the streets of Eugene are lined with Delages and Delahayes sitting curbside in the in the rain. Did you miss my endless homage to the beautiful 1970 Camaro? Anyway, CC isn’t Hemmings or the Robb Report. It’s about the love of old cars still earning their keep, beautiful or not. But there are two kinds of auto-love, and a self-consciously beautiful car like this 635CSi has the higher hurdle to clear.

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With what words shall I express my overpowering feelings toward this tin can wrapped in vinyl wood appliqué? Jeremy Clarkson once called the Sunny “the worst car in the world ever” (probably not for the first or last time). To show he meant it, he hurled one to its death from a trebuchet (sorry, I couldn’t find it on You Tube). Richard Hammond piled in on the flame-fest too, incinerating another Sunny in the scorching business end of a rocket car. If graphic language is going to offend your delicate sensibilities, better skip the jump:

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You would be forgiven for mistaking this modest-looking sedan as a low-end Dodge, Pontiac or Mercury. A Packard? The very name conjures images of exclusive cars from the classic era, like this illustrious coach-built V12, or perhaps its last gasp luxo-boat, the 1956 Caribbean. But finding this lowly 1951 Model 200 sitting curbside just a few blocks from my house was actually more fortuitous (and likely) than finding a glamorous one. Because in the history of this fabled brand, this car played quite a pivotal role: it brought Packard down.

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