Car Collector's Corner: 1966 Rambler Station Wagon – A Family Heritage Car Makes a Comeback

J Sutherland
by J Sutherland

Don Hogenson led a different life before he became a family man. He was a professional football player with the Calgary Stampeders of the Canadian Football League. Then he embarked on a career as a professional wrestler.

That all changed when his family got bigger.

Enter this 1966 Rambler American station wagon.

At that point in his life, Don was a car salesman. In those days, you didn’t use company demos for personal business. Don spotted this Rambler with a mere 114 miles on the clock. It was perfect for an upcoming vacation.

The car made sense for the trip until, as Don explained, “we were going on holidays and I couldn’t take a demo, I bought it, parked it and a half hour later cops were there after a guy had an epileptic seizure. Lost my holidays that year, because I told them I wanted all new parts.”

A year later the car was back to normal although Don admits that “the back corner has 4 pounds of lead on it.”

After that, there were no more disasters with the little wagon. As Don related, “ I drove it for twenty years pretty much anytime I didn’t have a demo car. I hauled kids everywhere in it and my daughter used it as a wedding car.”

There were a few skirmishes with the car though as Don recalled, “my kid and 2 other brats decided to break the windshield and I wore myself out trying to catch them as they ran around the car…disadvantages of a wagon.”

Eventually, the little Rambler became less of a factor for the Hogenson family, and it wasn’t driven for 15 years. Last year Don’s son decided to take the family wagon back to its former glory.

The car was really solid mechanically as Don explained, “I had to redo the brakes because they were seized, needed a new windshield, motor wasn’t touched.”

The car was a fairly lengthy project, and Don tried to stay away from his beloved Rambler during that period. Don admits, that he cried when he saw it. That speaks volumes about his inner car guy and his attachment to the little wagon because Don is not an overtly emotional guy in person.

Now,the Rambler gets a daily workout. Don can be seen all over town behind the wheel of his 46-year-old car. He admits “that I’d sooner drive this than my 2004 Camry because of the sentimental value, but it will never see another winter.”

His only regret is the lack of power steering. Don said it was easier to drive in 1966 when he was much younger and still had youth on his side.

Other than that, this 1966 Rambler station wagon is home for good as part of the Hogenson family heritage.

For more of J Sutherland’s work go to mystarcollectorcar.com

J Sutherland
J Sutherland

Online collector car writer/webmaster and enthusiast

More by J Sutherland

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  • WildcatMatt WildcatMatt on May 08, 2012

    Am I the only one who looks at the picture with the tailgate down and sees hints of Chevy Suburban in the two-tone and taillights?

  • Gannet Gannet on May 09, 2012

    Beautiful! And those Rambler wagons had fold-down front seats. Brings back fond memories from high school. :)

  • Wolfwagen Is it me or have auto shows just turned to meh? To me, there isn't much excitement anymore. it's like we have hit a second malaise era. Every new vehicle is some cookie-cutter CUV. No cutting-edge designs. No talk of any great powertrains, or technological achievements. It's sort of expected with the push to EVs but there is no news on that front either. No new battery tech, no new charging tech. Nothing.
  • CanadaCraig You can just imagine how quickly the tires are going to wear out on a 5,800 lbs AWD 2024 Dodge Charger.
  • Luke42 I tried FSD for a month in December 2022 on my Model Y and wasn’t impressed.The building-blocks were amazing but sum of the all of those amazing parts was about as useful as Honda Sensing in terms of reducing the driver’s workload.I have a list of fixes I need to see in Autopilot before I blow another $200 renting FSD. But I will try it for free for a month.I would love it if FSD v12 lived up to the hype and my mind were changed. But I have no reason to believe I might be wrong at this point, based on the reviews I’ve read so far. [shrug]. I’m sure I’ll have more to say about it once I get to test it.
  • FormerFF We bought three new and one used car last year, so we won't be visiting any showrooms this year unless a meteor hits one of them. Sorry to hear that Mini has terminated the manual transmission, a Mini could be a fun car to drive with a stick.It appears that 2025 is going to see a significant decrease in the number of models that can be had with a stick. The used car we bought is a Mk 7 GTI with a six speed manual, and my younger daughter and I are enjoying it quite a lot. We'll be hanging on to it for many years.
  • Oberkanone Where is the value here? Magna is assembling the vehicles. The IP is not novel. Just buy the IP at bankruptcy stage for next to nothing.
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