Category Archives: Planes Trains and Automobiles

These kitties smash model trains for a living

Posted on April 18, 2022 by James| Comments Off

Posted in Critters, Humor, Planes Trains and Automobiles

Birth of the Mustang (and the Pony Car)

Posted on April 17, 2022 by James| Comments Off

1964: Ford introduces the Mustang at the New York World’s Fair. It becomes an instant hit and an icon that alters the automotive landscape, giving rise to one of the most successful — and most uniquely American — automobile genres: the pony car.

The Ford Mustang was born of the simple idea that putting a back seat in a sports car would be a great idea.

The idea came to Lee Iacocca and Donald Frey in the early 1960s as the country was being overrun by European sports cars. Everywhere you looked you saw Alfa Romeos and MGs and Triumphs that dripped oil. Even French cars that would draw peals of laughter today were popular back then.

The two Ford execs saw a vast market literally rolling before their eyes, and, according to legend, the notion of a sports car with a back seat was one of those “ah-hah” moments. If Ford could dilute the European ethos just a bit by making the cars a bit more practical and a lot more affordable, Iacocca figured, the company would sell a few thousand.

He was right, but boy was he wrong. Ford didn’t sell thousands of them. It sold millions of them.

They sold 22,000 on the first day.

The Mustang was more than a success. It was a phenomenon. Ford sold 1 million in the first 18 months, making the Mustang its most successful launch since the Model A.

The pony car is easy to define. It was small by Detroit standards, with sporty styling. It had a back seat for your kids and a usable trunk for your stuff. And the rear wheels were driven by an engine — ideally a big V-8 — mounted up front where God and Henry Ford intended.

Pony cars may not have had the finesse of a European sports car, but they made up for it with brute force. A small-block V-8 can make up for a multitude of handling deficiencies.

The Mustang was successful like the Beatles were popular. Ford figured it would sell around 100,000 in the first 12 months of production. It sold 10 times that number in the first 18.

That success was not lost on the rest of Detroit, and everyone was cranking out pony cars by 1967. General Motors introduced the Chevrolet Camaro and its kissing cousin, the Pontiac Firebird. Ford offered the more upscale Mercury Cougar. Chrysler released the Challenger. Even AMC — google it, we’ll wait — got into the act with the Javelin.

Everyone had a favorite, and even now loyalists occasionally come to blows over which one was best. Countless bets have been made and races staged in displays of testosterone and bravado that would make Dr. Freud sit down for a cigar and a good long think.

And that was just in the parking lots and streets. Things really got wild when the automakers got in on the act, bringing in drivers like Dan Gurney and George Follmer and Mark Donohue to show who built the best car. The contest grew so heated it gave rise to a pony-car–specific racing series called Trans Am. (The car was named after the series, not the other way around.)

We’re inclined to give the award to the Mustang, if only because Steve McQueen drove a ’68 fastback in the most famous chase scene in cinematic history, that amazing dash through the streets of San Francisco in Bullitt.

The Mustang also gets the nod for sheer longevity. Oh sure, you can get a new Camaro that looks like a vintage Camaro, or a new Dodge Challenger that looks like a vintage Dodge Challenger.

But the Mustang is the only pony car to remain in continuous production since its introduction 45 years ago.

Ford has sold more than 9 million worldwide.

Posted in Because I Can, Planes Trains and Automobiles

Anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic

Posted on April 15, 2022 by James| Comments Off

On April 15th, 1912, RMS Titanic struck an iceberg on her maiden voyage from Southampton, England to New York City and sank, taking over 1500 lives with her.

Wikipedia Link

Posted in Because I Can, On This Day, Planes Trains and Automobiles

C.W. McCall is on the side. He’s gone bye bye.

Posted on April 2, 2022 by James| Comments Off

C.W. McCall, the Omaha, Nebraska adman who jumped to country music stardom with 1976’s “Convoy“, died yesterday at the age of 93 after battling cancer.

C.W. McCall (born William Dale Fries Jr., Nov. 15, 1928 – April 1, 2022)

“Breaker one-nine, this here’s the Rubber Duck” introduced America to CB Jargon in the mainstream. Selling more than 2 million copies, and inspiring a 1978 movie of the same name starring Kris Kristofferson, would bring “10-4, good buddy” and many more into America’s lexicon.

Born Nov. 15, 1928, in Audubon, Iowa, as William Dale Fries Jr., Fries created the character of C.W. McCall in 1974 while working at an Omaha ad agency. The goal then wasn’t to record radio hits but to sell loaves of bread with country-sounding jingles.

“I wanted to name the truck driver something that would be easily remembered. A lot of the truckers wore initials on their shirts,” he told Milwaukee deejay Bob Barry. “We thought it was sort of a country-western sounding track, so that’s where the C.W. came from.”

The first commercial, “Old Home Filler-Up an’ Keep on a-Truckin’ Café,” proved so popular (it won a Clio Award) that Fries began to write a series of truck-driving songs with Chip Davis, who’d go on to form the neo-classical group Mannheim Steamroller. “Old Home Filler-Up an’ Keep on a-Truckin’ Café” appeared on McCall’s debut album, 1975’s Wolf Creek Pass. The title track hit Number 12 on the country charts and Fries — by now fully transformed into the character of C.W. McCall — set about recording the follow-up.

Black Bear Road arrived in September 1975 and its title track stalled at Number 24. But McCall released another song off the album: “Convoy.” The tale of a caravan of big-rig drivers led by “The Rubber Duck” caught the national consciousness with its vivid cross-country imagery and playful lingo — “Smokies” for the cops, “bear in the air” for a police chopper, “What’s your twenty?” for location, and, of course, “10-4” for “affirmative.” The track spent six weeks atop the country charts and hit No. 1 on the pop survey.

“This here’s the Rubber Duck on the side. We gone, ‘bye, ‘bye”

Convoy lyrics here

Posted in Because I Can, Events, Music, News, Planes Trains and Automobiles