Post by Mike B on Dec 20, 2008 18:43:59 GMT -4
Sunshine hits heavy metal
Old Plymouth has loving overhaul
by Laura Lane H-T columnist | lane@heraldt.com
February 24, 2008
BLOOMINGTON — When they were kids, Susan and William Jenkin waited at the end of their long driveway for their dad, Elmer, to come home from work.
He would stop the car, and his children — once their legs were long enough to completely depress the clutch pedal — would take turns maneuvering his black 1949 Plymouth sedan to the garage.
“We were 10 or 11,” Susan Jenkin recalled. “We had to learn to back it up, and my dad would set up obstacles so we could parallel park.”
Despite excellent driving skills practiced during childhood, it was another decade before she got her driver’s license. Her parents decided she should wait until she could afford her own car and insurance.
“When I was taking driving lessons, the guy said, ‘You can drive just fine,’ and I told him of course I could drive. I just had never done it in traffic.”
Her dad’s car, purchased new in Bloomington in November 1949, cost $1,872.86. A year’s worth of coverage from R.E. Watt Insurance Co. on South Washington Street was $91.33.
In the early 1960s, the car started to run rough and the family parked it in the garage.
“My brother and I loved that car so much that we convinced him to keep it,” Susan Jenkin said.
Thirty years passed.
“We didn’t get it out until 1994,” she said. Her father had died the year before, and she decided to have the old Plymouth restored.
“It was important to us, me and my brother,” she said.
A big, red tow truck came and hauled the car, rotted tires and all, out into the sunshine. Dull and covered with three decades of dust, the Plymouth disappeared down the road, on its way to Gil McGlocklin’s shop.
The old gentleman spent a year transforming the car. He kept meticulous records, detailing expenses: $184 to install custom-made brake lines, $157 for two rocker panels, $130 to sandblast the frame, $5.12 for eight sheets of No. 80 sandpaper.
Jenkin said she visited the car every few weeks while it was being restored. At one point, when it was in pieces on the garage floor, McGlocklin fell ill.
“He tore it down to buckets and bolts and then he had a heart attack,” Jenkin said . “I was really worried he might not get well enough to put it all back together.”
He recovered and reassembled the car. All of the parts are original to the vehicle, except for the floorboard — the first one was rusted through — and one door. Replacement parts came from another 1949 Plymouth McGlocklin found to mine engine parts from.
The upholstery is new. “The original cloth seats were wool, which we couldn’t find to match,” Jenkin said. “But we got corduroy that matches what was there.”
The complete restoration, from the frame up, cost more than $5,000. In 1995, the president of Hoosier Classic Cars Inc. said the old car had an assessed value of $13,900 and a collector’s value of $22,500.
The day she retrieved the car, McGlocklin was sorry to see it go.
“He fell in love with it a little, I think,” Jenkin said. “When it was time to leave with it, he gave me a driving lesson. I told him I learned to drive in that car, but he was still skeptical.”
The Plymouth Special Deluxe never has been to a car show. Jenkin’s time behind the wheel has been limited the past two years since a back problem has restricted her mobility. She uses a cane to get around.
“I can’t even back the car out of the garage,” she lamented.
But she intends to drive it again some day.
“When you are driving holding on to that big steering wheel, the car just hugs the road. And the motor hums. That’s all you hear, is the motor. And it’s all heavy metal and chrome.”
Got a story to tell about a car or truck? Call 812-331-4362, send an e-mail to lane@heraldt.com or a letter to My Favorite Ride, P.O. Box 909, Bloomington, IN 47402.
Susan Jenkin’s 1949 Plymouth is hauled out of a garage in 1994, its first sunshine in 30 years. Courtesy photo
Gil McGlocklin tore the old car apart and lovingly restored it. Courtesy photo
Today, the “new” old car is valued at $22,500. Courtesy photo
After 30 years of storage in a garage followed by a complete rehaul, Susan Jenkin’s 1949 Plymouth now shines in the sun. Courtesy photo
Old Plymouth has loving overhaul
by Laura Lane H-T columnist | lane@heraldt.com
February 24, 2008
BLOOMINGTON — When they were kids, Susan and William Jenkin waited at the end of their long driveway for their dad, Elmer, to come home from work.
He would stop the car, and his children — once their legs were long enough to completely depress the clutch pedal — would take turns maneuvering his black 1949 Plymouth sedan to the garage.
“We were 10 or 11,” Susan Jenkin recalled. “We had to learn to back it up, and my dad would set up obstacles so we could parallel park.”
Despite excellent driving skills practiced during childhood, it was another decade before she got her driver’s license. Her parents decided she should wait until she could afford her own car and insurance.
“When I was taking driving lessons, the guy said, ‘You can drive just fine,’ and I told him of course I could drive. I just had never done it in traffic.”
Her dad’s car, purchased new in Bloomington in November 1949, cost $1,872.86. A year’s worth of coverage from R.E. Watt Insurance Co. on South Washington Street was $91.33.
In the early 1960s, the car started to run rough and the family parked it in the garage.
“My brother and I loved that car so much that we convinced him to keep it,” Susan Jenkin said.
Thirty years passed.
“We didn’t get it out until 1994,” she said. Her father had died the year before, and she decided to have the old Plymouth restored.
“It was important to us, me and my brother,” she said.
A big, red tow truck came and hauled the car, rotted tires and all, out into the sunshine. Dull and covered with three decades of dust, the Plymouth disappeared down the road, on its way to Gil McGlocklin’s shop.
The old gentleman spent a year transforming the car. He kept meticulous records, detailing expenses: $184 to install custom-made brake lines, $157 for two rocker panels, $130 to sandblast the frame, $5.12 for eight sheets of No. 80 sandpaper.
Jenkin said she visited the car every few weeks while it was being restored. At one point, when it was in pieces on the garage floor, McGlocklin fell ill.
“He tore it down to buckets and bolts and then he had a heart attack,” Jenkin said . “I was really worried he might not get well enough to put it all back together.”
He recovered and reassembled the car. All of the parts are original to the vehicle, except for the floorboard — the first one was rusted through — and one door. Replacement parts came from another 1949 Plymouth McGlocklin found to mine engine parts from.
The upholstery is new. “The original cloth seats were wool, which we couldn’t find to match,” Jenkin said. “But we got corduroy that matches what was there.”
The complete restoration, from the frame up, cost more than $5,000. In 1995, the president of Hoosier Classic Cars Inc. said the old car had an assessed value of $13,900 and a collector’s value of $22,500.
The day she retrieved the car, McGlocklin was sorry to see it go.
“He fell in love with it a little, I think,” Jenkin said. “When it was time to leave with it, he gave me a driving lesson. I told him I learned to drive in that car, but he was still skeptical.”
The Plymouth Special Deluxe never has been to a car show. Jenkin’s time behind the wheel has been limited the past two years since a back problem has restricted her mobility. She uses a cane to get around.
“I can’t even back the car out of the garage,” she lamented.
But she intends to drive it again some day.
“When you are driving holding on to that big steering wheel, the car just hugs the road. And the motor hums. That’s all you hear, is the motor. And it’s all heavy metal and chrome.”
Got a story to tell about a car or truck? Call 812-331-4362, send an e-mail to lane@heraldt.com or a letter to My Favorite Ride, P.O. Box 909, Bloomington, IN 47402.
Susan Jenkin’s 1949 Plymouth is hauled out of a garage in 1994, its first sunshine in 30 years. Courtesy photo
Gil McGlocklin tore the old car apart and lovingly restored it. Courtesy photo
Today, the “new” old car is valued at $22,500. Courtesy photo
After 30 years of storage in a garage followed by a complete rehaul, Susan Jenkin’s 1949 Plymouth now shines in the sun. Courtesy photo