THE FIRST HUNDRED YEARS... Was Spent In LA

There's an old saying, "The first hundred years are the hardest..." I'm a believer. In the first place, cars are a necessary thing out in Southern California. I've always been fond of the things, but I'd used alternatives too.

Well, buses didn't run all the time, and they didn't go all of the places I needed to go, so on to the auto dealership. And right back out. OK, so I'd never bought a car before... There were always the want ads. "Runs good!" Only with a tail wind...

"Needs work" Just lift the body up and drive a whole new car under it. "Brand new, fill in the blank" But you have to put in the blankety blank.

Humm... soon we were stopping to take down numbers as we walked (walked?!?) to work. Well, there was a welding shop up on the corner. The owner liked to be creative, and often bought older junkers to re-do. He'd had a little, partly red, 1964 Dart there for quite a while. He said it ran... we took a test drive in it and it did. "How much?"

Creative dickering really is an art form. We got the car for $75.00. Well, we really were delighted. Until we found out about insurance...

The mad welder had started fixing her up. This resulted in large areas of grey primer and the look of a somewhat demented mackeral tabbycat. Well, there was always Pic 'N Save. Six cans of bright, candy-apple red spray paint resulted in a car with slight variations in color, but at night, she looked pretty good.

In a slightly crazed mood, we found the insignia for the Chrysler Le Baron, the top of the Crysler line, and gave the Excaliber III a whole upscale look... sort of. The looks we got from people driving the real thing were either completely disbelieving or accompanied by hysterical giggles. There was one slight problem. The friend who drilled the hole for the hood ornament managed to hit the radiator. We learned about liquid solder.

For two weeks or so, all was quiet and serene. My partner in crime had complained about the lack of a cigarette lighter, but since I don't smoke, it didn't bother me.

Then the fun started. It was 2am, partner was working the night watch at an answering service. I attempted to start the car. Fascinating. I never knew there were so many different colors wires could turn while burning. I had enough sense to turn it off, but the damage was... extensive. The mad welder had removed the cigarette lighter but hadn't grounded the power line and it landed on the wire to the starter.

We were back on foot. The welding shop had changed hands, nobody spoke English, or knew where the prior owner had gotten to. On to the yellow pages under Electrical Repairs-Automotive. "What do you mean, only $350. I only paid $75 for the whole car!"

The amounts got more outrageous, and we got crazed. What about a junkyard. "Good place for it, but what do we do about transportation?" said the always helpful partner.

"No ditz, I mean, why don't we see if we can find the parts in a junkyard?"

Most of them refused to even talk to us. Women in their yard? Terrible thought. Finally we found a junkyard with heart (or maybe just more curiosity then the other ones). For a slightly exorbitant fee, they would let us rummage around in the back lot where the real junk was. No promise that they even had a match for our poor dead baby, but it was the best offer we'd had, and by now, the idea of doing it ourselves had taken hold. We would triumph. Maybe.

We knew the make and model we were looking for; the pliers had been located and we purchased a brand new Phillips head screwdriver for the occasion. A friendly spy from the nearby Chrysler Plymouth dealership found us the specs for the wiring system... for a '63 Valient Stationwagon. "The wiring colors are the same," he said.

We signed papers swearing that we wouldn't sue, promised not to climb higher than three cars, and were admitted to the ABANDONED AREA. For a moment we looked at each other. Did we really want to go through with this? We could hear rough masculine laughter on the other side of the wall.

Well, nothing ventured.. We approached each stack of rusted warped doors carefully. On the far side of them were the "whole" cars. Right. They were just strewn, like the Ventura freeway any evening. "Ugh, " said my partner. I had to agree. Then, over at the back wall of the joint, we saw a somewhat familiar looking front end. It didn't seem to have much of a back end left, but the things we needed were probably there. Our courage renewed, we lugged our boxes over to our victim.

At first we were very careful. Gently removing the fastenings, tracing the wires.. Then the Visigoth/Vandal syndrome set in. We ripped, tossed and tore harnesses, the dashboard, ignition sw itch... every thing including the turn signals, filling and then over filling those boxes. What fun. We labeled at first, but the labels got torn, or grease smeared, or battery acided. it became clear that this was a case for audacity. We figured we had plenty of that.

Three hours later, flushed with success, we hauled our loot back to the site of the disaster. We won't discuss the looks on the poor bus driver as we clambered on board with two huge, oily boxes of parts. The white blouses we started out with were going to require major restoration.

A friendly service station had offered us working space so we took them up on it. The guys were really enjoying themselves. Every time things quieted down at the pumps they popped in to see what we were doing.

We pulled things off the Excalibur III. We put new things on. We learned new words. We used new words. We found out that it is wise to disconnect the battery cables before touching them with bare hands. We began to have delusions... If a moderately bright 16 year old could tear down and rebuild a car, so could we. Yeah!

We crawled over, under, around and through that fugitive from the freeway for four hours. Then the ultimate test. Would she start. Several of our "helpers" were standing by with fire extinguishers. We felt that indicated a certain lack of confidence, but we didn't let that stop us. Cheryl handed me the key. Then went over to stand with them. Hmm. Oh well, 'Cal, it's just you and me and the moment of truth.

I approached, trying not to let my hands shake. I hung on to the steering wheel for dear life, and inserted the key. I turned the key, the starter clicked, and caught. The 'Cal III was alive and well again. Oh, there was one minor problem. The windshield wiper now had only one speed, but we figured if it was raining too hard for that one speed, we really didn't need to go. Yes, the first hundred years is the hardest, but as long as you have fun...

More comments on "The First Hundred Years" to come... stay tuned!