Anyone else have evidence that your dad was way cooler than you?

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Taken between 1959 and 1961. Cannot see it in the pic, but he ran around with a straight stinger pipe, no muffler. The guy kneeling down is my mom's cousin, and he had a 356 also. They used to race up on skyline in Oakland.

Your dad looks a bit like Hunter Thompson. That makes him cooler than my dad by itself.

I thought the same thing! Sadly, I think he looked like the good doctor for but a fleeting moment.

waiting for a flood

Great thread!
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It's yours truely with my dad's mother about 1961 or 1962.... little did I know at the time that it would become my first car in late 1964. Dad had blown the clutch in '63 and purchased a new Corvair Spyder and stuck the 356 on blocks under a tarp. After I turned 16 he said if I fixed it and paid the insurance I could have it....
I was on fire about Porsches and racing. Dad had gotten this car from Joe Buzzetta after it had been raced extensively on the east coast. It was a '56 with right hand drive and had been the first Porsche to go to Hong Kong. On the way home, the factory blueprinted the engine, they called it "hand polished" and gave Joe a different 3rd gear. In 1957 it won many races on the east coast.
Yeah, Dad was cool....

Awesome!

Actually, there IS a 914 connection to the picture. I got my 914 from my mom's cousin in 1984!

Actually, there IS a 914 connection to the picture. I got my 914 from my mom's cousin in 1984!

I don't have a picture of it, but my Dad had a 69' DZ302 Z28 brand new. My Mom made him sell later due to much-mass tickets.

By the time I was married, I had a 70' 911E (in between 914's at the time).

Not sure which is cooler, the DZ302 or the 911? Both are these days very rare.

Geez. Dad's cars. So many cool ones. Pics are hard to find, but my favorite was his two-tone brown '50 merc with fender skirts, slammed and chopped. By the time I came along, he was a very busy heavy equipment contractor, and relegated to an endless stream of Ford Pick ups. At least he always got the Big Block.

Well, both my parents were way cool...
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My Dad was cool because he was my Dad.

My dad is cool too.
Eniac Computer...
Arpa Net
Conference calling
Digital Cell phone

Tons of classified stuff that I am not allowed to hear.

All his patents and projects...

Far from a car guy though....

Rich

My mom was cool.



Unfortunately, she was also the photographer of the family, so I have no pictures of her with her Swallow Doretti.

Yeah, I think my dad was way cooler than I. He had a 56 Chevy painted candy apple red, then after he sold it to a friend for $100 bucks (yeah that’s what I thought). He moved on to a Pontiac GTO, teal/blue sold that for next to nothing, and then bought a 68 Buick GS California, bright yellow. I don’t have any pictures of them and can only remember the GS as a kid. He now has a1930 model A 5 window coupe. It was my grandfathers and is all original gun metal paint and all. He is torn because he is a hot rod muscle car guy and he wants to turn it into a full hot rod, but then again there aren’t that many fully original steel body 5 window coupes still around this area, salt got to most of them.

Byron.
And you mom was smokin' hot. Your Dad is (was) a lucky man!

I almost forgot!

I guess both my parents purchased VW Type 1's after the last of the kids were born. Dad had a black 60' vert and mom had a 63'??? coupe, that light blue color. I've seen pics of both.

So in 73', dad "surpised" mom by trading in both bugs for two brand new Vegas.

That.....was not so cool.

Mom still talks (complains) about that one almost 40 years later.

he sold his speedster for 2650 to buy the -6 for 3200

back in the early sixties I had a AC Aceca Bristol stage two coupe. I wish I still had the car but kept having kids and it got to small. sold it for $3600.00. I havent seen one since. Have a brother who raced in the 50's he had a xj120,MGtd, Glocker speedester, 550 spyder, MG special He drove a Morette in the 6 hour at Torry Pines and won the index of performance.
he also published the programs for Cal Club backi then He was cool

Thanks, he has passed though
That was their race car, both raced SCCA BITD....

Wow! I wonder what that is worth today??

The Swallow Doretti was a two-seater sports car based on the Triumph TR2, made between 1954 and 1955.

The marque came from Swallow Coachbuilding Co. (1935) Ltd. which was sold in 1945 by Jaguar (formerly S.S. Cars Ltd.) to the Helliwell Group which was taken over in 1946 by the British conglomerate, the Tube Investments Group (TI). The Dorreti name was derived from Dorothy Deen, who ran the US dealership Cal Sales.[2]

The first and only model produced by Swallow under TI ownership was the Doretti, which had a tubular Reynolds 531 Cromolly chassis with a body made of a steel inner structural skin and aluminium outer. Most cars were supplied with overdrive and they were capable of 100 mph. 276 cars were made, including a single fixed head coupe version.

My dad had a '40 Ford convertible when he was 21
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... and no, that's NOT my mom in the pic ... she did have some pretty cool cars though ...

'55 Chrysler New Yorker
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'62 Pontiac Bonneville
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'89 Camaro
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and her current car is a '07 Mustang. She still has a thing for convertibles.

Mom will be 87 in November ...

Well this is a somewhat recent photo, but I think it proves that my dad is cooler than me. All 4 cars in this photo were his at that time. He is the one who gave me the porsche bug. While I grew up he owned everything from 914's to a 930 Turbo. I may have even come home from the hospital as a baby in a porsche (this is unconfirmed, but I like to think its true). He is a great guy and a great dad.

Here is a shot of me in front of my dads 911E.

My grandfather did not even need a car!
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Dad (left) and a friend. Had a massive Caddy engine in the car and had to put the fan on half way up the hill!
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Another.

Is that a TR-250 or 6 in the background and was it your mothers?

My Dad was cool, but more of a family car guy with a twist.

He did get a HD 67 Chevy 3/4 ton pick-up with a 327/2bbl & Auto (so Mom could drive it too) that he put a cabover camper on the back for our annual Summer XC trips San Diego to Pittsburgh. It was one of the family cars I learned to drive in - the other being a 62 Olds 88 wagon with a 396 IIRC - and that truck could haul ass even with the camper on it.

But it suffered from 7 mpg, so Dad added 2 saddle tanks from an IH pick-up & a fuel tank selector switch from an aircraft to get decent range out of it (IIRC the tank behind the seat was only about 16 gals.). Good thing gas was only 25 - 27 cents a gallon back in the 60's, but it still hurt to pump 60+ gals. into those 3 tanks!

Like Rich's Dad, he was into science - chemistry, and did a bunch of NASA & JPL stuff on which he has or shares patents, as well as on the polyurethane varnish we all use on furniture, house & boat projects today.

His younger brother Merrill was the real hot car nut, who built a Model A Roadster Rod, had a 58 Vette barn find that he tweaked & drove XC Santa Ana to Pittsburgh several times in under 48 hours on pre-interstate old highways, then build it into a dragster in which he held the class record at the old Orange County Speedway for 2 or 3 years, then he built a rial to race there blown with an aircraft supercharger. So I learned basic car repair & maintenance stuff from my Dad, and more hot rod & custom stuff from my Uncle Merrill.

Merrill thought I was crazy to pay more for my 73 914-2.0 than I could get a Vette for back then, but both he & Dad liked to ride around with me in it - especially on the twisties!

Sorry - no old pix, as they're back at home in CA in my storage sheds, & I'm on the road in GA.

Heres my moms 2nd car! My parents got married in it.

Got married IN it? Musta been one of those vegas drive through weddings!

left to right: Cooper buick, Ferrari 250GTO, Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa, Chevrolet El Camino tow car

This was my mom's families set of racing cars. Phil Hill raced for my grandpa for several years. This was in front of their 6-car garage, equipped with a gas station, full time mechanic and living quarters above the garage. never got to meet my grandpa or drive the cars, but i have 5 uncles who have tons of stories.

Including one time when Carol Shelby was over for dinner and had to leave and left his prototype gt350 mustang for my oldest uncle to drive around while he was in HIGH SCHOOL. unbelievable.

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I don't have pictures, but both my parents have had some pretty interesting car choices

Dad:

In highschool, he had a '56 Chevy 210 Post that he rebuilt after his family recovered it (it had been stolen and stripped). He also converted it from a three on the tree to a three on the floor (and how it was a PITA). Later on he had a modified Toyota pickup 4x4, then bought the 914 from my mom. When I was growing up, we built our jeep and now he has a '11 Camaro RS/SS convertible.

Mom: In highschool she drove around in a 70 Oldsmobile 442 with the four speed on the floor. She sold that in 73 to buy a new Porsche 914, which she had kept until she sold it to my dad (before they got married). Since then that car has been at their wedding, my birth, and is now mine.

Wow! Unbelievable retirement fund there!!!!

I love that thread.

What I gave my Mother for Mothers Day
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Here's my mom with her 356.
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And my dad (Al Meredith on here) with his VW Beetle.
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Click to view attachmentClick to view attachmentClick to view attachmentI don't think Sagan's kids are members of this site, so I'll help them out by saying that their dad was cooler than they are.
Here's proof with one of his cars.
I'm in Hong Kong for a few weeks, but when I get back home, I'll find a pic of my dad and submit it as well. In 1967 he wanted to buy a 356 cuupe from a fellow Marine pilot going to Nam. My mother said $600 was way too much money for that old car...