It was fun to write about the growing trend in collector cars- the “derelict car” treatment , where classic sheet-metal is bolted on to brand new custom Corvette running gear. The approach produces a high-performance, brand-new 1948 Buick convertible or something similar. Very neat concept, and I am thankful that the work is so meticulous […]

Editor’s Note: The pain incurred at the loss of an old friend dulls over time, but there is always something that will bring you up short with sudden regret. It was seventy years ago that the Emperor Of Japan gave up. Our Pal Mac Showers was at Chester Nimitz’s Forward Headquarters at Guam, chief of […]

(USS South Dakota, (BB-57) in war colors as Flagship of the Pacific Fleet Commander, Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz. Official Navy Photo). I was going to write about cars this morning- it is the time of the season when the people with whom I share the mad eccentric passion for the wheels of yesterday are out […]

(GM VP Harley Earl in the forward-leaning Buick Y-Job, a concept car that became a prototype. Photo General Motors). I got a note from an alert reader in New Mexico this morning who asked what the difference was between “concept cars” and “production models.” It was a good question, since the lines blur. The question […]

(1955 Hudson Italia at the Bill Reddig AMC Show at Grissom Aeroplex, Peru, Indiana on 08 August 2015. All photos by Socotra). We got the fever at the car show. We always do, and leave while searching eBay motors for the perfect AMX hot rod, or a curious model Nash or Rambler Ambassador we remember […]

Increasingly, I am looking forward to closing out DC. I have been here a long time, but I think I am feeling that the run is done. I have lived in Big Pink longer than I have lived anywhere in my life (albeit in multiple units) and discussions with my brother in the rented Rav4 […]

We talked about all kinds of crap on the way from Indianapolis over to Circus City for the big car show. It was great to see my brother again, with a lot of water under the bridge and some significant changes in our various relationships and physical conditions. He had run in four of the […]

(A total of 42 cars participated in the Bill Reddig Rally at Grissom Air Park near Peru, IN, on Bill’s birthday yesterday. Photo Mike Socotra). As discerning readers well know, Peru, Indiana, is known as the Circus City. Back in the day, the rails going north and south and east and west all intersect here […]

Sorry if I got you alarmed yesterday. After I wrote about the Chinese weaponizing the personal data they stole on you and me and all my friends and family, it turns out that particular shoe has not dropped yet. A few minutes after mashing the button on my trusty lap-top the word began to spread- […]

What just happened to the Joint Chiefs of Staff ought to make us very nervous. Really nervous. Sorry- the unexpected and untimely death of a peer officer caused a rupture in the carefully crafted Socotra Production Plan, which would have lurched back to the sawn of the modern Iranian Continuing Crisis. Something else happened this […]