(The District Boundary Stones. I have a great deal of admiration for the people who hacked out the forty miles of underbrush to place them. 36 are still in the ground, and I am short of visiting only one of them). Shortly after my life took a dramatic new course in 2001, I started a […]

“For what it’s worth, and to add to the Beetle conversation, Dad (RADM Mac Showers) owned two of them. The first was a black 1961 model affectionately known as “The Raisin.” It had a cool accordion-style cloth sun-roof which nearly took up the entire roof of the car. Was much like an old camera bellows. […]

I had intended to tell you yesterday about the Spring Break of 1969, and the road trip in the red 1968 VeeDub to Fort Lauderdale, FL. Unfortunately, we got lost in the sagas of the sister to the famed Beetle, the Karmann Ghia. We never got around to talking about any of the other German […]

I looked over at Old Jim who was camped at the apex of the Amen Corner at Willow. The doors were wide open and the air conditioner- a perennial problem at the AC- was turned off. I said that the saga of the muscle cars had been fun, but it was important to move on […]

(1969 SC/Rambler in ‘A-scheme’ paint photographed at the beach in Kenosha, Wisconsin. I almost bought it yesterday and was saved only buy an important phone call at the end of the auction). I apologize for this- I had, as a general concept, considered limiting this narrative to cars and people I actually knew, or were […]

OK- so I am back up North, uncertain what the week will bring beyond the cold front blowing throw, cleaning out the sultry humidity and bringing the moment of unseasonably comfortable temperatures to Baghdad by the Potomac. It was a good technical drive in the Panzer- a solid road car that is peppy enough in […]

Thus has it always been for the Car People of the vast Heartland of America: big engines stuffed into little cars. After a recent over-indulgence on high-test muscle cars, a pal up in Alaska wrote to remind me that big engines are not the sole province of snotty suburban kids with connections to the auto […]

(Exterior of the Hazel River Inn, East Davis Street, Culpeper, VA. It is the oldest commercial structure remaining in town, dating to Colonial times. The small windows to the left are the natural illumination to The Rathskeller, and was once a Civil War jail for North and South.) I am at the farm. I had […]

“General Motors’ money-losing European unit, Opel, will halt sales of the Detroit-built Opel [or Vauxhall in the UK] Ampera because of disappointing results.” “After the eventual run-out of the current generation of Ampera, we’ll introduce a successor product in the electric vehicle segment. Our next electric vehicles will be part of our massive product offensive […]

(Maybe my favorite fins of all time on the 1959 Caddie El Dorado with space-alien brake lights. Nothing says “America will land on the Moon!” better than these). Detroit’s infatuation with the tailfin is directly attributable to the War. I don’t have to get any more detailed than this- Dad did two renderings of possible […]