WHEELS
WHEELS: Classics & Collections | 3rd Gear
5/19/2024 | 56m 46sVideo has Closed Captions
Explore the special connection between owners and their vehicles.
Explore the special connection between owners and their vehicles in WHEELS “Classics and Collections” 3rd gear. Producer Timothy H Bakken will highlight a variety of classic vehicles from around Minnesota and showcase the proud owners.
WHEELS is a local public television program presented by Pioneer PBS
This program is made possible by contributions from the voters of Minnesota through a legislative appropriation from the Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and viewers like you.
WHEELS
WHEELS: Classics & Collections | 3rd Gear
5/19/2024 | 56m 46sVideo has Closed Captions
Explore the special connection between owners and their vehicles in WHEELS “Classics and Collections” 3rd gear. Producer Timothy H Bakken will highlight a variety of classic vehicles from around Minnesota and showcase the proud owners.
How to Watch WHEELS
WHEELS is available to stream on pbs.org and the free PBS App, available on iPhone, Apple TV, Android TV, Android smartphones, Amazon Fire TV, Amazon Fire Tablet, Roku, Samsung Smart TV, and Vizio.
(gentle music) (bright music) - [Announcer] "WHEELS: Classics and Collections" is made possible in part by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota and by members of Pioneer PBS, thank you.
(upbeat music) (engine whirring) - My name is Jay Law, and I'm from Andover, Minnesota, and I am the proud owner of a 1957 Buick Century Caballero Estate Wagon.
(upbeat music continues) (gentle music) The Buick Caballero was a four-door hard top station wagon, and they only made 'em in 1957 and 1958.
In '57, they made a little over 10,000 of them.
In '58, I think they made around probably 5,000 of them, and that was it, just those two years, so it is kind of a unique car, I guess.
(gentle music continues) The price of this car brand new in 1957 was just under $4,000, which in 2023 equates to about just under $44,000, which is actually quite a bit of money for even today's cars.
(gentle music continues) Yeah, every day is a nice day for a drive, I guess.
(engine whirring) (energetic music) When I brought this car home from Canada, I drove it for about four years.
The engine was getting a little tired.
The tranny had a few leaks, so I decided to get the engine overhauled and tranny overhauled, and once we had the engine outta the car, I looked at the engine bay, and I said, probably be a good time to maybe repaint that engine bay up a little bit.
To make a long story short, it ended up being a total restoration.
(laughing) But like I said, I don't regret it one bit.
I'm glad I did it.
(energetic music continues) The speedometer on this thing, it's actually a cylinder, and it's black and orange.
As you start driving it, building up speed, that cylinder actually spins so that red mark starts showing up, and the faster you go, the farther that red mark goes on the speedometer, and it's actually pretty accurate.
(energetic music continues) (upbeat music) This car is mainly, I think, it was built for cruising.
It's got the original 364 Nailhead, which put out 300 horsepower, and it's original to the car.
The transmission also, I still have the Dynaflow transmission in it, original to the car.
I've been looking for 25 years specifically for this car.
I've seen seven of them, total of seven of them, and that's including my car.
I don't know how many are around.
I wish I knew, but I haven't seen any, that many, I should say, in 25 years.
Although, I do know of two that are being under construction in the state of Minnesota.
I don't know where they're at as far as how far along they are or what their plans are with them, but I do know of two more that are being rebuilt.
At the front end on these '57 Buicks, they put a lotta chrome on 'em, and there's a lotta weight there, too, but you'll notice they did put the year of the car, 1957.
I think they did that a couple years on the Buicks, but this one's the red, white, and blue emblem, which was characteristic of Buick.
The hood ornament was kinda unique to the Buick also.
(gentle music) In the '57 Buicks, there's a fuel door right here in the middle of the bumper.
This is where you add your gas, and it's pretty easy to get at, so, and you do have to stop several times to get gas with this car.
(chuckling) This '57, there was an option for a third row seat back then, and this actually does have the third row back seat.
It's also got the luggage rack.
That's era-correct there, too.
That's two of the options that it's got.
These travel stickers on the car actually came with the car.
It's been up and down the West Coast.
Many of 'em are from Canada because the car originally came from Canada.
Built in Michigan, but it was sold to a party up in British Columbia, Canada, so that explains a lotta the Canadian stickers.
(gentle music continues) Yeah, I try to take this to as many car shows as I can, and I think one thing that attracts people to it is they've never seen one before, but the only thing I have to do now is tinker with it once in a while, which I really enjoy doing, (laughing) and it's a lot of fun to drive.
(gentle music continues) (upbeat music) (engine roaring) - My name's Jacqueline Hadrath.
I'm from Clitherall, Minnesota.
I own a 1969 GTX.
And this is my daughter, Lorraine Luella Meyer, and she's named after my grandmothers.
Lorraine would've been my mom's mom, and Luella would've been my dad's mom, and so the name has very special meaning, and hopefully, someday she gets Dad's car.
My dad, Roy Hadrath, from Montevideo, was into Mopar and Chrysler quite a bit and really enjoyed fast cars, and the GTX was considered the gentleman's muscle car at that time.
He decided in 1969 that he wanted to order this GTX.
The sticker price on this car here is $4,118, so I believe that probably would've been fairly expensive at that day and age.
And when I've had it appraised, everybody says that it's very rare, and they haven't seen a car like this, that's all original, that hasn't been modified in the engine in any way, that has kept all of its to order characteristics.
(gentle music) My dad was born in 1942 in Montevideo, Minnesota to Lu and Rolly Hadrath, and my family is from the Montevideo area, came over from Germany, and he was named after his uncle, would've been his mom's brother, who was shot down in World War II.
He was a nose gunner in a bomber plane, and he actually survived a death march, escaped from a death march, and that's who my dad was named after.
My grandpa, Rolly, was well-known to the area.
Autobody repair, he could fix anything, and Grandpa was great at everything, and my dad was very close with my grandpa, and they were together all the time doing different things, and my dad learned how to do bodywork and paint and do woodworking and all that.
They actually, Dad and Grandpa made a boat, a little speedboat that matched the car, and Dad painted it to match the car, and he, at that time, had a trailer hitch on this car, and they'd haul up to Minnewaska and go water skiing, one of their favorite pastimes.
But Dad was a gregarious man, could talk to anybody, was always good-natured, very hardworking, and was well-respected in the community.
Unfortunately, mid-2000s, would've been about 2006, 2007, he was diagnosed with colon cancer, and he fought it off.
They did surgery, and they did chemotherapy, and he did well for about five years, and then it came back, and unfortunately, he lost that battle in 2011.
(gentle music continues) When he passed away, the car was handed over to my sister and I, and so this is something that I hold near and dear to my heart.
(upbeat music) So this particular car has the 440.
There was a Hemi also, and a man in Montevideo, Vince Smith, he had the Hemi, and both he and my dad had identical cars, just different engines, and Dad's here is a 440, and it has a four on the floor, a Hurst shifter, and standard transmission.
It has some extras on it.
Looks like he ordered it with the tinted glass and undercoating and that sorta thing.
The vinyl hard top roof.
These did come with a convertible, but Dad ordered the hard top.
He had 'em leave the stripe off.
Something that was real common with this car in that day was to have the stripes on, the big wide stripes going down the hood.
Dad had those left off, thought this looked a little bit classier.
I think he knew at that time that this was gonna be something that he hung onto, and Dad was always very meticulous about everything that he had, and it was no different with this car.
Only 42,000 miles on this right now.
(engine roaring) It's got a lotta snort, and it likes to hum right along, so RPMs will go up pretty, pretty quick.
I think you're running between three and four grand when you're going down highway speed.
(car whirring) (upbeat music) He did have a story that he had a friend with him one day, and they decided to see what the old girl had and put her through the paces, and when he looked over, his friend was white as a ghost and said he could slow down.
(laughing) (car whirring) (uplifting music) I would like to drive it more often during nice months, but special occasions only and only when the weather is really nice.
Make sure that it doesn't see any weather of any kind.
Make sure it stays rust-free and just the way Dad would have liked it kept.
I really wish that Dad and I could've driven it together and had him walk me through how this car is an individual and how it drives and the different things about it.
It's heartwarming, I feel like I'm with Dad.
It still has that same car smell that I remember as a child, and I get to share that with my daughter, Lorraine, and it's fabulous.
(uplifting music continues) He loved going to the Glenwood Car Show, so I thought, what better place to honor Dad than to go to the Waterama Car Show and show off what was so special to him and have my daughter be there with me and it was a great experience.
It was a beautiful day, and it meant a lot.
There was 110 cars there that day.
So I was there for Dad, and so I had a few pictures out in Dad's honor and just showing Dad off, basically, and we got top five, so I was really happy about that, so we did come home with a trophy, and that was really special.
(bright music) (engine whirring) - My name is Jef Fredine.
I'm from Starbuck, Minnesota, and I currently have restored a 1956 Chevrolet two-door sedan.
(bright music continues) Well, I've always been interested in the Tri-Five Chevys.
They were always so high-priced when you would find one, so I kinda backed off on it and waited, and I was at a car show about four years ago in Minneapolis, and I ran into a guy that was selling his '56, and it was a reasonable price.
He was from Hibbing, and it looked like a car that I could work with, so I purchased that from him.
And the story goes on with the restore, and I decided to take and tear it down, find out what I had, and build it back up to something that I wanted it to look like.
Kind of a turquoise, off-color white, which is kind of a traditional 19, you know, 50s color.
Nice looking, but it wasn't me.
I wanted something a little classy.
(gentle music) I think one of the things, I would say, would be maybe different would be the color scheme.
You won't find too many cars that are two-toned with this color and the interior to match it.
I think that's more unique than anything.
I think that's what really drives, I think, people to the car, really, is the color combination.
You know, the only thing that really looks like a '56 is the outside, you know, but I've put custom Dakota Digital gauges in there, power windows.
They didn't have power windows back then.
Tinted glass, smoked glass.
I have five-way power electric seats out of a Cadillac Eldorado, 2001, I put in.
The sound system in it, of course, is a lot different than what they had back in '56.
So the whole inside is modern.
(gentle upbeat music) I had a decision to make on the drivetrain and motor.
It originally came with a six cylinder in it.
We removed the six cylinder and put a small-block Chevy.
You had two options, a six and a 265, but I didn't have access to a 265, so I put a 283 in it.
(gentle upbeat music continues) Well, the special name, I wanted to put a collector plate on there, and so what would you call it?
What was the color of the car?
It's a metallic gold and a metallic brown or root beer, and it's sweet looking, so we just said, well, let's call it brown sugar then.
(gentle upbeat music continues) (engines whirring) (gentle music) A friend of mine, Dave Gunderson, and I got together right after we retired.
We wanted to start up a car show, so we got with the city, and the city said, sure, you can, you know, rent out the park and have your show there.
So we sat down, and it's from scratch and set up a game plan to start a car show.
I'd never done it.
He'd never done it.
We'd just, we took our own personal funds and did all the promotions.
We were able to, I think, the first year, I believe we probably got about 65 or 70 cars, which we thought was pretty good, you know?
And so we've been doing it ever since, and now it's growing.
This is our 10th year.
It's an event that we want the families to come to, you know, and kids, so we give out prizes to the kids, and we give out door prizes, and we have food and refreshments and everything that you need, and the only thing we gotta hope for is a nice day.
(bright music) - My name is Elli Barbosa.
I have a 1924 Cadillac Roadster.
I'm from Beardsley, Minnesota.
Well, actually, my father found it.
It was in a garage in Redondo Beach, California.
He bought the Cadillac and two other cars at one time.
Him and a buddy actually got together, and they purchased them.
My dad fell in love with the Cadillac.
I was away in the military, and so when I'd go home and visit and everything else, we would work on the Cadillac and get it back into the order it is now.
(bright music continues) It took 18 years from when we started to what it is now.
This was an off-frame restoration.
When we found it in Redondo Beach, California, it was a mess.
I mean, wood rotted and everything, so it was taken completely apart, and it was all redone by my father, myself, just homegrown backyard mechanics of tinkering.
15 minutes here, half hour there, spend a day here, and save money for six months to buy a part you needed.
(bright music continues) I classify it as a very rare vintage vehicle.
I researched for pretty near 20 years trying to find another 1924 Cadillac, and I've only found one other around anywhere in the United States or abroad.
Believe it or not, 314 cubic inch engine, V8 aluminum block flathead, but it only carries 31 horsepower, which really surprises everybody, but it's got torque that'll pull you from wherever you need to go.
The unique thing about this vehicle is right here in the front.
If you want to come up, I'll point at it.
This right here is a little air compressor, puts 2 1/2 pounds of air pressure into your fuel tank, pushing your fuel forward.
(bright music continues) It's, again, a Roadster, which means it has a rumble seat.
The top does fold down or removable completely if you'd like.
But usually, when they took 'em off back in the '20s, early '30s, they actually removed the whole thing because the rumble seat, which the Roadsters are known for, was also nicknamed the mother-in-law seat, so you had the husband driving, the wife in the passenger side, and the mother-in-law in the back seat.
So they usually took the top off so Mother-in-law could talk and feel like she was part of the family.
(bright music continues) One question I get from people is about all the pedals and buttons and everything on the floorboard.
So, of course, it's like any vehicle.
You got clutch over here, got your brake.
This one here is your gas pedal.
This is just a footrest.
This one up here, that's the starter button.
Then, of course, your hand brake and your gear shift lever.
This one says fuel, but it's not how much fuel you have.
This is how much fuel pressure we have.
Remember, we talked about the little air pump that puts two pounds of air in the fuel tank, and then it's regulated down to 1 1/2 to two pounds to your carburetor.
Then, we have our speedometer, which is a dial speedometer, rotates in a circle, not like most.
And then, of course, your odometer and tripometer.
(horn honking) (bright music continues) As you know, Cadillac's considered the rich man's car, so when you're coming off your golf course, open your caddy door, put your golf clubs in the trunk, then close it right up.
(gentle music) (engine whirring) I had it on a California freeway doing 55, so country roads out here, it's not bad.
I usually just try to stay, stick around 40 with it, depending on where I'm at.
I'm in no hurry when I'm driving it.
(gentle music continues) I don't get out to a lotta car shows.
I just try to make local ones.
It's a rare vehicle that you probably won't see anywhere else, and if you do, please let me know.
Like I say, I only know of two, and here's one.
- The water pump's (engine whirring) on inside, yeah.
- Right, but the reason, this has two water pumps is this water pump only inserts, and over the last five years, now, I've been taking it to a car show here and there, and it's trying to get people interested in car culture and back into vintage vehicles.
That's what it was built for, was to let other people enjoy a hands-on experience.
(bright music) (engine whirring) (gentle upbeat music) - I'm Kirsta Siems.
I'm from Farwell, Minnesota, and I own a 1982 Volkswagen Vanagon.
I was just scrolling Marketplace one night, and I found it on there.
I've wanted one my whole life, that I can remember, and I messaged this guy on Facebook and went and looked at it later that week and brought it home.
Yeah, I bought it from a guy that owned the Mantrap Lodge up by Park Rapids, Minnesota on Mantrap Lake, and they were just using it as like an advertisement for their lodge.
(gentle upbeat music continues) I've wanted one my whole life as long as I can remember, and it's very eclectic and fun.
I would definitely say it's unique.
It sticks out on the road, definitely.
(energetic music) ♪ Ooh, ooh ♪ ♪ Ooh, ooh ♪ - I get a lotta peace signs and thumbs up, yeah, while I'm driving, lots of smiles.
It's nice, it's a fun vehicle to drive.
(engine whirring) (gentle music) Well, the color alone is very eye-catching, I guess you would say, it's bright.
It's a four-speed, so that's interesting.
You have to push down and forward to get it into reverse, so I'd never experienced that before.
(chuckles) (gentle music continues) You sit directly above them, so it's a little bit different to park and even to drive, yeah.
The oil is right in here.
There's a dipstick.
That took me a minute to find my first time, and then this just opens up, and then, and then, the engine is just right there, and that's all there is to it.
It's a very simple motor.
There's not many bells and whistles to it.
It's a 1.6 liter air-cooled engine.
Yeah, so it doesn't like hills, (laughing) and 55 miles per hour is about where she likes to stay, yeah.
(gentle music continues) I guess, as much as I kinda hate to admit it, I'm like a hippie at heart, maybe you could say, and I guess that's kind of a staple that goes with that, and that's what, I mean, when I was a kid, I always wanted one, listening to Janis Joplin and collecting records that I was just like, I gotta have one.
And they're roomy.
I guess I've always dreamed of, you know, as a kid, going, driving across the country and just living out of your van like, you know, they did in the '60s, so that was kind of my want for one.
(gentle music continues) In the '70s, vans were kind of like a big deal, and I guess that went over to the '80s, too.
They made like Westfalias, Volkswagen did, and those are kinda more of a camper-style van.
Some of them come with like the pop top, and then like with a sleeper, and some of them even have like a little kitchenette and whatnot in them.
(engine whirring) ♪ I feel that you want it all ♪ (energetic music) ♪ You want it ♪ ♪ I know that you want it all ♪ ♪ And I can feel what you got ♪ ♪ I, I, I want it ♪ ♪ I know that you're out of this world ♪ ♪ Whoo, ooh ♪ ♪ Ooh, ooh ♪ (upbeat music) - I am Duane Johnson from Montevideo, Minnesota.
I own a 1965 Dodge Coronet 440 convertible and a 1970 Dodge Coronet Super Bee.
(engine whirring) Two years ago, I hit a deer with a '70 Super Bee in the front end, 60 miles an hour dead center front, and we go to car shows.
That's our entertainment for the summer, so I wasn't gonna go a year or two waiting for the car to be fixed and not be able to go to car shows.
And I got to looking, and I went back into the "Auto Trader," "AutaBuy Magazine," and there was a picture of this one that was about one inch by one inch of this car.
You could barely see the car on there, but I had seen one of these cars about 15 years ago, exactly the same thing, had a 318 and an automatic in it.
Boom, this pops out, and it say it's got a 426 street wedge engine and a four-speed manual transmission in it, and I thought this has gotta be a very rare car.
So I got to looking, I went on the internet and checked on this thing, and as far as I could find, there was only 21 of them made.
I thought if this thing's a real car, came this way from the factory, this is a rare collectible car.
So I called, and the guy said, "Yeah, it's a period-correct 426," and he said, "Mechanically, great shape."
He sent me 81 pictures of the car.
It was at American Classic Cars in Pomona, California.
I couldn't go out there and drive it.
I couldn't look at it other than with the pictures.
I had no idea what I was getting but I bought it because of the price and when I looked up the value in the book, what it was worth, and I thought I'll take a chance on this car.
Had it shipped up here by enclosed trailer.
I was sweating bullets until that thing came off the trailer because I didn't know what I was gonna get.
Everybody, "Oh, boy, oh, you're gonna get burned on that."
Three, four guys told me that.
So anyway, it came off the trailer, and this guy was very happy when it came off the trailer, (laughing) and then when I started driving it, I was even happier.
(engine roaring) (bright music) I thought, well, I gotta get this thing authenticated, make sure it's a real 426 four-speed car 'cause then it's pretty valuable, so I contacted Dave Wise of MMC Detroit who decodes these cars, and he's a consultant for Barrett-Jackson auctions, and I just got the information back about a week ago, and this is a real 426 four-speed car, one of 21 produced, Coronet 440 convertibles.
(bright music continues) (gentle upbeat music) I had a 1970 Dodge Super Bee ordered brand new.
When I got out of vocational school, I got a good-paying job, and I was saying, well, love the Super Bees, so I ordered one new.
I had it for basically about eight, nine months probably.
I got it in December, and I fell asleep on the way home from Willmar one night, and I ran into the back of a semi with it, and very lucky to be here today, be honest with you.
Years went by, I thought, boy, I'd like to have, you know, if I could ever find one, get one back, and it was just a 383 with a four-speed in it, and I thought if I could find one back, you know, I'd like to buy one and just to have it.
Went and bought, again, an "Auto Shopper."
Hadn't bought one in probably 10 years, open it up, and here's this '70 Super Bee 44 Six Pack car, and everybody wanted a 426 Hemi at the time or a 44 Six Pack car, but you couldn't afford 'em.
I paid a little over $5,000 for the car at the time in '97, and I thought, oh, boy, this is, you know, a lotta money to pay for this car.
Well, now, you laugh about it because what they're worth now.
(gentle upbeat music continues) The platform for the Roadrunner and Super Bee was B-bodies.
They consider this a B-body car.
Super Bee, it's a B-body.
It's a super fast car.
Super Bee, that's how the name came about.
I enjoy driving both of them, taking both to car shows, getting the comments from people.
That's what you really go for, is to talk to people, and people like 'em.
That's what you go for.
(bright music) Every car show I've gone to, I'll meet some guy or somebody that I'll sit and talk to for about two hours about a car or something, and they'll talk back about the cars they had, the cars I had, whatever, and every car show, you meet somebody like that.
People I would never have met before if I didn't go to car shows, so you're just expanding, you know, your friendship with other people, and, yeah, it's just great, I think, to go to these car shows.
And everybody respects what everybody else has got, you know what I mean?
And you don't criticize people, you don't, you know, 'cause it's just wonderful to see that people will restore these cars and bring 'em so other people can enjoy 'em.
(bright music continues) And I do drive both of 'em during the week.
You don't wanna let 'em sit, you really don't.
There's nothing like the feeling of that horsepower in a car and, of course, the noise, too.
The noise goes with the horsepower.
It's an experience all on its own.
You won't experience it with any other vehicle.
(bright music continues) (engine whirring) (upbeat music) - My name's Dale Remme from Ghent, Minnesota, and I have a small collection of vehicles to show you.
I have a 1929 Model A Sedan Delivery, a 1941 Dodge WC-12, 1946 Mercury two-door sedan, 1949 Ford F1, and a 1967 Mustang Fastback.
The '67 Mustang was the first one I built after I was buying my toys back, and that was bought down in Guttenberg, Iowa.
It took 10 years to do a full restoration on it.
It was pretty rough when we picked it up, so it took quite a bit of work.
Both rear quarters, fenders, doors, trunk floor, main floor, engine, transmission, everything was gone through, and we brought it back to the original colors.
We kept the original 289 V8 in it.
The original color was Wimbledon White.
When we bought it, it was a dark green, so somebody had tried to make a Bullitt clone or something like that, (upbeat music continues) but we put it back to Wimbledon White with the standard black interior.
That took about 10 years, but I had three little kids at home at the time, so it takes a little longer then.
(door slams) (upbeat music) My dad owned a DX station in Hardwick, Minnesota, and this was the truck he used to go out and do on the farm tire repair 'cause you can get out in the field with it pretty easy.
And that one's been completely restored, right down to the frame so everything works on it again.
After he died, I inherited that truck, but that was originally a military half-ton, so it's four-wheel drive, and we went completely through it.
Still has the flathead six, and the four-speed has been upgraded to a 12-volt system, and we added turn signals, and I couldn't bring myself to paint it olive drab, so it's Dodge truck red.
(upbeat music continues) (engine whirring) So that was the first truck I learned to drive in, that one.
(bright music) My father-in-law bought that new when he got outta the service in 1946.
In the year, sometime in the '60s, he pulled the engine out and put it in one of the trucks on the farm, so it just got pushed back in the grove, and the pieces would fall off.
Like the trim and stuff, they'd just throw it in the back seat.
It was pretty rough when we got it.
And Joette finally got permission to redo it, and that's her car.
I just do the work on that one.
- My mom would take lunch out to the fields with this car, and in the meantime, we would play with it inside and turn on all the buttons and all the knobs and play with the radio, and so when she wanted to take it out, you know, drive it to the fields with lunch, it wouldn't start because we had wore the battery down.
It took about three years work on it before Dale had it done.
(bright music continues) - [Dale] '49 Ford F1, a friend of mine told me about that.
We went and looked at it, and this was a gentleman who was having health issues, and he'd started the project and wasn't gonna finish it.
Price was right, so we just bought that one, and we finished it up, kept the original flathead V8, fitted with a five-speed transmission, so it cruises down the road pretty nice now.
(bright music continues) (upbeat music) Model A, that was sitting in a barn at the edge of town here.
I've lived here since '75.
I didn't even know it was there.
It was pretty rough shape.
It was basically a shell.
Engine was seized, but then that gives you an excuse to put an aftermarket and an engine in it, so we added two more cylinders, so it's got a little V6 in it now.
This is a three liter V6 out of a Taurus SHO built by Yamaha.
Working on the interior right now.
We still have to put the correct wheels and tires on it, but it's getting close.
(upbeat music continues) Do everything in a 22 by 24 garage.
(gentle music) - My name is Steve Andrews from Fergus Falls.
I'm the current caretaker of a 1957 Bentley S. They were made from 1955 to 1959, and there were about 3,500 of them made.
This one has got a little added twist to it because it's left-hand drive, and they only made 172 of those.
It was about $13,000, and the equivalent Cadillac at that time, or a top-line Cadillac at that time, was about $5,000, so it was pricey.
One of the things that got me very interested in British cars is when I was in the service, and I spent three years at Lakenheath in England, and so I would see things like this, and there was a Rolls 20/25 that a major on base had.
It was one of those vehicles that when it went by, you would see it, but you wouldn't hear it.
Yeah, this is pretty much like the quiet that you kind of expect from a Bentley.
Back in the '30s, they were advertised as the silent sports car because they were hot, but they just really made a point of cutting down the noise.
(gentle music continues) But they would say, if you want to be driven by a Rolls, if you want to drive by a Bentley.
(engine whirring) (bright music) Rolls-Royce owned Bentley since 1931, and so they used different marketing techniques and everything over the years, but when it got to this point, 1955, they started doing their own bodies.
That's pretty much the Rolls-Bentley that you associate, and from this angle and from this distance, you can't tell the difference between the two because the only Bentley that you see is on the hubcaps, but when you get to the front, and you can see the grill, the Rolls grill is very angular, and this is smoother.
The interior is walnut.
The outside is walnut, but inset is burled walnut inside, so from the root.
When they did the wood, it was all from the same batch of wood, so everything was gonna match all the way around.
And then, if you lean back in the back seat, look over your shoulder, there's a mirror right there.
And I think it's on the passenger side, there's a cigar lighter.
And then the dash is also walnut, pretty thin veneer, but it is split in the middle and opened up like a book, and so you see the blemish matches, blemishes on both sides, you know?
And the gauges, the speedometer starts from the top and goes around and comes, and for, but it is an inverse, going from zero to 50 to 110, going, looping the opposite way than what you expect.
But the gas gauge has got an interesting twist to it, and there's a button, you punch that button, and it tells you the oil level of the sump.
They had all sorts of neat things.
Another thing that differentiated a Rolls from a Bentley is that on a Bentley, this is the correct paint job, with the Shell Gray, just doing the roof, or the hood and the boot, or the roof and the trunk.
On a Rolls-Royce, the Shell Gray would've continued on the top of the bonnet.
(gentle music) And this is a front-end lubricator.
There's a lever underneath the dash that every 200 miles, I pump it twice, and it lubricates the whole front end.
Windscreen wiper, this is an oil bath air filter, and then it goes into a silencer for the air filter, and then dual carburetors on the other side.
I've had it, this is the third summer, and the last two years, I put about 2,000 miles of summer on it.
On a day like this, you have to be out.
Like I said before, you have a responsibility to take care of it for the next caretaker.
(gentle music continues) ♪ Let's go to my place ♪ (engines whirring) ♪ My baby ♪ (gentle upbeat music) (gentle upbeat music continues) (gentle upbeat music continues) (gentle upbeat music continues) (bright music) (bright music continues) (bright music continues) (upbeat music) - [Announcer] "WHEELS: Classics and Collections" is made possible in part by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota and by members of Pioneer PBS, thank you.
(upbeat music continues)
1956 Chevrolet 2 Door Sedan - Jef Fredine
Video has Closed Captions
Jef Fredine is the owner of a fully restored classic 1956 Chevrolet 2 Door Sedan. (5m 19s)
1957 Bentley “S” - Steve Andrews
Video has Closed Captions
Steve Andrews, from Fergus Falls, MN is the proud caretaker of a 1957 Bentley “S”. (5m 57s)
1957 Buick Century Caballero Estate Wagon - Jay Law
Video has Closed Captions
Jay Law is the owner of a rare classic 1957 Buick Century Caballero Estate Wagon. (7m 9s)
1982 Volkswagen Vanagon - Kirsta Siems
Video has Closed Captions
Kirsta Siems, from Farwell, MN proudly displays her 1982 Volkswagen Vanagon. (5m 36s)
A Collection of Classics in Ghent, MN - Dale Remme
Video has Closed Captions
Dale Remme, from Ghent, MN has restored and preserved a variety of classic vehicles. (7m 9s)
Original 1969 Plymouth GTX - Jacqueline Hadrath
Video has Closed Captions
Jacqueline Hadrath, from Clitheral, MN proudly presents her original 1969 Plymouth GTX. (7m 29s)
Rare Muscle Cars from the Past - Duane Johnson
Video has Closed Captions
Duane Johnson, from Montevideo, MN is the proud owner of two classic muscle cars. (6m 53s)
Very Rare 1924 Cadillac Roadster - Elliott Barbosa
Video has Closed Captions
Elliott Barbosa is the proud owner of a restored 1924 Cadillac Roadster. (6m 28s)
WHEELS: Classics & Collections | 3rd Gear
Explore the special connection between the owners and their vehicles. (20s)
WHEELS is a local public television program presented by Pioneer PBS
This program is made possible by contributions from the voters of Minnesota through a legislative appropriation from the Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and viewers like you.