The topic we were asked to write on today was cars, and for me, that is highly appropriate as I am a car guy. In the sixty-seven years I have been driving, I have owned thirty-one cars and trucks. So it wouldn’t surprise me a bit if I crawled through my past expenses and found that my most significant expenditure after my houses were my vehicles with their upkeep and maintenance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I had a lot of fun reminiscing along with my wife and listing all that I have owned. I clearly have not been a strict made in the USA person as I bought an almost even split between foreign and domestic vehicles, with fifteen being domestic and sixteen foreign.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It seems I am not a stickler on buying only new cars as although seventeen I have bought were new, I have bought thirteen of them used. And I also apparently don’t have a firm viewpoint about choosing four-door over two-door vehicles as fourteen of my vehicles were four-door and sixteen two-door.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As I reviewed the list, it is clear I am also not hung up in type as I have owned seven sports cars, of which five were convertibles. In addition, I’ve owned three station wagons, five SUVs, two pickup trucks, a Volkswagen camper, and a Studebaker Avanti show car. The only thing missing is an electric vehicle, and I plan to remedy that soon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Of all the cars I have owned, only four were disappointing. The first two were the Renaults I bought after leaving the Marine Corps, as their three-speed manual transmissions and small engines really sucked when driving in the hills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The third was the 1976 Plymouth Volare station wagon I bought new based on MotorTrend Magazine’s recommendation. What a piece of crap! There were almost thirty items on our list that we brought to the dealer that wasn’t working correctly, and at the end of the three-year warranty period, nine had never been fixed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The last pile of junk was the 1995 fully loaded Ford Explorer that we bought when we moved from Florida to Colorado. Unfortunately, its six-cylinder engine was so underpowered that we rarely got out of the truck lane when driving over mountain passes. Also, if you were in four-wheel drive with the steering wheel turned off-center when backing up, you ripped the front CV joint boots, which became rather expensive to replace after the warranty period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, which cars were my favorite? Clearly, I enjoyed my sportscars, especially the two Porches I owned, the 1970 914-6 and my 1988 944 Turbo. And, although it is not a sportscar, I enjoyed my 2001 Jeep CJ 5 a lot. Also, I must not forget my gold 1963 Studebaker Avanti that I restored and showed successfully in many local and national car events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My family’s favorite would undoubtedly be the 1971 Volkwagen Pop-Top Camper. For seven years, whether we were living in Houston or later Lighthouse Point, Florida, we made a two-week family vacation sojourn to Colorado every summer. We would first head to Aurora, Colorado, where my wife’s parents lived for a few days of altitude acclimation, then up to Longs Peak Campground in Rocky Mountain National Park for a week of camping.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you ask my two children what they most fondly remember while growing up, it surely would be those camping trips.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As I look back, I wish I had kept a few cars I owned as their current value has skyrocketed. For example, my used 1954 MG TF, which cost me $2200 in 1957, is now worth $19,000. My 1974 Porsche 914-6, which I bought used in 1978 for $2500, is now worth almost $80,000, and that gorgeous 1963 Studebaker Avanti I purchased used in 1977 for $6500 would now bring at least $60,000 at auction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And less I forget, that 1957 Supercharged Thunderbird I bought in 1959 for $3100 as I was about to enter Annapolis would now go at auction for the staggering amount of about $90,000.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As to where I got $3100 to buy a car while in the Marine Corps and only making $128\/month, that is a totally different story, maybe not suited for mixed company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, what’s next? I am sure at least one electric vehicle is in my future, but maybe no more cars and just UBER after that.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The topic we were asked to write on today was cars, and for me, that is highly appropriate as I am a car guy. In the sixty-seven years I have been driving, I have owned thirty-one cars and trucks. So it wouldn’t surprise me a … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":154817921,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paPDdH-sX","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1238,"url":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/?p=1238","url_meta":{"origin":1795,"position":0},"title":"SAVE TREES WITH YOUR CAR","author":"Elliot Actor","date":"1 Feb 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"Until the last few years, almost all of my writings were business or technical in nature. With this essay, it seems I have reverted back to my original form. I apologize for that, but like the old story about the scorpion and the turtle crossing the river, I couldn't help\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Published Novels"","block_context":{"text":"Published Novels","link":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/?cat=12997216"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":392,"url":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/?p=392","url_meta":{"origin":1795,"position":1},"title":"Retiring From Florida to Colorado","author":"Elliot Actor","date":"19 Oct 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"My first exposure to Colorado was back in 1967 when my wife\u2019s parents moved from Sacramento to Aurora, Colorado. Her father had just retired from the Air Force and was starting a new job as a navigator with United Airlines. At that time, my wife and I and our two\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Published Novels"","block_context":{"text":"Published Novels","link":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/?cat=12997216"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3740,"url":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/?p=3740","url_meta":{"origin":1795,"position":2},"title":"KOLA HELL","author":"Elliot Actor","date":"21 Aug 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Michael and Cynthia Atkinson are successful attorneys who have worked at the law firm Maxwell and Peet in Boston, MA, for over twenty years. Michael is a corporate attorney specializing in contracts and torts, while Cynthia is a tax attorney. They met at an office party soon after joining the\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/elliotactor-author.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/image.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/elliotactor-author.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/image.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/elliotactor-author.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/image.png?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/elliotactor-author.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/image.png?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/elliotactor-author.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/image.png?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":3158,"url":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/?p=3158","url_meta":{"origin":1795,"position":3},"title":"Grocery Store Hell","author":"Elliot Actor","date":"26 Jul 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"Most of us have heard about Dante\u2019s nine levels of Hell, but I have just found an even more perfidious tenth level, supermarket grocery shopping. Come on, grocery shopping? What is wrong with that? Most women probably do it almost every week, and they usually only complain about the ever-increasing\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1118,"url":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/?p=1118","url_meta":{"origin":1795,"position":4},"title":"My Scariest Moment","author":"Elliot Actor","date":"12 Nov 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"With my earlier years spent in the Marine Corps, you would think that the experiences I had then would be among my scariest, and you would be right. There were a few times I thought I was going to die, but maybe because I was so young and had so\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Published Novels"","block_context":{"text":"Published Novels","link":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/?cat=12997216"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":627,"url":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/?p=627","url_meta":{"origin":1795,"position":5},"title":"My Eulogy","author":"Elliot Actor","date":"12 Jul 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"One of the things that I have noticed as I have gotten older, especially now that I am dealing with cancer, is that I always look at the obituaries in the newspaper for someone deceased I might have known and their age. Although fortunately, there have been few names of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Published Novels"","block_context":{"text":"Published Novels","link":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/?cat=12997216"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/154817921"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1795"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1795\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3164,"href":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1795\/revisions\/3164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elliotactor-author.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}