Packard

The February 2010 issue of my Hemmings Classic Car Magazine is essentially all Packard.
The one thing my paternal grandfather wanted more than anything else was a Packard motorcar.
He finally managed to get one, about when I was born (1944), although my paternal grandmother resisted.
But only because Packard was marketing down.
They were somewhat poor, so his Packard was used, and also the cheapest model.
It was a sedan (four doors, I think), with a flat-head six-inline engine.
More upscale Packards had an eight-inline engine, and top-of-the-line offered a V12.
I suppose more than anything it was that beautiful skirling waterfall grill (pictured above), but also the red hexagon hubcaps.
My grandfather would take me out into his garage to admire his Packard’s hubcaps.
They were an icon before icons were in fashion.
My grandfather finally gave up on his beloved Packard.
He had to remove the rear seat for his tile-setting business.
It made it rather uncomfortable for long trips.
We little ones had to sit on wooden orange-crates.
He replaced it with a chrome-laden Buick, notable in that it supposedly pumped heat under the front seat.
Here were my sister and I groveling around on the car floor, trying to feel heat pumping under the front seat.
“Feel it? “my grandfather would ask.
“Sure, Pop-pop.” We didn’t feel a thing.
Sadly, Packard declined after WWII.
It was because its iconic grill no longer fit the styling that cars were becoming.
A manifestation of that grill was pasted on a new design, but it was ugly. A beetle-bomb.
And by the ‘50s, Packard was no longer financially strong enough to do what General Motors was doing — a completely new design every couple years.
Its redesign for the 1951 model-year had to last through 1956; altered quite a bit, but essentially the same car.
Packard was unable to do a modern overhead valve V8 engine until years after GM did one.
A while ago I bought a slightly customized three-quarter ton 1979 E250 Ford van.
It had a rear bench seat behind the rear axle, about 10 feet of open space in front of it.
My grandfather would have loved it.
It was like riding in a Packard.
Packard tanked in 1958, after merger with Studebaker, making it moribund, because it had to use Studebaker car lines.

• “My sister” is my sister Betty (Elizabeth). She’s second after me, 63 (I’m the oldest at 65). She lives in Fort Lauderdale, FL, and is married to a guy named Tom.
• “Pop-pop” is my paternal grandfather.