Another interesting 32 story

[deuce_roadster]

My 32 roadster avatar has quite a past that may interest some of you. The car in the late 40s was a hot rod owned by a fellow named Bennie Smith who owned a wrecking yard. In 1949 right before Thanksgiving he loaned the car to a friend who ended up in a tragic accident. The star quarterback of the H.S. football team was killed in the wreck, 3 others were hurt. This upset Bennie so much he parked the car in front of his wrecking yard and would not sell it to anyone. Over the years many tried to purchase it. It sat out in the rain from 1949 to about 1980 at which point a friend of mine purchased the roadster from the estate after Bennie's passing. After a while my friend decided it was beyond his skills to fix. It was one of those "if you ever want to sell it give me a call " deals and I picked it up in 1984. I didn't start working on it for several years but after starting on it got it done in about 6 years. I had to hammer weld about 10" all around the car,replace subrails and floor. I did it old school, butt welds, metal finished inside and out, used a tiny bit of lead here and there. I can say there is NO bondo anywhere on this car but there is some lead.
I uploaded pictures in a public album of the car during the process and the 1949 front page newspaper article from the Aberdeen Daily World of the accident. Click on my avatar and to to my albums for pictures. None of the captions are on the pictures I added and they aren't in the order I uploaded them but the 4 newspaper pages are in reverse order. The rest of the pictures are self evident. The exhaust is all stainless, the headers and intake are Cermachromed. I did all the body/paint/construction work myself. A friend pinstriped it and I paid a guy to do the black and white tuck&roll leather and make the top for the car.
I never drive this car without thinking of both Jerry McClellan and Bennie Smith. There is a member of my Ford club who grew up with Bennie and verified all of this info.

[mfagan]

Great story and fabulous workmanship!!

[deuce_roadster]

mfagen, thanks for your kind words. I know there are lots of good craftsmen on this site.

[Heard]

That is quite a story. Love the car! Nice work!

[neds29]

Very nice. The woodie is neat too! Ned

[kidflash]

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love these finds that have cool histories to go with it

[Brendan]

I bought a motor from a 70 chevy pickup, that the driver was killed in. he ran into a guardrail head on. when I first saw the pickup and every time I was around it I felt weird.
I guess knowing someone died in it. I put the motor in a 65 GMC pickup and it was a good running motor, the best chebby I ever had. I like to think that guy was looking down at me seeing his motor still on the road

[1932 V8]

These stories about our cars are great . This is another great story . We need to keep telling them and make sure they never get lost !!

[sonny]

Several years ago, I purchased a 32bb 1.5 ton dually flatbed, that used to belong to Paul Newman. If you ever heard of the "Hole in the wall gang camp" (Google it) it was one of their farm trucks. I just recently finished a total body off restoration and was able to safely remove one of the decals off of the door and had it laminated.

[FlatheadTed]

Nice Job you have done ,and history story.