The Studebaker Avanti - Still ahead of its time.
My mom,my Avanti -
A personal quest
By Tim Sheard
For the Brooklyn Antique Automobile Association
And for Avanti Magazine
When I was a kid my mom took us to the sports car races at Lime Rock and Watkins Glen and
Bridgehampton. She drove a Mini Cooper S type very fast, drag racing Jags and 'Vettes and muscle
cars off the line at red lights. She could double-clutch down to first with the best of them. Sometimes
she’d tear up the Harlem River Drive and blow across the George Washington Bridge flat out on our
way home. She never got a ticket. Maybe it was the legs.
After years of happy motoring, a dishonest mechanic ripped her off, painting her damaged engine
and claiming to have installed a new one. It broke her heart, but she traded the car for a Ford Fiesta,
and later a Honda CRX - the little two-seat sports car with five on the floor. She drove the Honda until
she was in her seven-ties, then switched to a Civic with an automatic so the grandkids could sit in the
back. Not that she slowed down much.
I finally took her car away when she became nearly deaf, half blind, and confused how to find her
way home to the apartment. But she loved it when I’d drive out to Jersey on Saturdays and take her
out in my car, even though it was only a Diamonte.
Last summer on vacation in Michigan, I said to my wife, Mary; “Look, dear, it’s an old Avanti for sale.”
She poked me in the side and asked me to pull over. “just to take a look.” Mary had been talking
about buying me a classic sports car when I turn sixty, two years down the road, but it couldn’t hurt to
just look the car over.
Right?
As soon as I sat in the Avanti, I fell in love with it. Totally blissed out. I drove the vehicle, Mary in
the back, the owner beside me. The car rattled and smoked, fumes filled the back seat, vibration
rode up through the gas pedal, and when I floored it, the car hesitated, then creeped a little faster,
but not much.
Assuming that I hated the beat up, smelly old thing, my wife was shocked when I told her that was
the car for me. Not that car, but an Avanti. After hearing that, Mary suggested that I sell the gaudy
cocktail ring my mom had given her and buy an Avanti. “I hardly wear the ring,” she reminded me.
“And we have two sons, after all; no daughters to inherit it.”
What a woman!
Back home in Brooklyn I went on the Internet and found a friendly, down to earth fellow in Florida
with a 1969 Avanti II for sale. I liked him. Mary liked his wife. I asked the fellow what would he sell
the car for?
He named a price; I told him I’d be happy to pay, and no quibbling. So we sold the ring in
Manhattan, mailed a check to Florida, and hired a trucker. Soon my racing red Avanti II was on the
way from Florida. It would take 5-6 days to arrive.
Rather than tell my mom, I decided to surprise her. Her memory was so bad, she wouldn’t remember
the news the next day, anyway. I would take her for lunch on Saturday to the little diner in town that
she loved, like always. I would act blasé when I opened the door to my sexy red sports car and watch
her face as she realized she wasn’t riding in the Mitsubishi.
The trucker called to say he was in Delaware and would be in Brooklyn late the next day with the
Avanti. I went to bed excited about driving the awesome muscle car.
The next day at work I got the call that every son fears: mom’s home health aide told me in a
trembling voice that my mother had died in her sleep. I’d spoken to her the evening before; she was
having her nightly bourbon and watching the news, like always. She went to bed and never woke up.
Not a bad way to go.
After filling out the paperwork at the funeral home, I went back to Brooklyn to wait for the Avanti. It
arrived at midnight, rolling off the carrier under a cloudy sky. The feeling seated behind the wheel
was bitter-sweet. Turning the key the first time, I heard the roar of the V8, and it was electrifying,
drawing patrons out of the pub across the street. She was a beauty.
I dropped the tranny into first and left a long streak of rubber on the street. Mom would have been
proud
AVANTI Magazine #134 Spring/Summer 2006
A personal quest
By Tim Sheard
For the Brooklyn Antique Automobile Association
And for Avanti Magazine
When I was a kid my mom took us to the sports car races at Lime Rock and Watkins Glen and
Bridgehampton. She drove a Mini Cooper S type very fast, drag racing Jags and 'Vettes and muscle
cars off the line at red lights. She could double-clutch down to first with the best of them. Sometimes
she’d tear up the Harlem River Drive and blow across the George Washington Bridge flat out on our
way home. She never got a ticket. Maybe it was the legs.
After years of happy motoring, a dishonest mechanic ripped her off, painting her damaged engine
and claiming to have installed a new one. It broke her heart, but she traded the car for a Ford Fiesta,
and later a Honda CRX - the little two-seat sports car with five on the floor. She drove the Honda until
she was in her seven-ties, then switched to a Civic with an automatic so the grandkids could sit in the
back. Not that she slowed down much.
I finally took her car away when she became nearly deaf, half blind, and confused how to find her
way home to the apartment. But she loved it when I’d drive out to Jersey on Saturdays and take her
out in my car, even though it was only a Diamonte.
Last summer on vacation in Michigan, I said to my wife, Mary; “Look, dear, it’s an old Avanti for sale.”
She poked me in the side and asked me to pull over. “just to take a look.” Mary had been talking
about buying me a classic sports car when I turn sixty, two years down the road, but it couldn’t hurt to
just look the car over.
Right?
As soon as I sat in the Avanti, I fell in love with it. Totally blissed out. I drove the vehicle, Mary in
the back, the owner beside me. The car rattled and smoked, fumes filled the back seat, vibration
rode up through the gas pedal, and when I floored it, the car hesitated, then creeped a little faster,
but not much.
Assuming that I hated the beat up, smelly old thing, my wife was shocked when I told her that was
the car for me. Not that car, but an Avanti. After hearing that, Mary suggested that I sell the gaudy
cocktail ring my mom had given her and buy an Avanti. “I hardly wear the ring,” she reminded me.
“And we have two sons, after all; no daughters to inherit it.”
What a woman!
Back home in Brooklyn I went on the Internet and found a friendly, down to earth fellow in Florida
with a 1969 Avanti II for sale. I liked him. Mary liked his wife. I asked the fellow what would he sell
the car for?
He named a price; I told him I’d be happy to pay, and no quibbling. So we sold the ring in
Manhattan, mailed a check to Florida, and hired a trucker. Soon my racing red Avanti II was on the
way from Florida. It would take 5-6 days to arrive.
Rather than tell my mom, I decided to surprise her. Her memory was so bad, she wouldn’t remember
the news the next day, anyway. I would take her for lunch on Saturday to the little diner in town that
she loved, like always. I would act blasé when I opened the door to my sexy red sports car and watch
her face as she realized she wasn’t riding in the Mitsubishi.
The trucker called to say he was in Delaware and would be in Brooklyn late the next day with the
Avanti. I went to bed excited about driving the awesome muscle car.
The next day at work I got the call that every son fears: mom’s home health aide told me in a
trembling voice that my mother had died in her sleep. I’d spoken to her the evening before; she was
having her nightly bourbon and watching the news, like always. She went to bed and never woke up.
Not a bad way to go.
After filling out the paperwork at the funeral home, I went back to Brooklyn to wait for the Avanti. It
arrived at midnight, rolling off the carrier under a cloudy sky. The feeling seated behind the wheel
was bitter-sweet. Turning the key the first time, I heard the roar of the V8, and it was electrifying,
drawing patrons out of the pub across the street. She was a beauty.
I dropped the tranny into first and left a long streak of rubber on the street. Mom would have been
proud
AVANTI Magazine #134 Spring/Summer 2006
| My 3,000-mile Avanti odyssey Story and photos by Tim Sheard - AOAI New York member On a crisp September morning I left Brooklyn in Et Tu, my ‘69 Avanti II, for a nine-state book tour promoting my latest crime novel, A Race Against Death. Loaded down with books and brimming with optimism (Ha!), I headed west, cross-ing into the wilds of New Jersey without incident, and bridging the Delaware Water Gap along lovely mountain roads. First stop: Hazelton, Penn., a rural outpost of civilization with its Laurel Mall. At the mall the locals largely ignored me (“See the shoppers come and go, talking of tuna casserole.”) as I sat at a table in the mouth of a Waldenbooks. The bookstore manager had tried to get permission to park Et Tu inside the mall, but was rejected. In the morning I went to the car parked in the hotel lot, only to discover a pooi of oily liquid beneath the left front tire. Pulling the master cylinder cap, I disco the large well was empty! Luckily, the “Altman Ava from the 60’s had a dual cylinder, so I limped dc country road to Dura Motors, a tiny shack hidden b a bakery, with no sign or name on the building. I Dura and Chris got under the car and found a le caliper. “What make caliper they asked. “Uh, Studebaker.” Surprise — nobody in town had Studebaker parts. But Studebaker Iternational had them. They shipped a pair of calipers by UPS overnight. Next morning, I flagged down the UPS driver as he cal barreling down the country road looking for the little shop. In short order my brakes were repaired a I was back on the road. In State College, Penn,, I had no problems, the Avanti scaling the crests of the Pennsylvania mountains with a lusty growl. On to Cleveland and Lakewood, Ohio. After speaking at the library, I set out the next morning in a light rain and dense fog. Lonely farms drifted by; trucks appeared suddenly out of the mist. I noted the am-meter gauge was dropping into the negative zone whenever I used an electrical device. I ran the wipers as infrequently as possible, but the rain wouldn’t let up, and I was afraid I’d get a ticket for not using the headlights. After stopping for gas outside Sandusky, Ohio, the battery was too weak to turn the starter. Don from Ebert’s garage came out and jumped the battery. I followed him to his tiny garage set in the middle of a corn field. Don charged the battery for an hour, then tested the current. He found the battery only drawing 12 volts. “Probably your alternator’s bad,” he said. My alternator was not an original, and it sat on the engine at a strange angle that never looked right. “I used to have a guy rebuilt alternators. He’s been dead a long time, but I think there’s one left out back.” Don came out and blew the dust off an original alternator for a small block Chevy V8. He installed the alternator, but the amp meter still dipped into the negative. Don disconnected, cleaned, sprayed and reconnected all the connections he could find. He put a loose wire to ground on the chance it was a factor. “Okay, start ‘er up,” he said. The meter leaped into the positive zone; the sys-tem was generating plenty of volts. “Don, you’re a genius! What did you do?” “I dunno,” he said with a wry smile. The car was leak-ing water as well, so I added a bottle of Stop Leak and continued west. I motored on to South Bend to visit the Studebaker National Museum and have dinner with Mike and Fran Lenovo at Tippecanoe Place, the former Studebaker mansion. Their wire wheeled Avanti was gorgeous; we had great fun talking about cars and life. The water leak was cured, the electric system charging, and the food quite good. It was on to Chicago, the car running fine and my spir-its renewed. I visited my college professor Abba Lessing from 1966, saw old friends in Chicago, and then headed north for Milwaukee. The ferry boat was not running, so I continued north to Manitowac, where I hooked up with Jason Ford. Jason ha~ a ‘63 R2 he is restoring. In the ferry parking lot I gave him my old original Studebaker steering wheel, the previous owner having added a wooden wheel that is quite hand some. Jason and I talked cars, and then I boarded the ferry for the six-hour trip across Lake Michigan. The weather was fine, the lake calm, the car safely secured in the hold. It was great fun driving out of the hold as night fell on the water. I drove into the flatlands of Michigan. Arriving at Ann Arbor, I found another water leak. Examining the cooling system, I discovered the overflow tank had cracked in the bottom. I pulled the battery, then the tank, which I wrapped in duct tape. As I worked, dozen or more people parked their cars in the lot on their way to work, not a one of them stopping to ask what was wrong or to comment on the classic car. Ann Arbor had changed since I’d lived there in ‘69. It had become a cold town. Heading to Detroit, the tank leaking a bit, I parked across from a mural depicting the motor city and its roots in the car culture (photo below). The Avanti drew smi1e and queries from several people as I waited to give my presentation and sign a few books. It was a relief to be back among car lovers. Continuing east the next day, hugging Lake Erie, I took the route north toward New England. I celebrated my en-try back into New York State, driving mountain country. The mountain grades in Vermont were exhilarating, the car climbing effortlessly, the downhill runs a rush in the narrow twisting roads. By the time I reached Brattleboro, the leaks had ceased, the StopLeak having overflowed into the tank. The elec-tric system was sound, the brakes, solid. Vermonters ap-preciated the car, several gathering to talk wistfully about the cars they had in their youth and let slip away, and younger drivers pining for a muscle car from the golden age. On to Boston, where the car battled hideous traffic, per-plexing road signs and daunting detours (the Big “Dig” having fallen in), But urban battles could not stop me now. I survived the combat, finally leaving for home on a morning of torrential rain. I’d planned to take two days to get to Brooklyn, but I missed my wife — I had been three weeks away — and I wanted to put Et Tu to rest. The Avanti skated down the interstate, tracking like a four-wheel driver, with an occasional fat drop of rain landing on my shoulder. More importantly, the one box of books remaining in the trunk stayed high and dry. I arrived home in early evening just as the rain let up, parked Et TU in its corner spot in the underground ga- I rage, kissed my wife Mary, unpacked, and started making plans for the next book tour. All I have to do is finish another crime novel and find a publisher! This one features a doctor who solves crimes and owns a, guess what, ‘69 Avanti! AVANTI MAGAZINE #137, Winter/Spring 2007 |
Driving out of the Ferry Boat.
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| RECENT PHOTOS |
