My Favorite Ride: Studebaker, Mercury Colony Park wagons a reminder of days gone by

Please excuse the poor quality of the photos that appear with this week’s column. I took the pictures from a grainy video of family home movies from the 1960s, so the images are quite blurry. And dear to my heart.

My Uncle Eric spent weeks this past winter piecing together fragments of footage from mostly unlabeled rolls of Super 8 film he’s kept stored in boxes that moved around the country with him over the years.

Now retired, he had time to open the boxes. The video he produced featuring our family members from 1958 through the mid-1960s is a treasure. The hairdos! The beautiful sheath dresses! Everyone is drinking and smoking! So much dancing — my Granny doing the twist!

And the cars — nearly all station wagons. Except for Uncle E’s navy-with-white-trim 1957 Chevy, which shows up in the background parked in the driveway.

The footage featured several scenes of relatives driving away after family gatherings at Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter. Kids and adults pile into the station wagons, which were filmed as they disappear into the distance. Everyone waves. I’m the little girl with long brown hair in the way-back seat.

Can anyone identify the two wagons in my family photos? The white one is a Ford, and the darker one a Pontiac — I think. Years of manufacture unknown.

Watching this family movie got me thinking about station wagons, the primary mode of transportation back then for families with more than a few kids to haul around. You don’t see many on the road these days. Blame the 1980s advent of the minivan for that.

I’ve owned a few minivans. But my first car was a blue 1968 Pontiac Catalina station wagon, so I’m partial to that style of travel. With so much room, my friends always wanted me to drive. We'd pool our dollars for gas money and off we went.

More wagon memories: Family lore about a 1949 Ford Woodie station wagon in the desert

Enough about me. This column is mostly about Andy Kluender’s station wagon memories. He couldn’t find any pictures of this family station wagons of yore, then dug up one circa 1970 of his father's Studebaker wagon.

Kluender's first car was a Mercury station wagon.

“Most station wagons were pretty well worn out by the time they were traded or sold, which means they were affordable first cars,” the Bedford man explained. “Mine was a 1966 Mercury Colony Park complete with a chrome roof rack and simulated wood grain paneling on the side. I brought it home in 1979 for $100.”

It was just the right car for him. “One of my first jobs was delivering Sunday newspapers to rural customers. Truth be told, most of the money I earned went straight into the gas tank as the 390-cubic-inch V8 could only squeeze 12 to 15 miles out of a gallon of gas.”

Two years later he sold the car. “I discovered that the frame rails over both rear wheels were mostly rusted out. The guy that bought it wanted a big old car for a demolition derby.”

Kluender couldn’t muster the courage to attend the event. “I'm sure the old girl folded like an accordion after the first rear-end hit.”

Like me, Kluender grew up taking family vacations in a station wagon. “Without air conditioning, my dad preferred to drive at night because it was cooler. He would fold down the rear seat, make a bed for us kids and wouldn't have to hear, ‘Are we there yet?’

“I remember waking up during the night and seeing my dad's face in profile, backlit by the dash lights as we hurtled down the interstate. I had no idea where we were going, but I knew we were making good time.”

Two childhood station wagons stand out in his memories: a 1966 Studebaker Wagonaire and a 1969 Volkswagen Squareback.

Likely long gone and rusted away, those wagons would be highly valued today. Even my ’68 Pontiac would be worth something.

“Station wagons are now bringing big bucks in the collector car market,” Kluender said, “since so many of us have great memories of them and so few survived.”

Have a story to tell about a car or truck? Contact My Favorite Ride reporter Laura Lane at llane@heraldt.com or 812-318-5967.

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: Wagon memories: Pontiac Catalina Studebaker Wagonaire Mercury Colony Park