What was the coolest car your parents owned?

I wish I could say I came up with this all by myself, but I read a Jalopnik article of the same title and it got me thinking. And then I figured you guys would have some cool answers too. 

So, for my parents. Well, my mother didn't get her license until well after my parents were married and usually just drove some regular commuter car that my father bought. But my father, well, he had some cool stuff. Nothing like a Ram Air IV GTO Judge or a Hemi Car or a Porsche, but still cool.

His first car, which he still owns, was a '67 Ford Galaxie 500 convertible. Blue, with a black top and dark blue interior. Someone had yanked the 289 it came with and put in a 390 at some point, as well as adding the 390 badges. He saw it every day on the school bus on his way to high school and one day it had a For Sale sign and he took out a loan and bought it and drove it for years. It's relatively intact and rust free, but I guess it has some old collision damage lurking and the Ford fullsizes also had frame troubles. He has a lot of the stuff to restore it, other than time. Photo isn't his, but similar. 

He also had a Jeep CJ5 with the 258 and a 4-speed that he bought cheap from an impound auction, repaired it and then drove it all the time. He loved that rig, and talks about getting it airborne off of sand dunes and driving it through the winter and how it would go anywhere. Rust eventually claimed it. It sat out behind the shed with a tree growing through it when I was a kid. He still wants another but the CJ5 market is insane.

Arguably the coolest though, and his only real hot rod, was he bought a '77 Buick Regal 2-door, light metallic blue, with a white Landau top and interior. Then he ripped out the running Buick 350 V8 and installed a 1969 high-compression Oldsmobile 455 and a TH400. Just because. It had something like 2.74:1 gears, and with the Q-Jet would get pretty good mpg, while still being reasonably quick thanks to Oldsmobile bulldozer torque. He remembers getting nearly 20mpg going down to PA. He still talks about the time that he did a burnout with it, and the rear gears generated so much wheel speed he jokes that he thought that the tires wer going to rip off the rims. It did leave divots in the pavement. No clue what happened to that car, but the Olds 455 and TH400 is still in the back shed, which I nearly installed in an '85 LeSabre Limited Estate.

Again, not the exact car, but very similar.

Here's a couple.  My dad also owned a Cooper 500cc Formula three car for hillclimbing, but I can't pictures of it though.

And that's me on dads lap.  By the look of it this was the summer of 69

My folks had a series of garbage cars way back.  Like $50 for a running car they would haul their newborn (me) around in for a few months until it died and they bought another $50 POS to repeat the process.

The only new car my dad ever bought was a 1976 Accord with.......a radio.  Literally no options.  
 

Later he owned a 1988 TurboCoupe in the mid 90's.  That was probably his "coolest" car.

KyAllroad (Jeremy) said:

 

The only new car my dad ever bought was a 1976 Accord with.......a radio.  Literally no options.  
 

Only new car my parents ever owned was my father special-ordered a 1987 Ford Escort with a diesel and a stick shift. Rare beastie, and it got insane fuel mileage. Like, 60+mpg rolling through Ohio.

Parents had a 57 T bird when I was born. Survived my sisters birth a year earlier but I was the straw that broke the camels back.

Few Morris Minor Woody wagons along the way cause traveling sales man and good fuel economy

1971 Datsun 240 Z that ws bought in PR and I got to drive in Canada and Europe and finally sold in Fl

A couple of Mercedes 280s that they hauled back from Europe; one an SL for Mom and  a Coupe for Dad. Sold back to Europe.

Pete

In reply to Adrian_Thompson :

Is that a Jag XJS cabriolet?!

One of the coolest cars my parents have owned has to be this 1959 Porsche 356 Convertible D.  

I may have been a bit blessed, because I also grew up with my parents 1966 911 S, dressed as a Carrera RS, in red.  I don't have a picture of that one to put up.  

I only hope that my kids look back and say that their dad had some cool cars too.  

Dad had a 30's Dodge convertible when he met Mom. Other than that just people movers.

We had two Oldmobile 442s as our only family vehicles.

Dad bought a 1970 Barracuda brand new.  Slant six automatic- the kind you'd never see at a car show nowadays.  

He crashed it- twice- and got rid of it soon after.  Said the engine was too powerful for the car.  Sorry I don't have a picture of it.  

He's driven pickup trucks ever since then.  

If you happen to think that aircooled Volkswagens were cool, we had them all.  Bug, bus, ghia, squareback brand-spanking-new from the VW dealer every couple of years.

NickD said:

In reply to Adrian_Thompson :

Is that a Jag XJS cabriolet?!

Yes, 3.6L AJ6 with a 5 speed.  Also had the TWR body kit on and the god awful US style headlights unfortunately.

No pics, but my dad had a lot of great car stories. He had a big old 60s Ford truck, and one day the parking brake quit working while it was parked on a hill, and it rolled down the hill and smashed some lady's car up but barely even had a dent itself. Another time he went into a junkyard and bought two incomplete Ford trucks, assembled them into one working truck, and drove it out of the junkyard. I seem to remember some shenanigans involving a hood that wouldn't stay down on another car. Probably the coolest one for me though would be the Ford Maverick with a V8. He said one time he did a burnout so good that his brother thought they blew the transmission, because the car didn't move an inch.

As far as during my lifetime, he had a 78 F150 and an older one (69-70 maybe) that I always liked. Oh, but I almost forgot the one that I still miss the most: The 90s fullsize Bronco in metallic blue with white roof. That thing was awesome and I still want to find one like it to restore.

I don't have any pictures on hand, but we had a few 60s mustangs including a 1966 maroon coupe and a 65 white convertible. A 60s imperial. Before marrying my mom, my dad had a 1952 Corvette, paid for with cash. He said the roof was never quite waterproof and one night he left the movies with a date and the top had leaked and the seats were soaked. He traded in after that. :(

Ohhh, this is fun! 

Coolest car my mom ever owned, at least for this group, was either a 1993 Roadmaster Wagon WITHOUT woodgrain, or a 2004 V70 T5. 

Dad... That is a hard one to figure out. Probably be easier to say the lamest car he ever owned, which was either a 1963 Chevy Bel-Air 4 door post sedan, inline 6 and the only option was a heater (was that an option?) or a Tundra. He also had a Plymouth Valiant, but that was a company car. 

His coolest car... That is a really hard one to figure out. I'm going to go with the 1959 Austin Healey 100-6, which beats out the following: 

• 1968 MGB, repainted Hugger Orange
• 1969ish Opel GT
• 1967 Pontiac Firebird Convertible
• 1981 (I think, either 2nd or 3rd gen) Celica
• 1987 Turbo-bird
• 1991 318ic (convertible E30 - still has this)

And that isn't even mentioning the "cool but not real cool" stuff like the Crown Vic, Impala, SAAB, G37, E34, W124, etc.

volvoclearinghouse said:

Dad bought a 1970 Barracuda brand new.  Slant six automatic- the kind you'd never see at a car show nowadays.  

He crashed it- twice- and got rid of it soon after.  Said the engine was too powerful for the car.  Sorry I don't have a picture of it.  

He's driven pickup trucks ever since then.  

LOL, how much power did the slant six have?  It wasn't' too much power, it was too little tire and suspension!

My dad had a red f-body Camaro. Most likely a v6, but I still thought it was cool.

Later on, he had an Eclispe GS-T, I think. That was also pretty cool.

But then he got a Sebring vert and everything went downhill from there.

My father would tell alcohol influenced stories about the cars of his youth, but I have no idea if any of them were true.  While I was growing up, he didn't even have a car until he got a teaching job in 1978 and bought a Datsun F10. I was 8 and besides that being a rather odd car, I have memories of us going to various dealers to shop for cars, one of them being a British Leyland dealer to look at a TR7 and maybe a Spitfire.  Given my father's complete lack of technical aptitude, not buying a LBC was probably a good thing. He drove that F10 from 1978 until sometime in the early 90's.

My mother absolutely did not grow up in a "car" family.  She mentioned she and her older sister had an Opel of some type when they were first learning to drive until my aunt ran it out of oil.  That would have been in the mid-60's. 

So growing up, the coolest car my parents had was probably the '71 Dodge Demon with a slant 6 automatic that was my mother's car from 1972 until 1985.  It was supposed to go to me, but circumstances prevented that from happening.  She still regrets letting it get towed away. My mother has owned a grand total of 5 cars during my lifetime.

My dad had:



My mom had:

No pictures, and they are pretty tame cars but here we go:

1.  1975 Pontiac Ventura  -  it was metalic brown with a straight 6, a three speed and bucket seats.  We took that car to Germany  when my dad was posted there, sold it to a soldier and then bought it back when we moved back to the US.

2.  1983 SAAB 900S - One of the only 2 new cars my parents ever bough.  They got it when me were in Germany  and used it to travel all over.  I learned to drive in that car, 5 speed, and rolled it 3 days before I graduated from High School with two friends in it.  Would have been mine when I went to college.

3.  1988 Olds 98 Touring Sedan - That was the nicest car we had had up to that point, all leather, handled fairly well and the 3800 had torque.

4.  1985 Thunderbird Turbo Coupe - He found it at a little used car lot close to Pittsburg and drove it until the motor blew.  That was the first turbo car I ever drove and have been hooked ever since.  My dad also says that car had one of the best manual transmissions he has ever used.

There was also a 94 SHO in there and at 73 he drives a manual 08 SAAB 9-3 Aero vert.

We never had anything really cool but there was always something interesting in the driveway.

Volvo 544. Loved that car. But dad isn't a car guy. He does have over a hundred motorcycles though.

Mom's highschool(1966-1970) boyfriend had a K Code mustang that she didn't trust him driving! 

She had a long line of Subarus nearer my lifetime but in days prior loved the hand-me-down 3spd+OD Lark Wagon she shared with her brother. She also had a very stereotypical Vega with all the problems. 

Dad had a bunch of cars, I like his first, a '60 Falcon and his last non-pickup an AMC Grand Wagoneer which he had when I was born. 

Coolest though was the 6 weeks my parents were in Australia and they bought a 67 Holden Premier. The only photo of it has a bunch of surfboards strapped to the roof.

Back in the 70s before I was around my parents had a 450SL which was pretty swanky for the mid to late 70s.  My dad later had a then new 91 LS400 when those were the new hotness at the time. Aside from that it has been mostly pedestrian stuff for both of them.  Dad currently has an Accord and Mom has a CX5. 

No pictures...  but in chronological order:

'59 Alfa Romeo Giulietta Spider Veloce

'6X Lotus Elan

'6x Barracuda

'73 Corvette

'85 MR2

'87 Alfa Spider.  All but this one was bought new, as far as I know.

I remember the Giulietta as dad sold it to my uncle and grandfather at one point.  I remember both the Barracuda and Vette riding in them- the vette being the fun one to carry 4....  And I have a scar on my head from crashing my bike into the Barracuda.  And dad got the MR2 just after I got my license, so I've been able to drive that one- which was a blast.

There have been some loosers, too

'5x VW Bug- dad thought it was the worst car ever.

'6x Fiat 850- I don't think we owned that for a year, it was so bad.

'7x Maverick.  yea.

'74 Vega.  Shockingly, we had this car for a LONG time.  Kept it until the rings just wore out the bore after over 100k miles.

All of the rest were decent cars.

Dad had; Lotus Elan, Bugeye Sprite, MGB GT, TR3, Fiat Strada, Ford Capri, Omni GLH, Shelby Charger Turbo, Daytona Shelby Z, Caravan ES Turbo, Audi A4 Avant, NB Miata.