More classic cars from the Antique Automobile Club of America, who were showing off their golden oldie vehicles at the Sonoma County Harvest Fair in Santa Rosa last weekend. I had some nice chat with some of the car owners, who were all very excited about these cars, as was I. I’ve said it before, you think of America, you think of cars like this, big and swanky, not the beige Toyotas that everyone here drives (including us). These aren’t simply ‘cars’, they are Automobiles. It’s worth saying all those extra syllables. I even recognize the sparkling whitewall tyres (thank you ‘Cars’, or rather thank you my three-year-old-son). The blue automobile above is a 1955 Ford Fairline Sunliner, ah 1955, I remember it well from Back to the Future. (Actually I saw an actual DeLorean a couple of months ago, on the Freeway, I’ve never seen a real one before! It was heavy) While sketching, someone did ask me why I chose to draw this one, and not, for example, the more interesting looking car next to it (a green Kaiser Dragon). This one, he said, was one of the less interesting of the cars on display. I told him, well it’s pretty interesting to me, but mostly it’s because I could see ll of it; the Dragon was partly hidden by a display board (and by this car). I tell you what I found interesting, there is only one wing mirror, on the driver’s side.  

This however was the car that everyone seemed to rave about, and it’s easy to see why. The big, powerful red 1936 Cord is like something out of a retro sci-fi fantasy, less of a car than a comic book come alive. Those metal pipes coming from the side make me suspect that this is in fact a Time Machine, what Doc Brown would have made if he had a better budget. How could I resist? I must admit, I’d never heard of Cord automobiles before. This looks like a Cord 812, though I may be wrong. As someone who usually can’t tell one car from the other (having been stuck in car parks full of beige Toyotas looking for a beige Toyota), I love the variety in design of the old cars. They don’t make ’em like they used to (but we probably get better mileage nowadays).