Dad gets a Studebaker

Dad recalled walking in the evenings with his brother-in-law back in Aalborg looking at cars in a dealership window and wondering to each other if they would ever be able to afford a car.  Within a year of arriving in Canada he bought his first car.  It was a used Studebaker and of course the guy saw a sucker coming a mile away.  What a clunker.  It was always breaking down on him.

            After acquiring the car he then he had to learn how to drive it!  When he took the test the instructor somehow got him passed on the first try.  A miracle.  Dad was always a careful driver but one day he got stopped by a police officer for a random safety check.  The officer asked for Dad’s driver’s license.  No problem.  Then he asked Dad to put on his emergency brakes.  In those days the emergency brake was a rod that you pulled up from some place on the floor.  Well Dad pulled it so hard that the whole long rod came out.  The officer shook his head and wrote in his little notebook. 

Then he said “put on your headlights.” 

My dad didn’t know what head lights were so he turned on the light above his head.  The officer was looking very skeptical now.  He then asked him to put it in drive.   My dad didn’t think twice, he drove away and the cop let him go.  Another miracle!  I guess it was too much trouble for the officer to chase after the poor immigrant!

After the sad experience with the Studebaker my dad became a General Motors man; all his cars after that were GMs and he was terribly shocked years later when he was speaking to one of our elected MPs who drove a Toyota!  He thought it was terrible that an elected representative of our country would drive a foreign vehicle.  No matter how many hard knocks my dad went through, he was a loyal Canadian!  He loved his GM and he loved the NFL (National Football League).  Living in Ontario he was a loyal Hamilton Tiger Cats fan for years.

Tomorrow I will talk about wrestling!

This isn't our car but it was similar; it was blue I think.