1950 Chevrolet Impala Coupe

    My brother and I went to the Summer Nationals in Pomona, California in 1960 and one of the great cars I spotted at the drag strip was a 1940 Ford Sedan Delivery that was painted 'orange.' This was not a factory color at this time, but it was my favorite. I decided then and there I would have a car that I could paint this color.
   This is the car I owned from 1961 thru 1962 and truly loved it. When I bought it there was a metal sun visor over the windshield and the car was two-tone green, a lighter pea green on bottom with a dark green top. I was still in high school and working nights at A&P Food Store to generate gas money. The car was purchased new by a cashier at a different A&P Store and when I bought it from her the speedometer showed only 34-thousand miles on it. The original 216 cubic inch straight six-cylinder engine got me through the first year, but then my brother helped me install a 283 cubic inch V8 engine. Custom made exhaust headers were the only modification to the engine besides a Holley carburetor. We also used the transmission out of the same car the engine came from, but I installed a floor shift unit instead of the column shifter. My father was never confused with anyone knowing anything about cars, but for Christmas in 1961 he took my 'Nifty Fifty' and had the entire interior redone in black Naugahyde. 

   The seats, door panels, headliner, and package tray were all re-done to make it one of a kind.... Or so I thought. One night while cruising North Dallas I spotted another orange '50 Chevy sitting at the Pizza King on Greenville Avenue. He waved me over and we sat and talked cars for a while. His '50 sedan was painted Gulf Orange as in the service stations, while mine was Omaha Orange, the same color the City of Dallas painted its utility vehicles. Most of my friends would refer to my car as the '50 Impala, even though Chevrolet didn't debut the Impala logo until 1958. While rummaging through wrecking yards on a regular basis, I discovered the written script  'Impala' on the dash of a burned out hulk. I pried it off and had it re-chromed before mounting it on the glove box door of my Fifty.

    My '50 was a business coupe from the factory and came without a backseat. Before the upholstery job I found a backseat and installed it over a weekend. The coupe was not one of my fastest cars, but with the V8 and light-weight body it was pretty quick for a car driven on the streets regularly. The time period of mid 1950's through the mid 1960's was a time I consider special. For those that missed out on this era, you missed some great times. It was an every night occasion to pull into the local Dairy Queen and find it filled with 409 Chevys,.. 426 Hemi Cudas...and 427 Ford Fairlanes. Of course there were always guys like me with an older car that had been stroked back to life. It was a super time and I am glad I got to take part in it..