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Feb 6 • 37 tweets • 12 min read
A Black History Month salute from #DavesCarIDService to the late great William Andrew "Big Willie" Robinson III. A Vietnam Special Forces veteran, he became the muscle car MLK with his credo "Brotherhood Through Street Racing" and his legendary 1969 Hemi Charger "King Daytona."
*The image is from a ~1970 ad for America Racing Wheels. A massive, imposing, yet gentle bear of man, Big Willie was the closest thing to a real life Fast & Furious character. If you've ever seen "2 Lane Blacktop" that's his King Daytona in the opening credits.
I was blessed to call Big a friend, as was everyone who met him. When he passed in 2012 I had been interviewing him for a never-published Garage Magazine piece. I do have a treasure trove of photos of his life which I will share at some point. RIP to a true American icon.
*BTW the LA Times recently produced a terrific 7 part documentary series about Big Willie and the Brotherhood of Street Racers, trailer here:
Before digging into today's batch of of automotive mysteries, I again remind you: (A) tag your ID requests with #DavesCarIDService, (B) our emphasis is on old family photos, and (C) check your politics at the door.
Let's kick things off with another episode of Toddlers! Perched! Precariously! On cars!

In this instance, it's on the headlight of a 1936 Chrysler, and the rarely seen pre-photo negligent adult daredevil baby balancer.

Dapper Lil' Gary favored formalwear to demonstrate why the family 1955-59 Chevy pickup was called a "stepside." In the bed is a 1964-69 Honda S90.
*addendum: the truck could also be a 1955-59 GMC.
More fashion plates here, with Mom in her striped pedal pushers and Dad in his jaunty chapeau unloading their 1954 Buick Century at Cape Cod. Per the NY license plate, I can conclusively tell you the year is 1956.
Dad again, ~12 years earlier, sans chapeau, in either a Willys MB or Ford GPW Jeep (would have to see detail of the hood or rear panel to determine which).
To complete the triptych, here's Mom & Dad again off to start their own personal Baby Boom in a 1946-48 Mopar (Chrysler, DeSoto, Dodge, or Plymouth) 4 door sedan.
This particular Caddy in Grandpa's long resume was a 1948, but pretty sure here it's dolled it up with 1954-60 Cadillac ribbed sombrero hubcaps (can't tell hubcap year due to photo blur).
Let's take a quick tour of the Johnson Garage up dere in Northern Michigan Yooper country:
1) 1949 Ford
2) 1936 Ford humpback sedan
3) 1953 or 56 Ford F100 shop truck, 1957 Ford Custom 300 sedan behind it, 1956 Plymouth at the pump, 49-51 Ford yonder
*finally in #4, not 100% sure but I believe the tow truck is a 1927ish Dodge Bros roadster pickup. Might get a little chilly in that thing pulling cars out of a ditch when the Upper Peninsula is 30 below.
Yessir, and this specific Kenosha Canoe is a 1965 Rambler Ambassador 990 sedan. Rambler was a model name under Nash until 1957; in 1957, "Nash" was replaced with "Rambler" as manufacturer name; and in 1967 changed again to AMC.

Uncle Roy is likely posing for the ceremonial new car pic with his very handsome 1933 Chevy Master Eagle 2 door sedan. "78" indicates Pottawattamie County IA, so the Council Bluffs story checks out.
Looks like a pretty windy day out there on the Texas plains. Parked behind the gals is Aunt Sally's 1949-50 Pontiac Chieftain 4 door sedan.
Shades of Rear Window with Jimmy Stewart: this neighborhood spy photo features a 1936-38 Mopar (Chrysler Dodge or Plymouth) coupe, need a telephoto lens to nail it down.
Officer Babe patrolled Grand Prairie in a 1953-54 Chevy 210 sedan, hopefully tricked out with Police Special triple carb 235 "Blue Flame"6 that was also used in 1953-4 Corvettes. (ht @ConservativeLA)
Sometimes an ID request can help figure out another ID request. I think this may be the same tow truck model seen earlier in the thread, which I am now inclined to believe is a ~1920 Hupmobile RPU. Still not 100% sure tho.
Hold the phone! A few synapses fired, and I *now* believe it is a circa 1918 Cadillac type 57 pickup. I forgot that Caddy (and Buick) briefly made pickups in the 1910s. In fact the very first tow truck in history was a 1913 Cadillac.
Here's the first ever tow truck, invented by Ernest Holmes of Chattanooga. His towing equipment company lives on today as Miller. If ever in Chattanooga, the International Towing and Recovery Museum is a fun visit.
Little did the local street racers know that sweet demure handbag & white glove Grandma Katie's flower festooned 1955 Chrysler Windsor was packing a fire-breathing Hemi under the hood.
#1 a 1956-57 Corvette w/ custom 53 Chevy grille bar leads, followed by 58-62 'Vette, yonder is an early AC Cobra or pre-cobra AC-Bristol Ace
#2 1956 Studebaker President, 63ish Rambler wagon,63ish Alfa Romeo Giulietta
#3 57 Mercury Montclair aft of VW
*for future reference, I appreciate it if you would split your ID requests into individual tweets by photo.
This blurry image of postwar modern ranch house bliss features what I'm pretty sure is a 1953-54 Chevy 210 2-door hardtop. If so it's fairly rare, most hartops were ordered with the deluxe Bel Air trim package.
*hmmm... upon further consideration I see a door post in there, so now I'm leaning 54 Chrysler sedan.
That there would be a 1913 Hudson Model 37 Touring.
Pops had pretty swank hooptie back then, a 1953 Ford Victoria hardtop.
Wowsers! Almost missed this terrific photo. The two central bikes here are circa 1919 Excelsior series 18 or 19, and are flanked by 2 Harley Davidson Model Js.
Well, ain't that amazing? The hindquarters of the car in this vintage pic from Gary IN belong to a 1938 Oldsmobile sedan, the same car driven by Ralphie's dad in A Chistmas Story, which took place in... Gary IN. Cue Twilight Zone music
a lovely bittersweet photo, given the horrors that would take place in Tulsa's Greenwood neighborhood 10 years later. The Williamses here are in a 1910-11 Cadillac Model 30 touring. (ht @PatrickGillam)
Ooooh mama, the vivacious Dorothy Malone stepping out of a '55 Chevy Bel Air convertible make my ol' wolfy eyeballs go aaa-OOO-gah (ht @hundred_percent)
In the wayyyy overdue ID department, a 1938 Buick Special sedan. If I have inadvertently overlooked your ID request for > 3 weeks, feel free to bump it back up in my mentions.
The local constabulary sure enjoyed shooting the living shit out of this 1957-58 Vauxhall Victor. Yes, these were sold in the US, mostly at Pontiac or Buick dealers.
Amazing! First time I've heard of Willie "Batman" Perry, and I am eager to learn more. And I hope his '71 TBird custom is still around.

'Fraid that's it for today's episode. Until next time, honor the legacy of Big Willie Robinson by promoting peace and brotherhood through horsepower. Happy Motoring!

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Feb 5
A very happy 90th birthday from #DavesCarIDService to IMO the greatest automobile ever birthed: the 1932 Ford, introduced February 9, 1932. Arguably the first muscle car, offering affordable V8 Power For the People. Vive le Deuce!
*Depicted above is a cabriolet, one of 14 available body styles. The Deuce remains arguably the most beloved car of all time, and the platonic ideal of hot rod material. Thanks to steel and fiberglass replicas, there are more 1932 Fords registered today than were made in 1932.
The key component of the Deuce was its powerful flathead V8, which Ford offered up to 1953. Its development was a monumental engineering task, costing $50mm in 1932 cash. The first production flathead is at the Ford Museum. Ford also tested an X8(!) as a possible motor.
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Feb 4
Fuck the Olympics
I am enthusiastically going to miss every goddamn second of them, you corporate totalitarian-fluffers
Don't miss the Xtreme stars going for the Toyota® gold in rad freestyle snowboarding on the Olympic® Games presented by Visa® exclusively on NBC and NBCSN! Download the Peacock® streaming app from Apple® or Google® !
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Feb 2
Breaking news from the Caligula News Network
if I had known CNN was such a nonstop spankin' suckin' fuckfest I might have applied for a job there
I reckon it's tweets like these that explain why my phone isn't ringing off the hook with media job offers
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Feb 2
We should probably hire some better expecters
cnbc.com/2022/02/02/adp…
Nobody expects the Bearish Inquisition!

Our two main weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless unexpectedness Image
The expectation they refer to in the article was from Dow Jones, not the government. Whoever does it, economic forecasting is basically gypsies reading reading chicken entrails dressed up in a Box-Jenkins statistical model tuxedo
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Jan 30
Happy 136th birthday from #DavesCarIDService to the single greatest invention of all time: the car.
*the Benz Patent-Motorwagen, built by Carl Benz in 1885, patented Jan 29, 1886.

There is quibbling about what was the first car, and even the definition of car; self-propelled road vehicles date back to the 18th century, but Benz's patent car is widely accepted as Car Zero.
other contenders for the title: the Cugnot steam wagon (1769), used to tow artillery for the French army, and the Murdock steam carriage (1788), from England. By the 1830s there were a few dozen road steam carriages operating in England and Scotland.
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Jan 29
Today's episode of #DavesCarIDService is brought to you by the all-new 1956 Studebaker Golden Hawk -- the car that's irresistible to clowns!
Despite the restyling of Raymond Loewy's immortal '53 Starlight design and innovative clown ad campaign, by 1956 Studebaker was in an inexorable slide to doom.

Then, somehow, in 1961, their ad men declared MOAR CLOWNS.

Studebaker died in 1963.
*Studebaker's South Bend plant closed in 1963 after making 1964 car models, and a limited run of '65s were made in Canada. Shame, because Studebaker made some quite beautiful cars, like the 1953 Starliner and 1963 Avanti, both by Raymond Loewy Associates.
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