Mark only owned the car for about 18 months. But since I was a junior-turning senior, that's all I needed to cement the experiences in my mind. Eventually, he let me borrow it. One time I bent the exhaust pipes by coming out of McDonalds' parking lot too fast (steep decline--not my fault, right?) On another occasion, he maintains I took the car without asking (Huh? Me? Nahhhhhhh)
In the end, I got to drive this baby quite a few times with my good basketball pal, Bob Anglier. For its day (post-oil embargo America), it was quite fast and fun to drive. 400 CID 4bbl. 230 HP. Funky NACA-style hood scoops. 3-speed automatic. Sport steering wheel and console and Rally Gauges. Wooooooooooooommmmm.
To the left: Another shot of this tuff sleeper. One time Mark got out of a bar (we had a lot of those in Wisconsin) and was at a stop light on Greenfield Ave. His reptilian brain took over and he decided to race the guy in the Challenger next to him. Woooooooooommm. Mark hit a pole and damaged the fender, then came home and parked the car quietly. Next day, he showed it to dad and blamed me "Dave must have done it--he had the car the day before!" Well, what did you expect him to do? Tell dad he was drinking and racing??
73
facts about 1973
New TV shows for this year included:
"Kojak", "Police Story", "Barnaby Jones",
and "The Six Million Dollar Man".
Lovin' Every Minute Of It....Loverboy
The man who began Pontiac's transition from stodgy sedan grocery-getters to power, muscle and excitement was Semon E. 'Bunkie' Knudsen. In 1956, he took over as general manager of the Pontiac division and hired men like Pete Estes and John Delorean. Knudsen was the first to recognize that the youth market was starting to be a force in the economy, so he coined the phrase that drove Pontiac's new philosophy:
"You can sell a young man's car to a old man, but you can't sell an old man's car to a young man."
Using this philosophy, Pontiac became the "young and exciting" car company and by the time Knudsen left Pontiac in 1961, he had moved the division from sixth place to third with 373,000 units--right behind Ford and Chevrolet.