Monday, July 30, 2012

Today I have a Zipcar.

PicMonkey Collage_flower_car

And I'm glad it's way smaller than this vehicle. Oh, the two dogs are always there at Bright Auto Upholstery, keeping company with the sidewalk. Gotta love 'em!

I have to tell you that the other day when I was out walking at lunch, and I came across this one, I literally stopped in my tracks. A Cadillac mixed with an El Camino? That's what it made me think. So that night I contacted my buddy Ratty Caddy, in my humble opinion Kind of the Custom Caddy, and asked him if such a thing existed off the assembly line. He got right back with me and said to Google flower car. Huh? Flower car? Oh, I see, as in that which transports funeral flowers. Naturally, I had to look some more on the Internet because I saw the insignia on the vehicle, Cadillac Caribou.

I found a bit, here and there. On a message board: Caribou Motor Company (USA) Cadillac custom Caribou pick-up on DeVille chassis, SSA 1992, p.30. CLC member, Tim Pawl, who is also curator of the CLC's Museum and Research Center, owns a 1974 Caribou, several years ago he contacted company that produced them; their records were supposedly lost in a flood. The person he talked to remembered that about 90-94 were produced in 1974, and perhaps as many as 275-300 total over the period from 1972-1976. Tim says also that another version of the Caribou was produced circa 1980-84. Over the past few years, Tim recalls that a dozen or so of the 1972-1976 versions have shown up on eBay and elsewhere. There was an article about the cars in Motor Trend Magazine circa May or September, 1975. These are very rare cars; their cost, when new, was supposedly $ 20,000 over the base $11,000 Coupe DeVille price or approx. $30,000. Typical ones today [2003-2004] have been going for $12,000 to $20,000.

And here's a link to Flickr image and comments about Caribou Motor Company conversions. The info here is fantastic--turns out Evel Knievel owned  a red one similar to this one and Glen Campbell and Bob Newhart owned ones converted into station wagons!

DSC_0482

Now I'm off to get ready to enjoy my Zipcar. Here it is, on the road the other day with someone else at the wheel. It's the Mazda 3 known as McMinnville!


4 comments:

Lois said...

I've certainly never seen one of those before. What an awesome find!

Paul in Powell River said...

It does look a bit incongruous, doesn't it. Though I do think it has just a bi more style than your Zipcar! Just saying! :)

Anonymous said...

This is a first... flower car... :-)

Randy said...

First time for me too.