MY MEMORIES

Charles Glenn Petersen

1946 - Terril Years

Cars (continued)

When I started Junior College I was driving to Estherville every day and I got a better car, a 1941 Chevy 2-door sedan. It had a lot of miles on it and needed a valve job. Then I tore up the transmission. That was beyond me so I paid a local mechanic to fix it. I remember as the odometer approached 100,000 miles, a lot of miles for a car in those days, I drove the car around the block a few times so that when I pulled into the driveway it read exactly a one followed by 5 zeros.

The next year my brother and I moved up to a 1947 Ford Coupe with a V8 engine. We thought we had the hottest chick-magnet around, particularly after we lowered the frame, put on dual carburetors and dual exhaust pipes with glass-packed muffler, solid chrome spinner bar hub caps, and had it painted jet black. The transmission was a standard manual 3-speed with the gear shifter on the right side of the steering column. I found an easy way of moving the shifter to the left side of the column. It was a unique feature and allowed you to drive around town with your right arm around your girlfriend and still shift gears with your left hand. It was a cool ride, at least we thought so.