When Did Your Family Go GM?

[RedVee8]

All this discussion on GMs death throes and I receive a little family history information. I wonder if the two can be combined? So here goes, a little light hearted distraction.

When did your family go GM?

I better start I guess!

I had heard from my Dad that his Father (my Grandfather) had a 1936 Chev Coupe. A Sloper, but my Dad got the irrits if i called it that, to him it was a coupe. Anyway, recently my Sister forwarded a scan of a photo showing my grandfather and his 7 sons standing in front of the Chev.
I don't have a date for this photo, but I think it was pre-WW2 & somewhere in country NSW.


Then a contact from up around Coonabarabran forwarded some info from my Grandfathers days as a Teacher at Hillview near Bugaldie (outside of Coona). Some people have written their memories down of this time and place. Anyway, my Grandfather was teacher at this one teacher school from 1926 - 1936 - this person remembers my Grandfathers Oldsmobile! my Dad didn't remember it - at least he never mentioned it - and I can't ask him now.

So I'm claiming 1926 and an Oldsmobile.

[eurohazard]

I was brought home from the hospital when I was born in a 1964 Impala. My mom used to tell me stories about how fast it was. My dad had it souped up pretty good, and he would drag race on the streets of Oakland CA for grocery money. That's as far back as I know for my family (1976).

[jkennedy293]

We had a Chevy Van with a 3-speed column shifter back in the 70's. I think my dad still has it.

[mikmak]

Dads first car was a LC Torana 4 door that he bought cash off the shop floor. The dealer had talked him out of getting the GTR for some reason (perhpas a bit mental for his first wheels). Not sure about his fathers cars. I remember my pa's HQ Station Wagon (ugly burnt orange that matched his boat) + Nans HB Torana (White coupe) and HR Station wagon (2 tone white on blue that we could see through the floor of) but I don' tthink that was brand new. Before that I'm pretty confident that they had a Goggomobile. (not the dart). What a heap, but I suppose any car was a flash car in those days (late 50's) for the common folk.


I'll see if dad can send me some pics of our olde Holdens.

[darndot]

My grandfather owned a model A Ford. He had so many problems that one day it died, and he left it on the hill along side the road. We have drove GM products every since.
I don't know the date, but it been a long time.

[MrCritical]

1981.

My dad was always a Ford man. I was a salesperson at a Chevy-Buick store. We traded for a '79 Electra Limited with 18k miles, like brand new.

He drove it and loved it. After he passed away a few years later, mom traded it for a Camaro.

[johnstarnes]

When I was a kid my Dad had a green 1955 Chevy....I think he had a Chrysler when I was born. His third car was a 1963 Bellair, then a 1968 Nova (which I bought). Then he got badly burned by an Oldsmobile, switched to the ancient Mercury wagon he keeps to haul stuff, has been a Honda man ever since Oldsmobile and GM "service" shafted him big time. He never thought he'd leave GM. We both loved that Nova!

[Dr. Show-Me]

My Dad bought a 1953 Chevy for his first Chevrolet, followed by many more GM over the years.
To me the most "memorable" was a Coral Pink 1959 Kingswood (Estate?) wagon, with tailfins that made it look like the batmobile. They kept it for years, and was the car I first drove (legally.) 3 on the tree, 283, nearly indestructible. My brothers and I beat on it regularly but it just ran on forever. They moved on to Cadillacs after that. So, GM from about 1953.

[JT87]

My dad (born and raised in Italy) first came here in the early 70's, and proceeded to buy an Alfa Romeo. He followed that up with a 74 Pontiac Astre (Vega), and then a '78 GMC truck. Since then, every vehicle has been a GM for my parents. My sister's first new car was an 04 Ion, and she is looking at getting a new Malibu. My first new car was my recently purchased '08 Cobalt SS/TC...

[91 s-10baja]

probably 1973 when my dad bought his first new truck, a chevy short box custom deluxe p/u. But ultimately, in 1986 when we accompanied it w/ a Chev Celebrity, by trading in the Ford Granada Ghia!!

[t-rex]

My Dad's parents were Jews masquerading as Episcopalians. They shied away from Cadillacs because they were too "flashy" and were hardcore Buick folk. They married in 1942 and their first car was a 1936 LaSalle, which Grandpa had bought a few years before. They owned a succession of Buicks from their first one in 1948, and Grandpa drove nothing but Rivieras from 1963 until the early 1980s, except for a period of Cadillac Seville ownership in the mid 1970s. Nanna bought her first Mercedes (a 450SEL) in 1977, after her '76 Electra caught fire, and drove them exclusively until buying her '98 (or maybe '99) Town Car, which she drives today.

My Mom's first car was a red 1962 Buick Skylark coupe, purchased my grandfolks to send her off to college in. She bought a '68 gunmetal grey GTO brand new and was driving it when she began dating Daddy, who was driving the '62 Thunderbird he got for a graduation gift. After they married in 1969, they bought a 1970 Grand Prix, metallic pea green with dark green vinyl top, and sold the troublesome T-bird. The "Good Time Operator" and "Grand Pricks" were sold when we headed off to Cape Town in 1972. Boy the memories I have of those two cars...

When we returned to the 'states in the early '80s, my parents were in fullblown Yuppie mode and drove a succession of Volvos, Audis, and Mercedes Benzes, until Summer 2001, when Mom purchased a new Buick Rendezvous. If GM weren't run by such clueless schmucks, and gave us some proper vehicles, there'd be a Chinese Park Avenue (not necessarily from China!) under their carport as we speak.

My wife drove an '89 Pontiac Tempest after moving to Canada and sold it when she moved to New Orleans to marry a certain dashing young beau! She still misses it, and notes that "Velma" never failed to crank, even on the coldest of Montreal mornings.

[GMCSonoma]

My mother was born into a GM family, my father had Chrysler products until the 60's when he saw the light. Considering they are in their mid 70's...I'd state that was a long time. My paternal grandparents never owned a car....my maternal grandparents did, even owning two, sometimes 3 at a time from WW2 until the early 1980's when my grandmother passed on. They had mostly GM's, with 1 Chrysler product, 2 Packards, a Studebaker, a few Nashes & even a Kissel! Gumpa's last car was a Mercedes Benz...

They've owned all GM's since, with one exception...a German Mercedes Benz...which Mom bought on her own and surprised Dad (he almost had a stroke!)

I've owned AMC, Chrysler, Ford & GM products...nothing else...I think I've owned close to 30 new & used vehicles since I learned to drive in 1983, only 1 was "given" to me by my parents, and that was my 1st car... the rest I purchased...

[mmciau]

Our first GM was a 1947 Buick assembled by Holden at Birkenhead, South Australia

Mike

[Buick61]

Grandma had a 1955 Cadillac Eldorado in purple with hair to match (I'll post the converted 8mm footage one day).

Grandpa had a series of Buicks starting in the mid-1950s.

But my parents didn't have GM cars until my mom got a 1980 Buick Skylark when my older brother was born and my dad got a 1983 Pontiac Firebird shortly after my younger sister was born. The Buick was totalled (replaced by a first year Plymouth Voyager) and the Firebird commited suicide (replaced by an Acura Integra). My dad didn't get another GM car until he had a Corvette ZR-1 in the early 1990s that was sold at auction in 2000. He later bought a used, 2000 Corvette Convertible, but replaced it with an SLK55 AMG after it proved troublesome.

My mom replaced her minivan with a dealer demo 1988 Pontiac Bonneville SSE, which then jettisoned its transmission after 65,000 miles. She replaced it with, in the summer of 1992, a new, leftover 1991 Cadillac DeVille Touring Sedan. That was on its second engine before 75,000 miles on the clock, so that was replaced by a Toyota Celica convertible.

That was the last time they had GM vehicles.

[JoeT]

My family from way back in the day have always been Ford owners. True. It was my Uncle who in the early 70's bucked the trend and got a FJ for a first car.

What got me into the Holden's was a HK Monaro GTS he owned when I was a very young kid. I loved that car, even at that early age. He sold it around '86 because he was getting sick of cutting the rust out of it. A shame I know, but he then got a HZ Wagon with a Statesman front end which he owned for year. I loved that car too. My mum also had a Holden Gemini right through the 80's. You couldn't kill it!

Unfortunately I haven't got any pic's of them, but here's a few interweb examples.