My First Car

By Ken Bounds

For the past several months, we have been running a series featuring members’ first cars.  Although we call it My First Car, this one really should be titled “My” “First” “Car”.  It wasn’t totally mine – my dad and I were partners.  It sort of wasn’t my first; I had beaten around in a ’56 Chevy, then a ’57 Chevy.  I don’t even remember if they were titled in my name or my parents.  And it wasn’t a car – it was a 1950 Ford Pickup.  Heck, it wasn’t even a V-8 - it was a Flathead 6.

My dad started working for A&P in Hannibal, MO in 1928 when he was 14 years old.  After a brief vacation as a B-17 turret specialist in England during WW-II, he returned to work.  In 1949 he was promoted to manage the A&P in my hometown, Kirksville, MO.

In 1970, just before my dad was able to retire, A&P abruptly announced that the store was to be closed.  After 21 years in Kirksville, my family had no desire to move to another town, so my dad decided to stay and seek a job with another company.  But he received an interesting offer.  A&P offered to sell him the fixtures in the store for a bargain price.  Since I had the entire summer before starting my senior year and was also out of a job, my dad and Iagreed that we should become partners and make some money selling the fixtures.  We were allowed three months to clear the store.

We needed a truck.  Somewhere in town we spotted a 1950 Ford F-1 Pickup and bought it for $100.  They certainly weren’t collectors’ items then – it was just an old beat-up, well-used truck.  The tires were shot and we knew we would be hauling some very heavy loads, so we went to Montgomery Ward and had a set of 6-ply blackwalls mounted for another $100.

Boy, did we use that truck that summer.  We hauled dozens of loads from delivering classic items such as A&P coffee grinders all the way to hauling scrap metal to sell to the junkyard.  I remember when we hired a local guy to help us load and unload really heavy items.  He would not ride in the truck, but wanted to ride on the running board so he could wave at his buddies and look like a big-shot since he had a job.

We made a lot of money that summer.  We sold the safe, scales, refrigeration units, ceiling fans, and lots more.  Some of the wooden shelving was sold to a tavern that was relocating a couple of doors down from us.  That wood was used to build a bar that is still in use today.

After the project was complete, I was able to buy my dad out on the truck.  That pickup became my mode of transportation during my senior year.  I kept trying to fix things up on it and once bought a ’48 Pickup for parts.  Returning that ’48 to a junkyard is another story and one that scared my poor mother half to death.

I had a lot of fun with that truck and many memories.  One that sticks with me is that I could never get the top off the oil filter canister and was afraid to break something.  So I never changed the filter.  Also, I have no memory of what I may have used off that ’48 parts truck.

After graduation in May 1971, it was time to leave small-town Kirksville and begin my career in the big city.  I bought a brand-new Buick and eventually the truck had to go.  I sold it to my best friend, Richard, for $200.  (Richard is the person who years later told me about the Crestliner for sale in Kirksville which I bought and still have today).  Richard eventually sold the truck to someone else.  I saw it on a trip to Kirksville a few years later - painted yellow; haven’t seen it since.  It was a good old truck.