We often show you cool videos from Petrolicious, but today we’re showing you a cool story from the website because it speaks to everything right and good about the gearhead world. We got tipped off to this story by reader Bob Pomeroy and we’re honored that he thought enough to share it with us because then story is 100% BangShifty perfection. How so? It is the tale of an ancient Willys Jeep that has been in the same family for more than 60 years and the memories/fun it provided that family through the decades. The story is written by Larry Shank, the son of the husband and wife that bought and originally toured around in the Jeep and the guy who serves as its steward now. Shank talks of the trips the family made in it, pulling the small teardrop camper, the modifications that were made over the years like the installation of a Chevy 265ci V8, and the reasons why it means so much to him now, looking back over all of it.
To read the story from Shank’s perspective makes it even better because he was a kid at the time and now as a grown man he can far better appreciate the experiences and lessons learned by spending that time in the desert rumbling around with his mom and dad. The best line in the piece comes from Stack’s mom who said, “You can stretch your eyes out here,” in reference to the wide open expanses of the desert in Arizona, or wherever they were at the time. My own kids have gotten conditioned to hopping into the car and driving for hours to do stuff but it seems like something that is losing favor among the masses. I grew up doing it, so I see nothing weird about just hopping into the car and going off on an adventure (I am writing this from a hotel right now with the kids jumping around like maniacs, in fact!) but I’m in a small minority of my friends that did this as a kid so they don’t think to do it as adults.
My stories of cruising for hours with mom and dad don’t match up to the scope and intensity of Stack’s but they do allow me to completely understand his adult perspective on those childhood memories. Like him, I wouldn’t change the experiences or the results of them on shaping my life for anything. The story, the photos, and the message here are fantastic. Do yourself a favor and click the link below to experience all of it.
What a great story, that couple were real adventurers. I’m jealous I didn’t do that kind-of thing much w/ my own kids. I bet I saw that very Jeep around Glendale/Burbank CA in the seventies, some of those Lockheed guys had real odd stuff.
I kept my parent’s short wheelbase Econoline that went from Alaska to Panama in the seventies when Dad finally wanted rid of it lately, it’s a similar deal to me and should be preserved.
Awesome article.
There’s another Flatty like this in a recent issue of JP Magazine with a similar family heritage history and engine swap, it was an awesome read.
This kind of stuff is how I got into 4x4s in the first place, going camping and hunting with my Dad in his first-gen S10 as a kid. The mini-truck rabbit hole.