I’m writing this on the fly because right now my head is spinning. I’ve spent the better part of the night chatting with Kevin from Junkyard Digs about cars, travel, and whatever else and for whatever reason, something triggered a memory in my head. The car in the picture is the 1982 Ford Mustang GL that my mother had when I was growing up. This isn’t the car I tried to steal when I was five…that was a Mustang II that belonged to my aunt…but this car was on my brain for years. It was (and probably still is) one of the few cars I could draw well. I knew everything about it, from it’s sport wheel to it’s turbine wheel covers to the strangely-shaped tailpipe at the rear and the burn mark on the bumper from where the 94.3 KILO sticker had resided, right underneath the license plate. I knew that the car got painted some shit brown color in the early 1990s, that the engine was killed in the mid-to-late 1990s when another family member took it on a road trip, and that the car was left for dead somewhere around one of my grandfather’s brother’s properties somewhere in Iowa.
You know, right in Kevin’s backyard.
This isn’t the actual car, but it’s the closest to it I could find on a Google search. Why in the hell would I chase around a lightly optioned basic early four-eye Fox Mustang? To be honest, I’m pretty estranged from that entire side of the family and have been since my grandfather passed on in 2007. What’s the point of hunting down a derelict car that’s been sitting for what might be a quarter-century? History? Maybe. Having something tangible from when I was just a tyke? That would beat the shit out of most of the Hot Wheels I have. Who knows…maybe I’d just take the cast-off parts from the Great Pumpkin Mustang and throw them into the shell of Mom’s old car to put it back on the road, or maybe I just see the car one last time, get some photos, and leave it to rust in peace. I don’t know, but hunting down this forlorn little Fox has turned up family history and stuff I never learned in the whole time I’ve been alive.
*again, not the actual car.
That’s just ONE car out of who knows how many that I’ve had some kind of attachment to. I’m jonesing to learn more about where Mom’s old Mustang got put and if the car still physically exists at all, believe me that I’ll take a trip to go check it out. I’m curious to see where any of this takes me. There’s a very solid chance that the Mustang got smashed into a tin can long ago. There’s an equally solid chance that in some field in BFE, Iowa, there is a notchback Mustang that has the faded remains of a bumper sticker just underneath the license plate. And I’m excited to learn more, whatever the story is.
If it was a Mustang of great value (Shelby, Boss or CJ) then maybe. Otherwise, I would move on.
First thing you’d need to make any progress is the actual VIN number for THAT car. IF you don’t have it already, possibly somebody in your family would have old insurance or registration form with the number on it.
After that, in “some” states you’d either be able to go to the DMV or if you had a friend in law enforcement, they’d be able to search for the VIN to see if it was still registered(still alive basically). From that point you may or may not be able to get the current owners name or address info. Dealing with der fuhrer here in PA, NONE of this is possible without a damn good legal reason. In other words, forget it!
So other than that, unless your car was really special in some way(fancy paint job, well known race car, you carved your initials in the frame rail,etc) and/or you live in a town with 1000 people and it always stayed local I’d say the odds of you finding a run of the mill daily driver just by a bumper sticker or a certain stain on the seat would be slim and none.
About half the time I’ve sold a car, it’s because the shipping on a car-sized burn barrel wasn’t worth it. The others typically weren’t quite that worn out, but were either appliances I didn’t have much attachment to, or were still worn to the point where I’d rather have another one in better shape than the exact same one I’d originally owned.
My late grandmother had a similar ’79 Ford Mustang like the one pictured.
Bryan, the tone of this article tells me you need to make a pilgrimage. Not so much for the car, but to clear out some familial cobwebs possibly lingering due to the mentioned estrangement. So, drive to where you think the car is. If you see it and are fairly certain you won’t be accosted for merely presenting yourself that’s when you decide if you want to pursue any further contact with that part of your family. Pretty much same deal even if you don’t see it. You’ve just gotta get there.