Junkyard Sightings: Dodges, Mercurys, And Pontiacs
Some of my fondest childhood memories are going to the local junkyard with Jesse and our dad. It doesn’t feel like it’s been over three decades since we were climbing into our dad’s Datsun pickup to go see what new treasures had hit the yard. Back then, it wasn’t uncommon to still see ’50s American cars and even some ’70s muscle cars, but those days are long gone. Hopefully, the remaining examples are being rescued rather than crushed, but something older hits the local pick-and-pull junkyard occasionally. I had to make a quick run for a heater control valve for my daily driver, a BMW 525i and was surprised to see a few classics in the yard.
I wouldn’t call these rare or spectacular finds, but in this case, that’s actually for the best. A four-door 1953 Dodge Coronet is an interesting car to see, but it doesn’t have much value, so at least this one can contribute a few parts to keep other examples on the road. Its drivetrain is gone, so perhaps it was a V8 car? The real bummer here is not knowing the story behind it. Was it found in a field or a barn? It looks like several generations of mice called it home, and based on the exterior, it seems likely it was a field find.
Keeping with the four-door theme, this 1973 Mercury Comet is one you rarely see, on or off the road. The Comet had a long history of sharing its underpinnings with one of Ford’s other products. At the time this one was built, it was the Ford Maverick. While not my favorite year for the Comet, seeing this one in the yard made me appreciate the styling. Compared to some of the more modern cars parked around it, it’s a handsome design, especially for a four-door ’70s car. The inline-six in this one wasn’t anything to write home about, but with the optional 302 V8, it would have been reasonably fun. Based on the license plates, it hasn’t been that long since this car was last registered, which leaves me wondering what happened that led it to end up in the yard.
This is the third Pontiac Fiero that I’ve spotted in the past year at this particular junkyard. At first, I thought it was one I had seen here before, but this one has a tan interior rather than grey. Just the other day, I thought maybe I should hunt down a Fiero, but after looking at the inside of this one, I remembered why I haven’t already bought one. I don’t mind the exterior design, and mid-engined cars are a blast to drive, but I can’t get over the interior design and odd seating position. This one appears to have been equipped with a V6 and a manual transmission, so I’m sure it was fun. While it’s sad to see it here, as the body looks solid and straight, its drivetrain is long gone. Hopefully, another Fiero will be cruising around Boise because this one donated its engine.
It had been a little while since my last trip to the salvage yard, so I had forgotten how fun it can be to browse the aisles of cars. I’ve been contemplating buying a different daily driver, so I was able to look at examples of vehicles I’ve been considering to see how they hold up and what seems to be common problems. It also brought back lots of fun memories of cars I’ve owned in the past, as well as some of those great childhood memories. So, if you still have a pick-and-pull junkyard nearby, I recommend making a trip out to have a look!
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Comments
Josh, my friend, you are preaching to the choir. Auto junkyards, or “Recyclers” as they prefer to be called, are dinosaurs. I don’t recall ever going to a junkyard with my old man. He was a carpenter, and had little to do with junkyards. My brother and I pioneered that ourselves. Heck, my 1st car, a 1958 Volvo, was gotten from a junkyard. Cost? $50. We don’t have that today. Vehicles are brought in, dismantled for what might be reused, and shred the rest. Impending legislation and NIMBYs and just lack of application, have all but eliminated the good old junkyard. At one time, a junkyard served a very useful purpose, keeping the old beater on the road. Sorry to say, nobody is going to want a front fender for a ’73 Comet today.
Be all that as it may be, this site caters mainly to memory lane, and anyone reading this surely has countless hours wandering through junkyards. It was a non stop cavalcade of stories, and maybe get a hood ornament for the garage, but I just don’t see that today. I realize my views of the future car hobby seem dismal, but I see such a stark difference in our society today, not much I held dear seems to apply anymore and junkyards are just but one example.
“countless hours wandering through junkyards”. Yup, you hit it right on the nose, Howard. Something not everyone enjoyed. But that’s good, too.
I still love a trip to the ol bone yard. We have two in the Denver area that I still go to. I pay two bucks to get in with my ‘small’ toolbox, throw it in a wheelbarrow and start walking. I can do a search on their website for the kind of car I’m looking for, Thunderbirds (80s and 90s), Lincoln LS, or any old FORDs. I was just there two weeks ago, I got front park lights and the tail lights for a 1996 Thunderbird. Paid about $75. The old cars are few and far between anymore but I have seen some cool junkers. And my wife loves to go with me sometimes. Friday afternoon date. Make her do half the work.
I would too if there were any around. The only one close is the guy in Penrose on Hy.50. They advertise some 50s and 60s, all pretty well baked. A guy in Westcliffe has a “collection” they advertise on FB, and never been to the Rambler Ranch near COS? Absolutely nothing in the South Park region. Stuff like shown above is pretty well picked over, it’s in the junkyard for a reason. It simply is too costly to save. Never used to be that way. A junkyard used to take in many of the cars that are now showing up here. Interest was so low for a ’73 Comet, or a rusty Road Runner, dealers were overstocked with them, and perhaps needing something simple, the car was junked. They picked at it for a while, and this is what’s left.
There were so many neat junkyards in Wisconsin. Many of the owners were a bit odd, one guy near my home in SC Wisconsin had a really big yard, but was really picky on what he’d sell. Only open on Sat. mornings. He had a slew of Packard parts, but those cars were his “babies”. “That was Uncle Louies car”, or several he had a personal interest in and no parts sold. Probably all scrap by now. The only one I know of left is near my brother in Watertown. Jacks Auto Ranch still has many older cars, if Jack is still alive, that is. He was a character. He had a 40s Sterling truck that held his sign I tried to buy for years. His response was, “what’s gonna hold my sign up?”
Littleton U-Pull….!
This takes me back a ways.. I used to go to one back in the last 60s and up to the mid 70s that was a ways north of Denver as I recall. We lived in Commerce City so it was probably up around that area. It was so much fun walking through the cars looking for what I needed and seeing so much cool stuff, and finding a few times for my Beetle and for my ’57 Belvedere. Those were good days.. going to Lakeside Speedway with my dad in my teens and later my own cars and going to the drag races at Erie and Thunder Mountain.
The last time that I went to a local Pull A Part, there was absolutely NOTHING that wasn’t FWD/80’s-90’s and beyond! No V-8 RWD dinosaurs…oh well, it was still relaxing just to walk and look, even if I didn’t score anything usable! One of my favorite “out in the country” yards has been taken over by Coparts! :-)
Going to the local pick a parts has been part of my life’s routine for the past 30 years – less so in the past 10 since I got married :). Yeah, there aren’t nearly as many cool cars as there were just 10 years ago but I still find some interesting bits from time to time. We have about 6 here in the Phoenix area that I hit up pretty regularly. I’ve found some “interesting” things in the junkyards over the years and also picked a lot of parts for other people and make some pretty fair fun $$ too.
My favorite yard is in a more rural area about 100 miles away near my childhood home that has a lot more older vehicles in it.
Here in the central and north eastern parts of Florida, we still have a few large u-pull it yards. There are several around Orlando and the Bithlo area, a great yard off Us92 west of Daytona, and 2yards in Jacksonville one off commonwealth and a very large yard on main st (US17) just north of town but finding 50’s,60’s and 70’s iron is scarce.
Florida was not near as populated in those years and though we don’t have salt roads,our humidity and rain tends to rust steel quickly. I saw a lot of old iron, particularly Edsels, off Route 66 in Texas and Missouri last year.
Certainly I can’t find good doors off a 69 cutlass for $25 a door at the local pick a part in Long Beach like I did in the 80’s. Those days are gone.
Great read by the way!
My wife has only gone to Pick and Pull once with me. I wanted to show her where I want my cremains to be spread- half in “trucks and vans” and the other half in “imports”. She gets it and doesn’t think that it is weird. Some of my happiest times with my dad when I was young was walking through “junk yards” with him, not really looking for anything in particular, but just looking. He taught me a lot about cars that way. Plus, for me, it’s a great place to get away from the world…
I took my youngest daughter to the daytona u-pull it yard when she was maybe 18 to try to find interior parts for her Galant. But during the search, I pointed out several different cars and their significance and like most Florida days, it was dry and dusty. We found no parts for her car but went out to my Silverado where I had a cooler of cold beer from a function the prior evening and we each had a beer and shared stories. I dropped her off with her mom and was told later that she told her mom it was the best day with dad ever.
No functioning “thumbs up”, so here you go. When she is older, your daughter will relish the day spent with you even more. What a good dad.
Back in the 70’s I’d fairly regularly rescue a runner from the “drove into the yard” row. Those were usually $50. I was looking for anything that I could make my daily driver on the cheap or fix up enough to sell for a profit. Back then there were many Chevy Tri-5’s which were already well-rusted and might have needed relatively simple repairs like valve guides or an exhaust. I kept a charged jumper battery in my car so I could start the “wreck” and check for knocks.
I could write a book on the adventures my late friend Al and I had at the junkyard. What a way to spend a Saturday. Sitting in the mostly intact cars and imagining what they were like to drive. Hudsons,Packards,Cadillac, Olds, Pontiac, Buicks. Flatheads, Straight eights, V8s,12s 16s. Prewar, post war, 50s, 60s a few early 70s. Only thing left of that place is the old barn. A part of Americana that’s lost. A lot like old motorcycle shops. Now they are like a department store. The old shops always smelled like a combination of gunk,exhaust.and gasoline.
We lived in a hamlet of 800 in S.Jersey and back in the 60’s they was a yard kind of behind my parents house and I remember a Henry J being in there.
My favorite “find” story happened in Salem, OR, at a Pick a Part… An older German guy had passed away and his wife finally decided to clear out his collection of older Mercedes that were just sitting around on her property. So, 4 0r 5 MB’s arrived at the yard and I had a hay day pulling chrome, dash parts, seats, radios, seat belts, etc. from these 66-72 vintage Fintails, sedans and even from a 68 2 door MB coupe. I was into doing the Ebay thing at the time, and no one else around was paying any attention to the early MB’s…..made a lot of money off those old classics! Unfortunately, before all the good stuff was gone, they were already heading to the crusher!!
In the central Piedmont of NC, there used to be Richard’s Yard off of HWY 49 near Asheboro. It was filled with 30s,40s, 50s, and 60s metal. 25 years ago a buddy of mine and I spent 3-4 hours just walking around loving the old stuff. 2 years ago we went back. It had been sold to an Asian Indian guy who had a 2 rows of very rusted 50s, 60s, and 70s metal in the front but only new stuff behind it and barns of small parts and chrome. Every LKQ or Pull-a-Part here has only late models. In the southwest, mostly Arizona, there are apparently a number of yards with tons of old stuff. If I ever get out there, I’ll try and get to them.
There is a yard north of Atlanta that has hundreds of 40s, 50s, and 60s metal in barns, lean-tos and in the forest. It’s a mess and the guy’s prices are astronomical. The stuff has been there so long that stuff is growing into the metal, and some of it impossible to eliminate should you want the car.
Yes, Eric, been there a couple of times. It’s billed as the “world’s largest old car junkyard.” It’s been a few years since the last time I was there but at that time he had some interesting cars that could be not only parts cars but were candidates for restoration, for example a few decent Packards. There was a film crew there that day taking photos of all of the Edsels.
My first college car was a 1964 Volvo 122 bought from a Michigan junkyard for $150 with God-knows how many miles, a salesman’s car with the plastic still on the back seat. The fenders were mostly rusted away by the door fronts, but I got many thousand miles from it, and learned a ton about how cars worked – and how to fix them. The guy at the yard had an Auburn sedan squirreled away in the barn, his only Won’t-sell car!
In case you have never visited, auto-writer’s Murilee Martin’s Junkyard Finds website is a dream if you love reading about them.
https://www.murileemartin.com/JunkyardGalleryHome.html
Each vehicle isn’t just pictures, there is an article written about every one of them.
A great way to spend hours / days.
No wonder our economy is in poor shape these days. Seems most of the guys who claim to be car guys are driving foreign made cars as daily drivers. I guess I’m out of the loop as I’ve been driving Fords since 1967 when my dad put a down payment on a 1965 Ford Custom 500 289 3 speed with overdrive and a/c for me after I returned from the army. My current is a 2019 Ford Transit Connect XLT. I love this car. I removed the third row seating for more cargo space since I’m a widower living alone and no need for extra seats.
Okay enough said about that. We still have some Auto Recycling yards with older than the 90’s cars here in Houston.
God Bless America
Rambler Ranch is worth the drive to visit. We have been twice. You can easily spend a full day and still not see it all. The salvage yard they have is not part of the regular tour, but we got a walk through a couple of years back before they had an auction of select vehicles. The South Metro has a couple of yards I use. An enjoyable afternoon stroll.
My first vehicle was a 1942 Harley 45 that I bought out of a junkyard for $50. I was 15 and didn’t have a license yet so I parked it in a tall hedge not far from my house, and took it out at night or on the weekend. I never brought it home.
This was in 1959 if you’re wondering.
Oops-1960.
Good job, Josh. Your article generated some great reminiscing!