Ken Taylor’s long-gone 1948 Ford coupe

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Ken Taylor enjoys reading CarStory in the Brantford Expositor. Born in 1944, he has fond memories of the car that came into his life when he was 17:

Ken Taylor at 18 leaning against his ’48 Ford coupe in 1962.

“In 1961, I purchased a 1948 Ford coupe that I saw sitting in someone’s yard. I paid $150.00 for it, and since I didn’t have enough money for the insurance or the license, I had to get my dad to tow it all the way home from London south to London north where we lived at 99 Barker St. in London, Ontario.

“Until I saved enough money for the insurance and the license, I gave all the kids in our neighbourhood rides up and down in our backyard.

“As far as I know, there was not another car like it in London all the years that I had it. It was chocolate brown in colour and was partially customized with a shaved rear deck.

A cable inside the car opened the trunk lid.

“It also had dual exhausts with Hollywood mufflers and everyone thought it had a souped up engine because it sounded so cool when you were stopped at a red light. In reality, though, it had the original 239 cubic inch flathead V-8 engine and the fastest I ever had it going was about 70 mph.

“It was my pride and joy and I used to wash and hand wax it continually. It sure shone up nice! “On a trip up to Tobermory, the engine kept cutting out. My dad and I discovered there was dirt in the gas tank and it was clogging the carburetor. To fix the problem, we blew air through the line from the carburetor to the fuel pump, then ran a rubber hose from the fuel pump under the seats and into the trunk to a five-gallon can of gasoline (extremely illegal today). This meant we had to stop for gas more often, but that was easier than cleaning out the gas tank.

“Unfortunately, in my last year of high school, I was unable to stop at a stop street because of severely icy conditions and ran into a Nash Rambler, crushing one of my front fenders.

My dad and I welded another fender onto the frame, but because I didn’t have the money to do a first-rate job, the car never looked the same.

“I sold my coupe for $75 to a friend of mine and I have missed it ever since. My friend later sold it to someone else who wrecked it. The car is gone but the memories live on.”

We want to say thank you to our readers who send in their stories. When a reader’s story is published in CarStory they receive a copy of Bill Sherk’s book “60 Years Behind the Wheel: The Cars We Drove in Canada 1900-1960”. To share your stories or photos e-mail bill@ carstory.com or write Bill Sherk, 33 Oak St. E., P.O. Box 10012, Leamington, ON N8H 2C3.