1965 Dodge Dart

This Dart may win the award of being the oldest daily-driven car around my neck of the woods. I actually saw it just a couple weeks ago, getting its brakes fixed at a repair shop. I imagine it must take a good deal of dedication to keep dailying a 53-year-old car, but I suppose Dart parts are cheap and relatively plentiful, and since it’s probably got a slant-6 under the hood, reliability isn’t likely to be too much of an issue.

For some reason, the ’65 Dart (and specifically the coupe) is still quite a common sight on the streets of Southern California. It’s gotten to the point that I won’t always stop and snap photos of one if I see it on the street, just because I see so many of them. But I had been waiting to catch this one at a standstill for awhile by the time I finally got these pictures. There’s just something about an honest daily-driven classic that appeals to me so much more than a meticulously-restored garage queen.

Santa Monica, CA

Photographed July 2016

1979 Honda Civic CVCC

This is a final-year first-generation Civic, the car that really cemented Honda’s place in the US market. The Civic first came to our shores in 1973, three years after Honda officially entered the market with the N600 and later Z600: both of which were too small to be successful in an American market still saturated with hulking land yachts. The Civic’s success largely stemmed from its fortuitous timing: it arrived just as the 1973 oil crisis began to take foot, prompting an increased demand for smaller, more fuel-efficient cars, both qualities possessed by the new Civic.

Honda’s subsequent climb in sales was quite striking: starting from just 4,195 US sales in 1970, they crested the 100,000 per year mark in 1976 and by the time this Civic came around in 1979, Honda was selling over 350,000 cars in the US per year. And to think it was this little car that started it all.

Atwater Village, Los Angeles, CA

Photographed August 2017

1974 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray

The license-plate frame on this Corvette says it’s a ’74 model, and I’m inclined to believe it, but the rear bumper is definitely from a ’75 [EDIT: it’s actually a ’76-’77 bumper, as pointed out by a helpful commenter] Corvette. 1974 Corvettes were the first year of the urethane-molded rear bumper assembly, but the first year had a split bumper with a visible seam running down the middle (which isn’t visible on this car’s bumper). The presence of rear bumper guards also pegs this as a later model. But the front bumper is definitely from a ’74: otherwise it would have bumper guards of its own. So my best guess is that this is indeed a ’74 Corvette, but one that got rear-ended at some point and reassembled by a less-than-fastidious repairer.

Sawtelle, Los Angeles, CA

Photographed June 2015

1991 Toyota Supra

This is one of just 3,623 1991 Supras sold in the North American market, continuing the downward trend of sales ever since the 3rd generation’s introduction in 1986. For some reason, I always feel like the 3rd-gen Supra is the most forgotten model in the Supra lineage: the 2nd-gen really thrust the Supra into the public eye and made it a desirable commodity, and the 4th-gen is an icon of the ’90s Japanese sports-car era. The 3rd-gen just never seemed to attain the same aura as its surrounding generations.

I guess you could make a case that the 1st-gen Supra was even more forgettable, but it only lasted a few years and was mostly a Celica with an I-6 dropped into the engine bay. The 3rd-gen was the first Supra to be a completely differentiated model from the Celica, and I feel like that gave it the legs to survive in the collective memory of the public far better than it ended up doing. I don’t know, though: maybe it’s just me?

Sawtelle, Los Angeles, CA

Photographed June 2015

1969 Ford Torino

The Torino was introduced for the 1968 model year, as an upmarket series of the Fairlane. This particular Torino, a 1969 model, sports the new-for-’69 351 “Windsor” V8, one of around 8.6 million 351W’s that would eventually be manufactured by the end of production in 1996.

It’s also a great example of my favorite types of finds: old cars that are still being put to good use. It’s not in the greatest shape: there’s a few dings and some misaligned trim and a badly battered roof, but it’s honest in its weather-worn state. While it hasn’t quite aged gracefully, it’s still plugging along almost 50 years after it started, and that’s quite an achievement indeed.

Santa Monica, CA

Photographed February 2012

1961 Ford Ranchero

One of the most tragic byproducts of the evolution in car design has been the elimination of two-tone paintwork from the automotive color palette. Not that this Ranchero is the poster child of two-tone application: cream and light brown render perhaps too much of a resemblance to an oversized vanilla fudge sundae, but still: a massive improvement over a hypothetical solely-cream-colored Ranchero, which would just look like a slab of vanilla popsicle.

Just as two flavors are always better than one; so too are two car colors. Also, California should totally bring black the blue plates from the ’70s and early ’80s like this Ranchero has: they’re much more visually interesting than the drab blue-lettering-on-white-background plate that they haven’t changed since about 1993.

Silver Lake, Los Angeles, CA

Photographed August 2017

1970-73 Volkswagen 1600 Squareback

Looking back through the archives, it seems I hadn’t yet posted a 1600 Squareback. Which is surprising, really, since this is one of no fewer than 8(!) that I’ve shot over the years.

Squarebacks are sort of on that weird frontier of being too common to stop and take a picture of and too old to not stop and take the picture. I also think that outside of California (and maybe the PNW) they’re not nearly as common: I imagine rust has claimed quite a few of them by now. Still, in Los Angeles at least, there are still quite a few rear-engined Volkswagen fans for whom a Beetle will simply not do. Or maybe they just want something a bit more practical.

(Side note: if anybody knows how to narrow these down by year for the ’70-’73 models, please let me know: I have absolutely no clue of any distinguishing features between the years.)

Santa Monica, CA

Photographed August 2017

1984 Volkswagen Jetta

After a brief new-car interlude, we return to our specialty with this Jetta: cars that most people wouldn’t look twice at but ones that are rapidly disappearing from the US’s roads. This is an ’84, the last year of the first-generation Jetta: one of 36,636 sold that year and one of 110,281 first-generation models sold on our shores over five model years. For comparison, the modern-day Jetta has eclipsed that number every year since 2010.

With 110,000 Jettas sold you’d think they would still be relatively common, at least until you realize Chevrolet sold 811,540 Citations in one model year and there are approximately 3 left in the country. Most of these cars have long since been disposed of, and this is one of the very few still left.

Del Rey, Los Angeles, CA

Photographed July 2017

2017 Tesla Model 3

No, we’re not turning into a new-car blog. But our primary focus is rare cars found on the street (or, in this case, in a driveway), and at this point in time the Tesla Model 3 still counts. Why?

Well, it turns out Elon Musk had his sights set a little too high when he predicted back in July that Tesla would be producing 20,000 Model 3s a month by the end of the year. Hampered by “glitches” at Tesla’s Gigafactory and other various manufacturing issues, Tesla’s fourth-quarter production output totaled to just 2,425, which certainly counts as rare in my book. Up until about a week ago, I actually hadn’t seen a single one on the road, but in the days since then, I’ve noticed more and more of them popping up, which culminated in my finally finding one at a standstill.

It remains to be seen whether the Model 3 will follow through on Musk’s grand promises. I imagine they will proliferate in the coming months, but to what extent? This is the biggest challenge Tesla has ever faced, and it’s not entirely certain that they will make it through in one piece. Only time can tell.

Glendale, CA

Photographed December 2017

1964 Rambler Classic 550

I just realized that even though this blog is called “Roadside Rambler,” we had not, until now, featured an actual Rambler in any of our posts. So, to assuage any concerns of false advertising, the oversight has been remedied in the form of this car.

This particular Rambler is a base-model 550, equipped with AMC’s 232 cubic inch straight-six engine, the second year for an engine that lasted until 1979. Its parent family of engines is one of the more well-regarded designs in motoring history: introduced in 1964 in the Rambler American, it continued on until 2006 and included one of the most iconic American motors of all-time, the Jeep 4.0L straight-six. This particular example is finished in the lovely shade of Woodside Green.

But one of the most interesting parts of this car is its scandal-ridden salmon license plate. The situation went like this: Oregonians who spent an extra $30 (initially, plus every two years to renew the plate) were assured that this money was being used to fund salmon conservancy efforts: a worthy cause. However, in a shocking example of a severe public funds misappropriation, half of the money raised was actually being funneled to the Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board, paying for, among other things, staff salaries and a website improvement project. The total misallocated funds ranged into the millions of dollars, prompting an understandable scandal and a hasty vote by the Oregon legislature to fix the issue.

Lesson learned: always double-check where your money is actually going.

Portland, OR

Photographed August 2011