Forever Cars, Part 5

By Dave Molter

My first car was a 1951 Cadillac hearse. No, I am not descended from a long line of undertakers, nor am I particularly morbid. But there is a story behind my purchase. In 1967 I was 18 years old and newly graduated from high school. I was also in a rock band, and it was by no means cool to show up at gig in my father's 1965 Rambler American. One of my friends hauled around his band's equipment in a 1956 Cadillac hearse, and it was love at first sight. I found my ride in a vacant lot behind our singer's apartment. Unfortunately, I never took pictures of my hearse, but it was pretty much the same as the one pictured here, with one big – and, to an 18-year-old, great – difference. The guy I bought it from had a venetian blind repair company, and he had stencilled above the windshield, in huge, white block letters, “THIS DRIVER IS BLIND MAN.”

I paid $35 for what many people called my "deathmobile." Because hearses don't drive very far, it had only 15,000 original miles. It was an eight-cylinder with a three-speed stick on the column. Black leather interior with red leather headliner in the cab, red velvet in the back with rollers for a coffin. I loved the toothy metallic grin of its grille.

My one venture into morbidity – it was unintentional – took place when I parked across from my high school to pick up my girlfriend, who was two years younger than I. I was happily sitting behind the wheel minding my own business when a man dressed in a suit appeared at the driver's side window.
“Perhaps you think this is amusing, but I don't,” he said. “I own this business,” he added, gesturing toward the sidewalk.
I realized that I had parked in front of the funeral home catty corner to the school. I drove away sheepishly, never to park there again. My hearse served me well for more than a year before my mother made me sell it because I could no longer find anyone willing to insure such a behemoth. But I have many fond memories of hauling equipment slowly up the West Virginia hills – this was before I-70 and I-79 had been completed – and of turning heads wherever I drove.