Don's Buggy
Historical Photos & Stories

In going through my boxes and boxes of photos in the attic, I've been shocked to find just how few pictures I've taken of my little car over the years.   One of the oldest is the B&W shot at the right showing me grinding the roll cage proir to installation.  I was about 19 and still living at home in New Jersey.  Now I'm almost 43, divorced, with a 16 year old daughter! ... Wow, where did the years go?

At one time, for several months, when I was about 20, the buggy was my ONLY form of transportation!  Once I got married the pressure to be "responsible" pushed the buggy aside for long periods of time.  Not to sound bitter, but a lot of it had to do with being married to someone that didn't care for it much.  I'm not sure why she's getting in the driver's side, but my ex is shown at the left ... probably around 1976 ... she was only 16 at the time.
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My buggy was almost like a mistress to my ex ... taking my time and attention ... and my money ... but not as frequently as you might think by her attitude towards it.  Take it from experience ... if you don't have a spouse that loves your passions as much as you do ... WATCH OUT!  The photo at the right is a similar vintage, although, obviously not the same season!

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Handsome devil, wasn't I? ... <smile>

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The three photos below all came off the same roll and were taken when a very good friend of mine, Leslie, was back in the USA in 1977 after moving back to England.  He and two of his British pals, Lee and John, decided to go "on holiday" to "The States" ... that's Lee behind the wheel taking it up and down the street just before leaving for the airport.

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We had quite a blast with the car during their visit as I recall ... some real muddy romps in a few of my favorite spots.  It was a hot summer, so we took advantage of great weather and really played hard. After one such jaunt, we stopped to visit someone.   Lee was shirtless and had been sitting in the back seat and was (naturally) splattered with a little mud.  The mud had dried to a strange color and in his heavy Cockney accent he glanced at his shoulder and cried out "I got 'oles in me arm!!"

The B&W photo at the left was taken in the Fall of 1978.   I shot it just minutes before a friend of mine slammed her into a tree!  He was cocky after a day at an Autocross with his Porsche 914 and was used to the grip of pavement ... not realizing this, I let him go around a couple times in a field near his house after we got back ... then WHAMMO.  He spun into a tree about five inches in diameter, splintering the end of the wooden bumper and burrying the tree into that front left fender.

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I'm not sure why, but my step-mother, Rhoda, is shown here, I think in about 1978, pointing out SOMETHING about the car ... I have no idea what.  She and my dad used to come up from Florida and visit her relatives at the Jersey Shore in Summer and my ex and I took the car down to see them on one visit.   When I was single I'd take the car down to the Pine Barrens in South Jersey.   I have NO CLUE why I never took my camera ... and there were several trips.   I'd also go out trail riding with my (former) brother-in-law (him in his Jeep) to some great spots near us ... but again we never took cameras.  I guess we were too busy having a good time!

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There were a few occasions where I got the time and a few dollars to put into her (the car ... not my ex <smile>).  One problem that developed by around 1980 was a plethora of micro cracks in the gelcoat on the hood, so around 1981 I decided to give it a spray with Imron, the best catalytic paint at the time. My brother worked for a restoration shop specializing in Mustangs and I towed it out to Pennsylvania and worked on it there on weekend visits.  Fortunately, I got a couple shots of it just after I sprayed ... and a few more back at my mother's place where I did the reassembly.

This next series of polaroid shots were taken after a short run of work I put into the car around 1989.  Note the addition of the driving and fog lites on the windshield frame (not the same ones that are there now).  I also finally replaced the tires with BF Goodrich All-Terrain Mud & Snow.  This was just before my relocation from New Jersey to Pennsylvania. Once I got to Pennsylvania there wasn't much time to work on it while I was trying to get settled.  I had a short period of working on it in about 1994 where I started on it's current configuration, but I didn't get back to it 'til this past Summer.

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