Sunday Drive

I can recall that spring through fall our family indulged in that great American postwar prosperity can culture institution of the Sunday drive.   In 1951, my parents bought their first new car, a green 'fastback" chevrolet.  (When we first got it, my father and I searched for an unduly long time to find the ash tray for my mother, which was camouflaged in the verticle chrome strips that made up the dash board.)

So on Sundays spring through fall we often climbed in the car and went on a half day drive with picnic.   My father's favorite route was up route 19 along the Palisades Parkway that followed the Hudson River north.   We'd usually stop at the US Military Academy at West Point with our picnic.   The Hudson and its views from the cliffs that make up its banks is an under appreciated beauty.   We'd also stop to gawk at the mothballed fleet of Victory ships that were anchored  side by side, waiting for another war, along the river:
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/4164580
They were really spooky.  Eventually they were mostly cut up for junk.   (When my career turned to occupational health, I learned that the workers that built these and other WWII ships sufferred incredible death rates from asbestos related disease caused by exposures constructing the ships.)

A second destination was High Point...where PA, NJ, and NY come together.  There's a tall fire tower there we'd climb to look out across the hilly countryside.   We'd usually stop on that trip at the Delaware River Water Gap.

When we were more ambitious we'd go west to Pennsylvania Dutch country.   I remember the colorful "hex" signs on the barns.   Once my dad took me up on a sightseeing plane ride.   It was awesome, but also scary.   I remember I was sitting next to the door and it was just canvas and shook back and forth as we flew.   It didn't make me feel very secure.  I kept thinking about falling out.

I wonder what killed off the Sunday Drive.   Maybe it was the financial and physical accessibility of longer and bigger vacations further away.

I'd usually fall asleep coming home in the dark.   I liked to sleep on the back shelf under the back window.   We weren't too concerned about safety at that point.

Speaking of which, we had that car when we moved to Springfield in 1954.  Heading down rt 22 coming home from the first big box hardware store (Rickel's?) we had a big car accident.   I was sitting in the front between my parents and hit the side of my face into the steering mounted shift lever.   I had to be taken to the hospital and stayed 4 days.   I was swollen up like a grapefruit.  I remember going to a photographer to take a picture of my deformation.   We got some money from the accident for this.....and that's why we cold afford to send me to National Music Camp at Interlochen the next year.   It also caused me to stay home from camp that summer and work on my Barnegat Sneakbox sailboat restoration.   I can still feel the scar tissue under my cheek from that accident.   My smile is kind of lopsided because of it.   Maybe that's why I don't smile in pictures.  

Nobody else was hurt in the accident, but the car was totalled.  My father was shocked how little money we got due to depreciation.   He vowed never to buy a new car again.  

He didn't for a long time.   After that we owned a 1948 Nash Rambler, two 1951 Chryslers in succession, a 1954 Plymouth, a 1948 Plymouth, and a 1958 Plymouth.   In 1961 they bought a new Mercury Comet.  My father usually drove panel trucks he used for his floor scraping business.