The '55 was reborn once by my dad and was our daily driving family car for a long time before it wound up soaking up water in our back yard.  It was partially reborn again when I took over while in high school and it made a fine steed at the time, although it required nearly daily work to keep up with it.   Maybe this time I have a half a chance of getting it right.    Below is a picture of The Beast around summer of 1986. 

The summer of '86 was probably its best year as I had finally settled on a good combination and had discovered the joys of Unilite distributors.  If you've ever run a points n' condenser distributor that was worn enough to leak oil up inside or weak enough to float the points, you can probably sympathize a bit.   At the time this was taken, the front coils were chopped and the front bumper was pulled.  The license plate resided on a bracket in the tilt off front end just underneath the front splash panel.  The engine was a 360cid 4 bolt Chevrolet with a whale of a good cam, massaged heads, and a plethora of carb combos.  I never got around to actually applying paint.  Who would have thought I was 20 years ahead of my time with my Rat Rodding? 

Hey while we're looking at it way way way back....  this is in probably around 1983 or 1984 when I first put it back on the road.  Talk about having to "make do"....  I was extremely fortunate to get help in buying a new set of tires for it... everything else was held together by a band-aid and a prayer! The trucks to the belongthe friends I used to hang out with back then.

Below is the old  "Junkyard".  The truck is merely a delivery vehicle for The Wagon and I've since moved to a more hospitable working environment. Thank God! I accumulated enough rocks up my arse from that gravel driveway to start a quarry! Of course my friends now make fun of me saying that I didn't by a house.... I bought a garage that just happened to have a house attached to it.

And what would a junkyard be without a couple of junkyard dogs?

Special note......  Sometime in the night of 8/16/00,  Jessie (left and below) passed away at the tender age of 6. 

The plans for the latest rebuilding call for a gasser treatment.  I've toyed with the idea of sedan delivery but that's a ways off if I do it.   While this isn't a total frame off restoration, it is pretty thorough as I'm a lot pickier than I used to be. How many of those advertised "frame-offs" are real anyway?  I didn't realize so many people had body jigs. 

"Hurry up, damn you!  I want to go for a ride!!!"