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. No bolt was more than finger tight, the rear doors were bent downward on their hinges and the runs in the paint on the frame went up instead of down. Clearly, the body had been off and the car had been manhandled. My friend and the broker were no longer on good terms and no previous history of the car was available. Nevertheless, the combination of my attraction to a good puzzle and my friend's offer to let me pay him off over two years brought us to a deal and the car was mine.
Surprise #2: Australian Body
At the time I had just become active in the Early Ford V8 Club and my initial fantasy was to restore my newly acquired Phaeton to Dearborn standards. This plan was soon dashed when my more knowledgeable friends told me that although the car was left-hand drive and had a US frame number, the body was of Australian origin. Consequently, I had to make a new plan. The car had an original '32 engine but an extra, later model flathead came along as part of the deal. Investigation revealed that the later engine had been installed when the car last ran. Further, close inspection of the license tags on the black California plates indicated that the car had likely been assembled in the late sixties. I had long heard stories about Australian '32 bodies being imported by Southern California hot rodders so I decided it would be fun to reassemble the car as closely as possible to the condition it was in when last it ran. I figured that if I ever got it to show-worthy condition somebody might recognize it and tell me its story.
Surprise #3: Recognition in Pismo
Given family activities, career commitments and my casual approach to hard work it took nearly a dozen years to get the car assembled and back on the road. However, by 1998 the car was complete and we had begun driving it to various events around southern and central California. At a show in Ventura a fellow recognized the car as one he had purchased at an auction in the seventies, but he didn't remember the details and I couldn't get any additional history - frustrating!
Then, in 2001, while I was working the safety inspection at the Early Ford V8 meet in Pismo Beach, I met long time V8 Club member and noted Ford historian Charles Seims. Charles told me he recognized the license number on my car as one that had been on a Phaeton featured on the cover of a magazine back in the seventies. He said the car looked different and he couldn't remember which magazine, but he knew that was the same license plate he had seen almost thirty years before. I pressed for more details as politely as I could given my excitement at finally getting a clue, but that was all Charles could recall at the time.
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