My name is Donna Cardia and I am writing in response to the Young Rodder stories you are looking for. I hope it is ok but the story is about my husband (Josh Buckley), my son (Billy) and me. My husband and I are both 25, my son is 7, and we all live and breath cars, trucks, bikes…basically anything with an engine. We all feel that our love is in our blood and we have all been this way since we were very little. 

Ever since I can remember we had in my family some form of an older car. I know it started with a 67 CJ5, then went on to a 66 Chevelle SS 396 (which is my other baby) and then my dad and me built his 40 Ford, by that time I was a freshman in high school. My husband’s family was the same way with the exception that they had many more cars then we did. I know that their baby, as they call it, of his family is a 64 Chevy Long bed Pickup (at one time they were up to three of the same truck). The day after I turned 18 I went out and bought my first official street rod, a 48 Chevy pickup convertible. My mom, dad, and I once again had a project and by the next cruising/drag racing season it was out and running with a Maaco paint job. My son, Billy, by this time was being pushed around in a 37 Ford Cabriolet stroller. After high school Josh had earned a scholarship to Universal Technical Institute (UTI) here in Illinois and left his truck with his dad in Massachusetts. Once he got settled here Josh started working at Discount Tire and saved up enough money to buy a 82 Camaro, it helped that he was able to work at it in school. By the next year I had my truck back out and then in June disaster struck. On the way to the GoodGuy’s show in Indianapolis a deer came out and struck the side of the truck. It was so bad that we had to bang out the rear fender off the tire (keep in my those were the original fenders from 48) just to drive it the rest of the way. By morning we realized that every piece from the front to the rear would have to be replaced. I decided that if it had to be redone that I wanted a fresh look, I wanted it flamed so that everyone knew it was a girl’s truck! By this time Josh had met me while doing a routine tire rotation on my truck and we had started dating.  The void of not having my truck was filled by him having a Camaro and the fact that we were both in school, he was at UTI and I was in school for Automotive Engineering. (I felt like at least I was working on cars) September came and the truck was all done with a new look, we were all off to Kalamazoo for the Street Rods Nationals North. The truck with its PINK and PURPLE flames turned a lot of head so much so that I was asked to be Lady Rodder that year. The following year we were once again off to the GoodGuy’s show in Indy thankfully without any disaster. I was still very uneasy about the crash and was looking into possibly trading my truck for something else. A fellow club member approached me with a trade, my truck for his Model “A” roadster that was complete however it just needed to be put together. When we got back my family and I went and looked at it and the deal was done, Josh still busy with school and work was unable to go see it. We went the following weekend to pick it up.

I have enclosed just some of the pictures of what we have done. I hoped you enjoyed hearing the story of my hot rod family.
Thank you, Donna Cardia