The Van

On a recent road trip, I happened to see an old full-size van parked by the side of the road which sent my free-flowing stream of consciousness (or flea like attention span depending on who you ask) rolling down memory lane in the van of my youth. Which we always referred to as just “theVan”

Our first attempt at Dodge’s 1976 flagship offering did not get off to an auspicious start. Although she/her was a “factory order”, the first one rolled off the assembly line with a very wrong liquid poop colored interior. The exact conversation that was had when the salesman tried to talk my father into accepting this ugly as homemade sin color combination has been lost to the ages, but it may have involved some profanity and insults. Legend has it that the phrase “no-f’ing-way” was born that day. This was back when car salesmen were known to be underhanded untrustworthy souls much like they are today. A few weeks later theVan rolled back off the assembly line, off the dealer’s lot and into our lives.

While looking back at the 70’s van culture, one is impressed by the Crager wheel clad, black bubble windows in shapes of hearts or lightening, with custom painted images of big breasted mermaids holding flaming swords on granite outcroppings in rough seas. But our’s was a family van, so the exterior of our van was painted, in a socially accepted manor, in what was known a the time as two-tone metallic leisure suite green which roughly resembles the contrasting color tone one finds on a well-manicured golf course. The paint was complimented by has much chrome as dad could add. Sometimes he let me wash the bumpers.

Entry for the driver and passenger was normal, but the rest of the occupants got to enter through the innovative “sliding door” that was the envy of many. TheVan’s sliding door was like a horizontal guillotine and was the uncouth savage ancestor of the gentle self-propelled powered sliding doors of today. If your limbs were in the way, you were going to feel pain. Slamming the door was almost a capital offense.

Beginning shortly after she graced our driveway and throughout her life, my dad, assisted by a neighbor, friends, or an uncle, added the custom touches that made her “theVan”.

For reasons of speed and safety a ground effect front spoiler was added and “fog lights” integrated. Owing to theVan having the aerodynamics of a brick, the spoiler decreased drag and improved fuel efficiency and handling. No, I’m kidding, we thought the spoiler looked cool, but the amber colored fog lights did have some functionality in snow or fog.

One of my favorite memories of theVan surrounds its trailer hitch which was usually covered by a freshly filleted tennis ball. This one particular day, I road my bike up the driveway to the garage and watched my father and his friend work to change the hitch ball to another size. They had put a wrench to it, but it didn’t budge, then they tried a socket (no luck), then they switched to a longer breaker bar (no dice), then then put an old piece of pipe on the breaker bar for leverage and were amazed that sucker wouldn’t break free. There was talk of grabbing the torches and adding some heat when I decided enough was enough and told them they were going the wrong way. Because I was a child, they tried to tell me I was wrong by teaching the old adage “righty-tighty, lefty-loosie. I informed them the nut was upside down. We’ve chuckled at that exchange for forty years.

My mother and maternal grandmother transformed dish towels into to curtains all around, secured with Velcro ties for driving visibility, however, they could be completely closed for privacy. There was also a matching thin tri-folding camping mattress secured to the back of the bench seat with bungee cords. If this van’s rockin’….

The gearshift was custom made from a Budweiser beer tap and machined to fit. The other Budweiser adornments I remember were a couple of empty cans that always sat up in the center console where the pull-off tops of “road pops” were disposed. I don’t know who needs to know this, but beer can tabs used to come off when you opened them. I’m not going to hazard a guess at how many trips I made to the cooler in the back over the years for “refreshments”. Those were heady days of the 70’s when the major fear of drinking and driving was spilling your drink.

Sitting between those two beer cans, a CB radio graced the console as well. The model changed from a numbered dial with 23 channels to a digital 40 channel model over the years, but it was always a Cobra brand. While I still remember dad’s FCC licensed “call sign” KIY3963, he was renowned by is handle “El Cheapo”, which I’ve been told stemmed from his Slovenian negotiation prowess, but he was always generous with me. I recall some excitement in theVan once when we kept hearing “breaker-breaker Spanish Miser” over and over again. After about the sixth time, mom reached deep into her elementary Spanish knowledge and exclaimed “Ron!, he’s calling YOU!”

I never learned another language, but I can define the phrases double-nickel, kojak with a kodak, beaver bear, pregnant roller-skate, hammer down, wall to wall and ten feet tall, with ease. These were the days when CW McCall’s song “Convoy” ruled the radio and “Smokey and the Bandit” broke box office records.

Since this was also the height of CB culture, dad installed an antenna atop theVan to extend the distance of his road information. Truckers and other CB enthusiast routinely called out locations where “bears” were located so dad could back off the hammer to avoid any interaction with Johnny Law, so the further out you could talk the more you knew about road conditions ahead. The downside to having the antenna on top of the van was that dad had to gingerly avoid some low hanging obstacles, or slow down to drive under low tree branches. I still can hear the distinct doink of the antennae making contact with a wayward pigeon under a bridge. He never knew what hit‘em.

A few more creature comforts were added to adorn the factory green interior. TheVan was retrofitted with a Pioneer Supertuner 8-track that blasted Frankie Yankovic, Fleetwood Mac, or the Village People with equal measure. As he was older, my brother frequently got to “ride up front with dad” in the captain’s chairs and controlled the radio. While my brother did go on to a successful sales career, I think he could have made a go of it as a radio deejay. He has the face for it. (-love you bro)

TheVan took us everywhere. We had a travel trailer parked at a campground ninety miles from home so every weekend we loaded up theVan with food, drink, and supplies. TheVan had enough room to hold bikes, coolers, and fishing rods with ease. We always had room for a schoolmate for the weekend. You never have to decide between two a pair of shoes when you have theVan. It made family road trips across states and teams of buddies to practices. As soon as we got home dad washed the road off theVan because he would never allow himself to be seen in a dirty vehicle.

My dad awoke extra early and took theVan to work before sunrise every day. He had a special spot in the parking lot next to a “vacant” spot occupied by a fire hydrant in his factory lot. He had that green metal cooler with a few beers that’d he’d sell at work for a quarter. These were heady days when you could grab a beer on break and head back to the factory punch press with your eight full fingers after lunch. More men had less fingers when I was a kid.

He’d sit out there in the parking with his radio and hold court during his thirty-minute lunch hour. His brother, a truck driver, would stop by sometimes, and if my mother, a schoolteacher was off, she sometimes brought lunch. Every once in a while, a new guy would start at the factory and on their first day choose to park in the fire lane spot. Legend has it that they were routinely advised by a vast numbers of factory labor and management that parking in “Ronnie’s spot” was no-no and should always be avoided. During the holiday time when the factory handed out a turkey to each one of the workers, my dad knew that some of the single guys didn’t want a turkey, so he’d bring a couple of cases of whisky and trade a bottle for a bird. This went on for years with the record being nineteen turkeys, one year, in our freezer. Ron understood an asymmetrical market opportunity while he worked in a factory to send me to college to learn what one was.

The factory wasn’t always a happy place. I remember well the day dad came home and someone had “keyed” the side of theVan. He never got it repainted because he figured the same ne’er-do-well or some other asshole would do it again. He buffed it out as best he could and kept a healthy coat of wax on the scratch for the rest of theVan’s life, but I know it pained him each time he saw the scratch.

TheVan took my brother back and forth to college for four years and made many trips between for basketball and baseball games. During baseball season, theVan parked along the third-base side with the sliding door opened, lawn chairs out dispensing beers to my brother’s friends at his dry Christian college campus. TheVan lived by its own rules.

Brando defined the motorcycle culture of the 50’s while McQueen and his mustang shot through the 60’s, and for me, Ron & theVan were the cool icons of the 70’s.

Being four years younger than my brother, theVan loaded up and took me to start my college career, but unbeknownst to me, that was theVan’s swansong because the first time my parents came to visit, they were driving theTruck. I saw theVan a few times after that parked outside a local mall because my dad had sold her to a JC Penney suit salesman. I never even drove up close. I just looked from afar.