Okay, we all had to start someplace... My interest in cars started back in the '50s, building model cars & dreaming about driving. In the day when Don Garlits was better known as the Swamp Rat, Drag Racing was my auto sport of choice. With the interest, came the language, Rat Motors, Elephant Motors, Top Loaders, Slush Boxes & Torque Flites. Then the places like Englishtown, Bakersfield & Woodward Ave. come to mind. Twisted youth, you bet, but it kept me out of trouble & gave me the initiative to make the best out of every blessing sent my way. So here's a question for you, was Woodward Ave. the Cruisin' Legend for the rest the Country? If not, what place do you call Cruisin' USA?
Woodward and Gratiot Avenues were Mecca for Motor City, but we all know that Southern California is, was, and always will be the true heart of American car culture...
Okay Satch, can't argue against the 405 rush hour being the greatest cruisin' circuit on the planet. Found the night crowd on Sunset Strip to be a little more animated & Mulholland Dr. was a big deal before the Tail of the Dragon came along. No doubt that the west coast has it's place in America's car culture, but just like the Beach Boys & the Temptations, America's car culture has many hometowns.
True, true. . . but I'll see your Tail of the over-law-enforced Harley-crowded Dragon and raise you California Highway 33. . . And shall we talk about the postwar lakester culture? Huh? Huh? Riverside? Torrey Pines? Phil Hill, Dan Gurney, Richie Ginther? The TEMPTATIONS? The BEACH BOYS?! Dick Dale, ya mook.
My Dad started taking me to Detroit Dragway and Motor City Drag Strip when I was about 8 years old. I was a total muscle car and dragster gear head in my youth. By the time I got my driver's license we lived north of Detroit in orchard country but on Friday and Saturday nights I would drive over to Woodward Avenue and cruise, although in nothing that bears mentioning. It was a cool place. We even had our own cruise route in our little town (Romeo, MI, now famous as the hometown of Kid Rock), much like American Graffiti, and everyone looped back around at the A&W. There were only two stop lights in town when I first lived there, one at the Four Corners, Main Street and 32 Mile Road. Drive a mile out of town in almost any direction from there and you could find 1/4 miles marked off on any number of side roads. One of the things that made Woodward Avenue legendary was that the factory guys use to take the factory built cars out on Friday and Saturday nights to test them out in real-world situations. That probably never happened in SoCal. That all changed when my best friend and neighbor's brother-in-law, who owned both a Porsche 356 and a BMW 2002, took us to Waterford Hills Raceway out in Clarkston, near Pontiac when we were in high school. I was hooked on sports cars ever since!
Amen Brother, My time in Motown happened well past my motorhead years, but the sense of all those years of tradition was hard to avoid. One of my top two real life experiences, my time in Detroit was like a rolling museum. The other one was my visit to San Antonio & the Alamo. Like you ride choices. Ditto the 2006 M Roadster, mine was silver, then a 2010 335i drop top.
