Rebel Without a Cause Mercury. Photo courtesy National Automotive Museum.
Sam Barris, Gil and Al Ayala, and Frank Sonzogni might not come to mind as darlings of the concours crowd, but in their own way, they had the same intentions as the celebrated coachbuilders regularly feted on manicured lawns: to create automotive art using manufacturer-supplied ingredients. Rather than Ferraris and other exotics, however, they plied their trade in more commonly available domestic sedans and coupes, and about a dozen of their most significant examples will get their turn in the limelight later this year when the Pebble Beach Concours celebrates postwar Mercury customs
While nobody could consider the 1949 to 1951 Mercury a commercial failure – it outsold much of its competition at about 300,000 cars a year – the E.T. “Bob” Gregorie design didn’t quite have the punch and flair that many other midsize American cars had at that time. No rocket motifs or portholes, no drastic body shapes, nothing to really make it stand out. But as designer Harry Bradley wrote, its “tentative combination of old and new that was not as fresh as its sister cars from Ford or Lincoln, or its competition from General Motors… [was] exactly what made the car so appealing to customizers.”
Those slab sides became big canvases for doodlers in chrome trim. The conservative front end easily adapted to new grille and headlamp combinations. The small windows and thick pillars gave it a tougher and, at the same time, more flowing look when metalsmiths dared to chop its top.
Who exactly was the first to take that plunge has been a matter of debate for some years now. Customizer Sam Barris typically gets credit: Only a few weeks after buying his 1949 Mercury coupe that year, he took a torch and welder to his car to lower its lid, dechromed it, altered the side sculpturing, lowered it, and painted it metallic green. At about the same time, Gil and Al Ayala had set about chopping and altering the sheetmetal on Louie Bettancourt’s 1949 coupe. Whoever did it first, more would soon follow, including Jerry Quesnel’s Barris-chopped 1949 coupe and Bob Hirohata’s 1951 coupe, which Barris chopped and hardtopped and which would go on to become perhaps the most iconic custom Mercury.
While many of the custom Mercurys of the Fifties – such as the 1949 coupe that starred alongside James Dean in the 1955 film Rebel Without a Cause – featured only mild alterations and still looked fairly stock, others – including the 1950 coupe that Leo Lyons modified over a period of nine years – so extensively reshaped the cars as to make them almost unrecognizeable as Mercurys. Persistent magazine exposure helped popularize the chopped and customized Mercurys coming out of the Los Angeles-area hot rod shops in the Fifties, but so did films such as Rebel and the 1955 Mamie Van Doren flick Running Wild , which included the Hirohata Mercury. They soon picked up the nickname “leadsled” for the vast amounts of body lead applied to their flanks during the customization process.
Leo Lyons custom Mercury. Photo courtesy Geoff Hacker.
Hot rod and custom collector and historian Ken Gross, who has helmed the biennial displays of prewar customs, sports customs, and other hot rods at Pebble Beach since 1997, said the 1949 to 1951 Mercury, to many enthusiasts, represents the definitive custom car. “The cars hail from an exuberant era when backyard mechanics and bodymen were convinced they could build stylish automobiles as well as any major automaker,” he said. “These cars are rolling proof that they did.”
To put the class together, Gross said he looked to Bradley’s list of 10 ultimate “Original Radical Custom Mercs” – which includes the Barris 1949 coupe, the Bettancourt 1949 coupe, the Quesnel 1949 coupe, the Hirohata 1951 coupe, Wally Welch’s Ayala-customized 1950 coupe, Ralph Testa’s Barris-customized 1950 convertible, Buddy Alcorn’s Barris-customized 1950 coupe, Fred Rowe’s Barris-customized 1951 convertible, Dave Burgarin’s Barris-customized 1951 coupe, and Sonzogni’s 1951 coupe – for inspiration. Four of those cars – Burgarin’s, Sonzogni’s, Quesnel’s, and Bettancourt’s – have gone missing in the decades since they were built, so Gross said he would like to include a few other noteworthy custom Mercurys in their stead, including the Rebel Without a Cause coupe, the Lyons coupe, and Darryl Starbird’s “Fabula” 1950 coupe. No cars on the list have yet been confirmed for the concours.
In addition to the display, Gross said he will also put together a panel discussion on the custom Mercury’s impact for the Pebble Beach Classic Car Forum at the Inn at Spanish Bay. Other panelists expected to participate include Pat Ganahl, Larry Erickson, Rik Hoving and George Barris.
Along with the postwar custom Mercurys, this year’s Pebble Beach Concours will feature classes dedicated to Preservation Ferraris and Ferraris that Raced in the Pebble Beach Road Races in the 1950s, duPonts, Pope automobiles, designs by Carrozzeria Touring, postwar Cunninghams, Japanese motorcycles, prewar British sports cars, Lincoln Continentals, and Shelby G.T. 350s.
The 65th annual pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance will take place Sunday, August 16. For more information, visit PebbleBeachConcours.net.
from Hemmings Daily - News for the collector car enthusiast http://ift.tt/1CCuWtD
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