The Jack Stewart Ford Project goes GNRS

For the last two or so years I have been part of the Jack Stewart Ford Project team. My biggest part in this project was creating the Jack Stewart Ford book which was finished in November 2012. After that I have been very busy with all kinds of things that needed to be done to prepare everything for the other really big part in the project, getting the Jack Stewart Ford as complete as possible and ready to be shipped to the 2013 GNRS in Pomona California. 

Palle Johansen and his team took care of most of the hard work restoring the car in Denmark. In early December 2012 the car was - as planned - put in a container along with the printed books and shipped to California. Here David Martinez would do some finishing work on the car to get it at its best to be shown to the visitors at the show and to to Jack Stewart who was very anxious to see his old custom being brought back to the looks it had when he drove it in 1951. 

The car at David Martinez his shop in Desert Palm Springs
moments before it was put in the trailer to be driven to the
GNRS in Pomona. 

The first plan two years ago,was to completely finish the car, paint and all, and ship it to the GNRS. But once the car was stripped from its 1972 paint job a wonderful bare metal and lead custom sculpture was revealed. It was then decided the car should be show in bare metal so that everybody could see the great workmanship from the Ayala brothers in the late 1940's and early 1950's as well as the fine tuning work of George Barris who did the finishing work on the car for his friend Jack Stewart in 1951. 

Before we left for the GNRS the team had created some large 3-D "Jack Stewart" letters copied from the 1951 Hot Rod Show display. We also made some framed display signs and Palle had a series of stitched patched made from my Jack Stewart Ford Project logo artwork.

The stitched patches arrived the day before we left for the US.
They came our really great. 100 patches were made.

This last decision was welcomed by a lot of custom car enthusiast who came to see the car in person at the show. Through out the whole show the car was mostly surrounded by people admiring the metal work done 60 plus years ago. Never before was such an iconic Custom Car built by both the Ayala and Barris shop displayed in bare metal. 

The car was pushed into the Custom Car building at the GNRS.

The highlights at the GNRS for the Jack Stewart Ford Project team was when Jack Stewart and Bob Drake inspected the car. It was the first time that the original owner of the car Jack Stewart and the fourth owner of the car Bob Drake met in person. Both had very emotional moments when viewing the car in bare metal for the first time. Bob had traveled all the way from Indiana with the help of his daughter Tanya. Both talked in length with each other and shared many personal moments they have had when they owned the car. Both Bob and Jack spend all three days signing copies of the Jack Stewart Ford book, and talking to people who wanted to know more about the car.

Me hanging the Kustom Kar Books banner on the back wall
of our booth.

The finished booth, ready for action.

This was my view from behind the booth. 

A personal highlight for me was when I presented Jack Stewart with my book during set up day on Thursday. Jack had been so kind to wait receiving the book until I could personally hand him a version at the show. He kept looking in the book, and each page he opened and each photo he saw a new story about the car and the time was shared. It was an absolutely great day that will never be forgotten.

Jack Stewart in his old custom. He sat in it for some time, reliving
old memories.

Bob Drake, owner of the car from 1955 to 2006 on the left
and Jack Stewart  on the right talking about the book in which
they both play a huge roll. They were both pre-signing books
before the doors of the show opened.

Another highlight of the show was when Jack Stewart handed
over the award Jack won with his Ford in 1951. The same
award that can be seen in the popular photo with the car on
the display with the wall and Jack Stewart letters behind it.
Jack also gave me something really nice. But more about that
in a later post.

I had never before had a booth at a show like this so I had no idea what to expect. I had, as on previous times when I visited this kind of show, brought my photo camera and try-pod to make as many photos as I could. It turned out that I was so busy during the entire weekend selling books and talking to the people that visited our booth that I did not even have the time to visit every building at the show, let alone take photos of all the cars I liked. 

The book sales started already on set-up day when people came over to ask about the book. And the rest of the weekend there were always people getting a signed copy of the book right there and some even traveled from far with the previous acquired books to have them signed by Jack, Bob and Palle.

The Jack Stewart Ford book is available directly from the publisher at: www.kustomkarbooks.com

Out great friends Pat and Paul Bragg came over from Paso Robles.
Paul had brought his book which he had ordered when the book was
first released to have it signed by Jack, Bob and Palle

Pat Ganahl came by to pick up a book.

And so did Junior Conway.

Palle Johansen showed Keith Weesner every little detail about
about the car, and once inside he would not leave it for some time.
Here Palle takes a snapshot of Keith sitting in the Ford on Keith his
iphone. I guess Keith will cherry this photo for a long time.

After the show was over the car was transported to a photo studio.
Here the Jack Stewart Ford Project team carefully rolls the car
from the trailer.

Rik Hoving's First Custom Car book.

It has been a while since I wrote my last story for this Rik Hoving Custom Car history Blog. I never intention to go so long without a new input on this blog... But I think I have a very good excuse for it.

For the last year or so I have been spending most of my spare time working on one of my long lasting dreams.
Writing my own book about Custom Cars.
And I'm very proud to say that I just finished this book!

My first book about Custom Cars is at the printer right now getting ready to be printed and bind into my very first and hopefully not my last Custom Car book. The book is planned to be all done at the beginning of December 2012, and if all goes as planned I should have it at the GNRS at the end of January 2013.
More details about pricing and where to get it other than at the GNRS will follow in the next couple of weeks. So far I have been too busy getting the book ready for the deadline that I did not have to much time for the other details yet.

The book is available directly from the publisher at: www.kustomkarbooks.com


So what is this book about
I hope I have created a rather unique book that will interests a lot of people.
The book title is the Jack Stewart Ford and the subtile 
a journey in time with the car and its owners
So basically the book is about one car?... well YES, and NO.

The cover of the book, well a 10% print of it.
This one is not even 2 inches tall. The real book will be
8.7 x 8.7 inches. 

Whats inside

Even thought the Jack Stewart 1941 Ford plays the key roll in the book, it sure has a lot more things to offer. The book starts with a inspiring foreword by Pat Ganahl. And then there is a Chapter about the history of the Jack Stewart Ford, showing many great, never before published photos of this trend setting historical important car. This chapter tells the story on how the car was built, when, where and how it ended up on the Mid West of the US and later in Denmark. 

Then there is a chapter in the book about inspiration, things that inspired Jack to built his custom car in the later part of the 1940's. It shows and tells about other custom cars that influenced Jack, or that were built with a similar theme. 

There is a section on the two major Custom Shops, Ayala and Barris that created this car.
And my most favorite part of the book are the chapters devoted to the four major caretakers. Here they get to talk about their years with the car. But these chapters also highlight many other cars and other vehicles these guys have owned prior and past the Jack Stewart Ford.
The Jack Stewart Ford has always been owned by people that had some very interesting cars, and done some great stuff all around.
On the Jack Stewart Research trip we have interviewed the former owners of the cars, And since then we have been in constant contact verifying the text I had written to make sure the stories are as accurate as they can be.

Jack Stewart had a 1953 MG Custom Sports Car that was customized by George Cerny, and Jack later built his famous 1932 Ford Roadster. Both of these and more are shown in the book with many never before published photos.
Jim Skonzakes (Street) had several very nice custom cars before the Jack Stewart Ford. And the famous Golden Sahara, kookie T and many other projects after he had sold the 1941 Ford. Some of his amazing stories get told in his chapter.
Bob Drake made the Jack Stewart Ford famous by driving it all around the mid West and creating several other great cars during the time he owned Jacks Ford.
And Palle Johansen the current caretaker has done everything in his power to restore the car back to its 1951 version. Plus he has had some great cars in the past and present as well.
All these caretakers had a great collection of wonderful info and photos to be shared in this book.
The book shows a great selection of never before published material on a lot of really great cars.

Some of the pages, again 10% prints cut and folded to make
them look like book pages.

There are some really great color photos in the book dated back to 1948-52 from the collection of Jim Street showing his early customs. 1941 Ford, 1949 Buick both in beige and dark purple and couple of the only color photos we ever found on Jack's 1941 Ford in 1951.
There are also a series of amazing photos of the Golden Sahara with the most accurate information on this fantastic show car ever published including the REAL story with documents on how the pearl white paint job was created.

There were a few people who I told that I would be working on this book, and when I told them in the beginning that it would be about the Jack Stewart Ford some were somewhat skeptical. They where afraid it might not be interesting enough focusing on just one car. But as soon as I showed them the first drafts they all knew they had been wrong and took their words right back.

I have created a small scale dummy of some of the pages from the book and took some photos of them to share here. And of coarse the best pages will not be shown here. For those you need to get yourself a copy of the book.
These photos are taken of 10% size prints and are far from the quality the finished book will be. The photos are just to give a first impression.
The next time I will show some photos of the book will be from the printer in Denmark Hopefully in the next ten or so days.


GNRS 2013
The plan is to have the book available at the GNRS 2013 where the real Jack Stewart Ford will be debuting as well. The car is currently being prepared for this show where it will be shown all done, except for the final paint. Early December the car and the books will be shipped from Denmark to California.
When the body of the car was stripped of its paint the metal underneath it looked so good and the craftsmanship of the Ayala's, George Barris and Bob Metz looked so great that it would have been a shame not to show it. So it was decided to finish the car as far as possible and do all the body work needed in metal and lead and show the car in bare metal.
At the show the car and the original owner Jack Stewart will be reunited again. And we will have the new book available there, and of course we will have Jack there to sign the book for those who want that.

I want to specially thank all the previous care takers of the Jack Stewart Ford, Palle Johansen, Scotty Gosson, Tony Miller and Paul Kelly for helping me out on this project.

Below is a small collection of the photos/documents that did not make it into the book.

I hope you enjoy it.

Rik Hoving

Jim Skonzakes his 1949 Buick in 1951

One of the many news paper articles about the Golden Sahara.
Jim Skonzakes (Street) toured the US Custom Car shows with
this masterpiece for many years.

One of the several early color photos from the Jim Skonzakes
Collection. Each had one of these date stamps on the back.

A bit blurry photo of the Jack Stewart Ford when owned by
Bob Drake in the mid 1950's.

George Barris and Bob Drake checking out the engine in
Jack's old Custom. This was in the 1980's as George his
Jacket and glasses clearly shows.

The Danny Hall 1940 Ford Coupe - another surviver

By Dick Page and Rik Hoving

This is how Danny Hall's 1940 Ford Coupe looked
when it was featured in Custom Cars July 1958

This 1940 Ford coupe was owned by Danny Hall of Tacoma, Washington when it was featured in the magazines. When Danny bought this 1940 Ford he had great plans with it… Full custom was the only way to go for him. So Danny contacted Schneider's Custom Shop in Tacoma to do the heavy work for him. The top on Danny's coupe was chopped 3 inches, with the windshield raked back at a very pleasing angle. The drip rails remained, but where shortened around the rear side windows. Unusual for a chopped 1940 Ford the rear window was chopped as well. The hood was welded and nosed, the trunk decked and the rest of the body trim was also removed. Electrical solenoids where installed to open the doors and trunk from the dash. Danny used a 1941 Lincoln front bumper bumper and an 1950 Chrysler bumper at the rear. The license plate surround comes from a 1953 Studebaker. A very nice Custom parts that is not used a lot. He installed the Studebaker taillights, and those are the best looking taillights for any 1940 Ford Custom.

The Studebaker license plate surround on the rear bumper

Wonderful flow of the top and this view also shows the
shortened drip rail

The interior in Danny's Coupe was done in red and white naugahyde in a very nice but unusual tuck & roll upholstery pattern. The body was painted in a really deep Titian red lacer. Danny installed some new smooth hubcaps, but a set with a nice revile in them to give the car just a bit more flash, but not to much. I think he made a perfect choice with those. The car already came with a set of spotlights, so they where put back on. Back in the 1940's and 1950's you needed to have a set of Appleton S-112 or S-552, but those seamed to be less popular in the later part of the 1950's. A lot of the cars started to use Dummy spots from Cal Custom or other aftermarket companies. But Danny wanted to use the real ones, perhaps they where Appleton's, but not the famous Custom Series, these where a bit smaller. Still they look very good on the car. Danny was a member of the Tacoma Toppers Car Club.

Danny Hall's 40 Ford coupe was a big deal to Dick page as well. Danny worked in the neighborhood where Dick Page lived, just a very short walk from his house and he always loved looking at it up close.  When he heard that it was for sale in a body shop in Bremerton around 1970 he went to see it and was shocked to see it radically changed and sitting outside in primer. After that the car was painted lime green with gold trim.

I only found this small scan of the car
around 1970.

Later Bob McCutchen owned the car. For the last sixteen years it has been owned by John Dixon of Olympia Washington who loved the car when he first saw it in its present form and has no plans to change it. So the car is still around today… it sure does not look anything like it did in its glory days in the 1950's. But the new owner feels otherwise.

This photo of the former Danny Hall 1940 Ford and now owned
by JohnDixon was taken in the summer of 2011 by Dick Page.
It pretty much looks the same as it did in the 1970's
But far from how it looked when owned by Danny Hall.

Dick page helped the John Dixon identify his chopped 1940 Ford coupe as the Danny Hall 1940 Ford, showing him some hidden signs that nobody knew about. But Dick was able to find them. Positive ID.
Could this 1940 Ford be brought back to how it was in the photos shown above. Yes I think it could. It would need four new fenders, possibly a replacement hood and most likely a new old chassis. But the rest is all there, and most of all the great chop performed by Scheider's shop is still perfect today. I sure hope in the near future we could see this old custom get restored again.

Bruce Rosengren's 1936 Ford Cabriolet.

Bruce Rosengren from White Bear Lake, Minn. has owned this 1936 Ford Cabriolet from 1955 till 1958-59.
He would like to know if his old car is still around, and also who was the original builder of this great looking Custom.

Bruce Roseengren and his 1936 Ford Cabriolet in 1958.
Bruce had to remove the hood and hood sides in the summer to
prevent the engine from overheating.

Bruce bought the car in 1955 as a used custom from a news paper ad in St Paul for $350.-  The car was obviously customized in the 1940's with a chopped windshield, a padded top that most likely is an original Carson Top Shop top and one that was made none removable for unknown reasons. The interior was done in red lather for the seats and red velour for the rest.
The stock grille was replaced with a custom made panel and Packard grille with solid hood sides. The taillights where 1948 Chevy units. All the work was really well and most likely done by a professional body shop. The car was painted a two tone light green and cream color when he bought it. And after Bruce had made the changes it was painted with gray primer, he never got around to give it a final paint job and wen the car was sold it was still this same gray primer.

When Bruce bought the car in 1955 everything and especially the natural aging pointed toward this being an old custom car from the 1940's, but Bruce was not really interested in its history at the time, so he never asked about the cars past owners and where it was originally built.

The car with its smoothed hood and solid hood sides.
An amazing early looking Custom Car for 1958.

Bruce had Dick Freudenberg rebuilt the 59ab Flathead engine and had a local shop french the Chevy taillights and set in the rear license plate.

A better view of the Dick Freudenberg rebuilt Flathead engine with
two carb intake.

Bruce went into the Navy in 1957 and had parked the car at his parents house. His father sold the car a few years later, after first asking Bruce if this was okay with him.
Ever since the car was sold Bruce regretted ever letting him father sell it.

This fuzzy photo of the rear shows the set in license plate and 1948
Chevy taillights.

Over the years Bruce has always wondered what happened to his old Car, if it is still around. With all the restorations of old Custom Cars going on in the last couple of years Bruce now also wondered who built this car in the 1940s, and he really regrets never asking more info on the car when he bought it in 1955.

So if anybody who sees these photos of this great looking 1940's styled 1936 Ford Cabriolet recognizes it and can shed a bit of light on its history or current whereabouts, please let me know and I will make sure to pass it on to Bruce. (rikhoving@xs4all.nl)

Without the mid/late 1950's car in the drive way this photo could have
very well been taken in the 1940's. 

Larry Watson's very first Scallop paint job

Bob Schremp's 1954 Chevrolet was the first car that Larry Watson scalloped.

This is how Bob's 1954 Chevy can be seen on the
Clock drive-in Bellflower poster by Steve Stanford.

Bob was from Norwalk California, his car was a mild custom car with removed trim on the hood and trunk and the door handles where shaved. All the body work was done by Brandson Body shop in Artesia. 

The shop also lowered the car and according the 1958 Custom Car Annual the ground clearance was just 1 1/2 inch, which was more than likely measure from the lake pipes to the ground. But still Bob's car was very low.

Bob installed the 1956 Oldsmobile hubcaps on medium size white walls on all four corners and no fender skirts where used as was the trend in the later part of the 1950's with this style of custom car. Bob also used a set of Spotlights which looked to be early style dummy spots that had still the shape of the Appleton Spotlights but no handles.

In 1956 Bob drove his car to Larry's Watson house and asked him if he knew how to fix the bad runs he had on his freshly painted hood and trunk. Bob did not want flames on his car, and he realized the runs where to big to be hidden by some pin striping. 

Larry had been having scallops on his mind for a while, and he figured this car would be perfect to use them on. He could sand off the runs, and cover up those sections by the scallops. Bob had no idea what scallops where, but he let Larry do them anyway.

Larry painted the scallops in teal blue with white fading tips in 1956 in Larry's driveway. He remembered that he wanted Bob to flip the front bumper on his car so he told him he would not pin stripe the scallops until he modified the front bumper on his Chevy. Bob agreed, flipped the front bumper and Larry striped the scallops initiation gold.

This is the only photo in the Larry Watson Collection of this
car that shows some color. But I'm unsure if this the actual
color of the scallops, or that its just a chemical process that
gave the scallops color.
There is no other color visible in this photo.

Bob's car set the trend, and for a while Larry was asked to scallop a lot of cars for people who had seen Bob's Chevy at the local drive in's. 

Bob Schremp stands proud next to his 1954  Chevy mild
custom with the first Larry Watson scallop paint job.

The photos of Bob's Chevy shown here, where taken by James Potter to be used in various magazine features on the car, the test sheets these scans where taken from are part of the Larry Watson Personal Collection.

Justin Kudolla's Custom Cars Trend Books

There are not to many strictly Custom Car related magazines and book published these days. Back in the 1950's and early 1960 this was quite different. One of the strictly magazines or perhaps we can even call them books where the Custom Cars annual put out by Trend Books.  The first was published in 1951, and the last was done in 1962. It was almost an annual published report on the latest trends in Custom Car world. 


The books are filled with nothing but Custom Cars. And Justin has been able to find Custom Cars that where not published before, or seen to much on the internet. Quite an achievement today. And besides the features of Custom Cars there is a styling Studio, Book review, Custom Model Cars and as far as I think, the best part of the magazine, a wonderful interview with an old timer Custom Car who tells just great stories how it all was back in the days. 


The first 2009 book had an interview with Gerald Twamley and his famous 1954 Chevy Custom Car. Gerald also shared many of his great Custom Car photos from his personal photo album. 

In the 2012 book Justin interviewed Johnny Zaro who had two famous Barris Custom Cars and he also shares his amazing early Custom Car photo album. (below)

Justin has been so kind to share some of the unused material for both of these early time Custom Car guys with us to share. Thank you Justin Gerald and Johnny for sharing these amazing photos.


Justin Kudolla has been in love with everything Custom Car for as long as he can remember, and when he read one of the first articles publisher Luke Karosi from Kustoms Illustrated magazine put in his own magazine. The article was called "Attack Of the 1/2 Foot Zines,"  which had articles about Rolls & Pleats and some of the other magazines along those lines.  In the article he said something about "with the advent of personal computers and desktop publishing systems, things that were once solely done by professionals can now be done in your own home, such as magazine publishing."  

Well, that got Justin thinking!  
He always liked the old Annuals, they were my favorites.  And he had hoped that someone would bring them back, and not do them in an updated way, but continue them as they were before.  
Back around 1994, there were two issues published of Hop-Up magazine, in the little size how it was in the 1950s. (In Justins opinion, these two issues were far better than the Annuals that were later published, after the rights to the Hop-Up name were purchased by a new owner.)  They were very good quality, on thick paper, and had some color inside, but many of the layouts and even the ads were done the way the old ones were.  
That is exactly what Justin wanted to do with his Annual.  There may be some modern style customs in the new Annuals Justin created, but he still wanted to give all of the articles an old look, so it would be like looking at something new through the eyes of something old, like a Twilight Zone experience or something!

"I don't know if you have copies of, or have ever seen the Tex Smith's Custom Cars Magazine from the late 1980s?  He only did 4 issues, but it was a great magazine, one of the best in my opinion.  He was another big inspiration.  It folded because he couldn't meet his quota for paid subscriptions, (which was 5,000) but I would always think of how much I liked that magazine and how much he could have accomplished with it if people would have supported it.  I wanted to do something to help get custom cars out there, to help make up for what he sadly wasn't able to accomplish since he didn't have much support.
Even though my first Annual came out about 20 years after the last issue of Tex's magazine was published."


If you have not ordered one of these great Custom Car books, do yourself a favor, and go to Justin's website and order one, or two. You wont be sorry. The interviews with Gerald Twamley and Johnny Zaro alone are worth the price. 


www.trendcustomcars.com




Here are some of the photos that Justin scanned from the Johnny Zaro Photo Album.

Great low angle front view of Johnny's 1940 Mercury.

Rear view of Johnny's Mercury.
Wonderful flow of lines.

A bit hazy snapshot in between the trees.

Johnny proudly shows the freshly upholstered Mercury.

Johnny bought this unfinished 1941 Ford project.
George Barris had been building it for John Vara, but he
decided to sell it before it was finished.
George Barris finished it for Johnny Zaro.

Great side view shows the wonderfully done upholstery.

Especially nice is the very rounded shape of the tuck&roll
inset panel on the rear bench. The upholstery was
done by Chavez in red and white leatherette.

Channeled 32 Ford 3-window coupe at the
Compton Avenue Barris shop

And here are some of the photos from the Gerald Twamley Photo album

Very nice front shot of Gerald's Chevy

Gerald's 1959 Pontiac

Kookie Kar that Gerald photographed at an outdoor show.