Ok folks, here are a couple
of more things I'd like to point out to all of you
who are so heavily into the
"original" restorations. I grew up in Hamtramck,
Michigan which was where the
Dodge Main plant used to be. Actually, I
lived between Dodge Main and
the Plymouth plant which was on a street
intersection of Mt. Elliot
and Lynch Road. I think I got that second street
right. I also worked at
the Dodge Main plant for a couple of years as a
computer programmer in the
early '70s. The time I spent living between
the two plants was from the
mid-40s until June of '59. I got heavily into
cars, particular Dodges and
Plymouths, when I hit 13. I'd bike my way from
plant to plant and from
dealership to dealership and pick up the catalogs
so I could check out all the
available stuff. As I got a few years older and
on the verge of getting my
driver's license, I noticed that from time to time
I'd see several Dodges and
Plymouths stored outside with colors and
interiors that didn't comply
with those that were shown in the catalogs.
This happened most often when
it was time to begin building the cars for
the next model year.
Occasionally I'd see the same thing early in the
season but they were quite
rare. Therefore, I assumed that several folks
custom ordered the colors and
interiors on some of those cars. The ones
that showed up like that at
the end of the year were most likely because
the plants had used up the
stuff as shown in the catalogs and they didn't
want to spend excess bucks to
replace it so they most likely used materials
and paint from previous model
years or from the upcoming model year.
That could very well
explain why my C300 didn't have the light brown
interior that
was intended for those cars.... or it could've been because
the
original owner custom
ordered the interior. Just thought I'd let all of
you
know another reason why some
of the oldies don't quite match what
showed up in the
catalogs.
Jerry
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