I love a good car. I get my car gene from my dad. My dad passed away in January of this year and I get a lot of my traits – both good and bad – from him. He was a Philosophy professor for decades, and I inherited his commitment to and passion for education. I also inherited his stubbornness, his stoicism, his myopia, his musical talents, his dislike of phone calls (I know – weird, eh?), his tendency to take charge, and his love of a good car.
What is a good car, you ask? Well, he drove a Nash Metropolitan when I was growing up. It was “three on the tree” and that’s how I learned to drive a standard. He was a shade tree mechanic (I am not) and he kept that car running almost single handedly. I love a fast car – I used to drive a Porsche Boxster, and these days I drive another small, fast, sports car.
Here’s a picture of my dad when he was in college, leaning against his first car.
After my dad sold the Metropolitan, he eventually bought a Caballero. He bought what? For those of you who don’t know, a Caballero is the unknown twin to the El Camino. What? For those of you who still don’t know, these were made by Chevy (the El Camino), Ford (the Ranchero) and GMC (Caballero) and were part car (two door cab on a station wagon platform) and part truck (cargo bed). They were quite popular in the 70s and early 80s. My dad bought a used 1978 Caballero and drove it for 20 or 25 years until we had to take his keys away. He loved that truck – red interior and faded, dented red exterior, three speed standard transmission, bench seat, much used cargo bed.
After he died, I kept telling myself to get that truck sold. And I kept putting off selling it because my more recent memories of my dad are partly connected to the Caballero. I finally realized that I didn’t want to sell it, I wanted to see if it could be fixed up. So I had it shipped to Austin and set about finding someone who would get it running. And guess who I found?
Mike Shobroek. Mike is our Automotive Tech department chair. I asked him if the Caballero could be a teaching tool, and he asked me to take him to look at it (I had it parked on the street in my neighborhood). After looking with his expert eye, he said “yes” and the department picked it up and took it to RVS for the Fall Semester. The picture of the truck on the lift is from early in the Fall semester at RVS.
I so love the symmetry of this. My legacy from my dad is encapsulated in this picture of the beat-up, undrivable Caballero on the lift at RVS. His commitment to education and his love of a good car are living on at ACC. Thanks, Mike! And thank you to the students in the Automotive program at RVS this Fall.