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Dad's 'Mad, The no longer hibernating 1957 Nomad.

All y'all need to stop. We've been sub zero here for two weeks, just finally warming up to the 30's. First snow was Nov 18, and it's just piled up already. We've been here almost 13 years now...and this is the second worst it's been right after our very first winter here.

It looks "festive"?

Fock festive, I want palm trees and bikinis!
So I shouldn't mention how it has been 48 to 50 degrees here lately? And I haven't had frost on my windshield with the mid twenty degree lows??
:D
 
So I shouldn't mention how it has been 48 to 50 degrees here lately? And I haven't had frost on my windshield with the mid twenty degree lows??
:D
@shima was over and we were measuring his driveshaft angles and I was in sweats and a t-shirt. Though I did get a little chilled with the cold snacks out of the garage fridge he brought over.

I love snow, but it can stay in the mountains when I can drive to it, not have it dumped all over town making my life like I’m living on the planet Hoth or something.
 
Fock snow.

I would be happy if it never hit the 60’s.
 
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Weather-wise I'd be happy with 45-55 and no rain. Seems like it's been dumping since October. It was bad enough last week that if I'd left for work an hour later I wouldn't have been able to get there.
 
No earth shattering updates. Though the kid and I took the Nomad to a cars n coffee deal in Castle Rock about 45 minutes away from me. It’s the earliest in the year I can ever remember seeing the car out of the garage. A little chilly, but the heater definitely works.

Lost of cool cars and trucks with a handful of tri fives.

I liked this 4 door as they did a good job trying to hide the crew cab look by shaving the rear door handles.



These European amry trucks are cool. They were Swedish not Swiss. I assumed they were pinzguers, I was wrong. They did have portal axles though.


So this old timer came rolling in late cruising the lot for a parking space. Note the cowboy hat on the dash. He was wearing the complete bandit getup.


The golden supercruise is tomorrow so I got the hot rod out to clean it up. I used Mr. Sam’s tire and wheel cleaner and I’ve got to say the tires came out great. Worked like the old Westley’s bleach white used too.

 
So it’s been an interesting couple of days. I was contacted via email from Wayne the last surviving founding member of the Mile High Nomad club and National Nomad Club. He lives a few miles from me in Englewood and I talked to him briefly at a cruise last year.

He wanted to let me know of an auction of a banner he had up on eBay from one of the conventions, in particular the one in Caspar Wyoming that my folks went to. Contained within the pics of the auction was a pic of my Dad at the podium of the awards banquet with the banner clearly behind him. He would have been 39 in this pic.


There was another pic of my Dad handing an award to another MHNC member.

That’s the big guy in his prime. Mutton chops and all!

So naturally I had to bid on the auction. I had emailed back to Wayne to thank him for sharing the info with the pics of my Dad. I had also immediately sent the link to my sisters so they could see it. Within minutes I think we were all in tears. The anniversary of his death is on the 10th of this month so I think all our senses are a little raw.

Allergies cleared I talked to Wayne a little further and offered to come see him on Saturday (now today) before I took the Nomad to Golden for the cruise. He gladly accepted.

Sadly I missed on the auction. Got sniped in the last minute. But this morning his other auction of the 1977 banner from Indianapolis was ending at 10:00 am. I wasn’t going to be sniped again. And while it’s not the one with my Dad in front of it, it is significant for other reasons. It was the first convention I ever attended. So all of the family was there except my little sister as she stayed at home with my grandparents since she was only two. From the NNC, that convention was the largest ever with over 250 Nomads in attendance. Something that didn’t happen again and given the value of the cars will probably never be duplicated.

I won the auction which is probably the biggest souvenir of the event. It will be displayed proudly in my garage. The best part was I didn’t need to wait for him to send it to me, I drove over to his place as planned. The banner:


I spent three hours over there today. First Wayne checked out the Nomad. I could tell he got choked up at one point looking at the car. He mentioned memories coming back. We went inside the house and he showed me a lot of treasured Nomad memorabilia. He made some nice 8x10 prints of the pictures of my Dad which was awesome. He had a giant photo album from all the NNC conventions his late wife had made up and he let me look at while he gave the backstory from each year. Some I knew parts of, most I didn’t know. I love this kind of history. Tidbits like at the Caspar convention a freak hail storm prompted everyone who brought a car to promptly yank mattress’ out of their hotel rooms to protect the cars. The hotel was not amused, but most of the cars survived unscathed, including our car that was there!

The second convention was in Troy, Mi, the same Detroit suburb I was in for work recently. The hotel was under construction when they picked the location but they were promised it would be ready. Weeks out from the event a member from Detroit tipped them off the venue wasn’t ready. They assured the club it would be when they checked on it but the banquet hall would not be ready and they offered to bus the club members to another hotel downtown for the banquet instead. The staff refused since they knew most of the guys didn’t want to leave the nomads behind. The hotel ended up setting up a tent complete with full carpeting, chandeliers and anything else they wanted. As it ended up didn’t get the occupancy certificate until 6:00 the afternoon most of the club was arriving. Cutting it close for sure.

I got stories of his personal 16 nomads he owned and the demise of 6 Pontiac Safari’s that got sacrificed to keep nomads on the road. Sounds insane now knowing the rarity of Safari’s was even more that of Nomads, but back in the 60’s and 70’s both the Nomads and safaris were just old cars. Nobody cared then. Arguably, the Nomad was more popular and justified his his actions. Though he admitted regret today.

We talked about my Dad and his late wife. Mostly about good times not at the end. I certainly enjoyed soaking up the history and felt good giving him some company for a while. I gave him my phone number and told him to let me know if he needed help with anything car related or not since I’m pretty close to him.

I took off from Wayne’s to go to the cruise. Talked to many and saw a lot of cooks stuff.


In front of where I parked.


I ended pulling out onto the front row as a spot opened up.


Pretty good day.
 
What a great visit Rob! All the memorabilia, stories and pics, what an experience to soak all of that in. Thats the kind of info that will be missed in the future. I’m glad you got to take it all in.
Car looks great!
 
That’s cool you got to talk to a guy that knew all those stores of your dad!
I’ve known this guy my entire life. One of the few that still call me Robbie because he knows me more that way than Rob now.

I’m hoping he takes me up on my offer for help if he needs anything. At minimum I’ll see him at the Englewood cruise this summer.
 

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