So, my fellow Hoons, it has been three years to the day that the Hooniverse Overlords allowed this olelongrooffan a key to the vault that is Hooniverse. And what a ride for this olelongrooffan it has been. 605 posts. Yeah, the 300, 325, 504, 505 and 604 anniversary posts just slipped on by. And 1,095 days.  Appropriately enough, this leather year anniversary falls on a Wagon Wednesday for this olelongrooffan. Of course there are plenty of other Hoons posting stuff up here with a greater number (and quality) of posts than this olelongrooffan but I just have to say this about that. I have had a blast experiencing tons of off the wall stuff and sharing it with my fellow Hoons, regardless of the excellent skill sets my fellow Hoontributors possess.

Near the end of April, 2010, this olelongrooffan was sitting in my Taj Mahal there in the Birthplace of Speed wondering where all the cool kids from [REDACTED] had gone. It seemed that, once again, life caught this olelongrooffan spinning my wheels on the restart. I had stumbled upon [REDACTED] fairly recently and now it seemed once again this olelongrooffan was left behind at the first turn. It was only from a random comment the lovely Air Cooled Queen Ambersand left on [REDACTED] that I was able to find my way on over this way and, as of yet, this olelongrooffan hasn’t been kicked to the curb.

Yeah, as I was reading along on all things Hoon, I kinda figured some of the random crap this olelongrooffan writes about might be appreciated by my fellow Hoons. So I popped off an email to the Overlords with a couple of posts I had published over on my personal blog and low and behold, those Overlords added me to the queue of contributors.

And my fellow Hoons have accepted this olelongrooffan nearly without exception. Oh sure there have been a couple of would be scoundrels who have, on a very few occasions, almost caused this olelongrooffan to slam that calmshell tailgate closed and head on down the backroads to another adventure. But I have to thank my fellow Hoons for giving the green flag to this olelongrooffan’s writing style, as quirky as it is described as being. But hey, as Popeye says, “I yam what I yam.”

As this olelongrooffan mentioned in my first post thirty-six moons ago, I am not all that great at technical or third person stuff . I do better with first person experiences. I mean, and I have said this before, any old site can screen grab some images of a new car release, but to this olelongrooffan, there is nothing better than a first person account of that release. And sometimes a surprise story is even better.

Now this olelongrooffan has rambled on more than one occasion about my love and lust for olelongroofs. Well, new ones too. And I am not alone, especially here in the Hooniverse. That has been the one constant in my life for as long as I can remember. It was at least 12 or 15 years ago while cruising around some car show with thejeepjunkie that this olelongrooffan mentioned to him that longroofs were the next big thing. Well, my fellow Hoons, he pahshawed me and at the time, I just dropped the subject. As the years have passed, we all have seen the popularity of vintage longroofs increase almost to the point of vulgarity. But the comment by Tanshanomi on a post I did about my brother Bus-Plunge’s shorty bus sums it up best. “Not a huge number of them made in comparison to passenger cars….they were pretty much used up and unceremoniously discarded as scrap.” To me, that comment pretty much describes the fate of many old longroofs of back in the day.

And that makes the sighting of this 1957 Buick Century Caballero hardtop longroof I saw a couple weeks ago not far from TheStuccoBox all the more worth while. Yeah. Longroof. Vintage. Excellent Two Tone Color. Primo Shape. And a Hardtop. What could be better?

Well, Model number 69 would be a great place to start, IMHO.

But, yeah, in addition to a bunch of cool ole longroofs, there have been many other cool sightings by this olelongrooffan over the past Messerschmitt numbered days and I am always on the lookout for something I hope and believe my fellow Hoons will enjoy.

Yeah, that hardtop longroof was nice and that all original 58 Cadillac drop top seen in the background of the above image was just as desirable. Yeah, it’s an all original 1958 Cadillac out of the Design and Styling Department of General Motors overseen by Harley Earl, just prior to his retirement in 1958.

And because it is Wagon Wednesday here in the Hooniverse, another one is due. And while this one was spotted at another local car show down here in toney Palm Beach, Florida, this wagon holds a special place in the heart of this olelongrooffan.

My fellow Hoons may remember that growing up on Haven Lee Farm way back in the 1970’s, my pop, TheGentlemanFarmer picked up this old then new Sweptside Dodge pick up as our daily driver farm truck.  I posted about an experience this olelongrooffan had with this ole farm truck here. thejeepjunkie and this olelongrooffan have long had a running disagreement about the actual year of our old truck. He is certain it was a 1970 while I held out for a 1971 model year. I know we could have google imaged the dang thing and resolved it years ago but what the hell fun is that?

Anyway, a week or so ago I spotted this Power Wagon out at yet another car show. Seeing one of these in Palm Beach is quite rare but was a real treat for me. The owner proclaimed this one to be a 1970. As it has round side marker lights and our farm truck had the newer style rectangular ones, this olelongrooffan is proclaiming thejeepjunkie to be mistaken. Stick with old Jeeps my young brother. Based on this morning’s Classic Caption, I’m now not so sure. But I will say this about that. See the way the rear end of the hood is sprung? Ours ended up the same way when a strong wind caught it as some young whippersnappers were trying to open the hood up at Dot’s Log Cabin gas station a long time ago.

The side moldings on our were a tad bit different as we had trim around the wheel wells and along the bottom between them. No upper side trim was in place on ours. Also, our Dodge 200 had deadly split rim 16.50″ wheels, long since outlawed by the Feds. The step bumper on the rear of ours was the standard gray model with no side returns such as this Power Wagon has.

In addition to the same rear tail lights and reverse lights, our farm truck shared yet another common feature with this Power Wagon. See the creases in the uprights on each side of that tailgate? (It says Dodge in between those uprights.) Yeah, see those creases? Well, know this my fellow Hoons, those are not factory installed. Those are custom features, usually field applied.

Well my fellow Hoons, if that particular truck is Hooned around with the tailgate down long enough (and enough potholes and livestock dug holes are hit at speed) the straps holding that tailgate horizontal will snap in two and that tailgate will drop down and hit that step bumper, resulting in those creases to those uprights TheGentleManFarmer used to yell at us about way back in the day.

Yes, my fellow Hoons, this olelongrooffan just can’t make this shit up.

Anyway, thanks for having me around these past Messerschmitt days and Peugeot posts. Hope I can overstay my welcome just a bit longer. This olelongrooffan is having a blast.

Image Copyright Hooniverse 2013/longrooffan