CLASSIC CARS--MINNESOTA

We visited with Geri's dad last weekend at his retirement community in Inver Grove Heights, Minnesota.  It happened to be the weekend when the facility was celebrating its 10th anniversary.  As part of the celebration, the facility had arranged for a display of about a dozen classic cars in the parking area at the front of the facility.  I virtually always bring my camera on our excursions, so i decided to take some shots of the cars.  I did not have my tripod with me.  However, it was a very bright day, and most of the shots were taken at a very fast shutter speed.

Here is a shot of a 1953 Buick.

In those days each make of car seemed to have one defining style element, and Buick's was a series of three or four "portholes" on either side of the engine.  Theoretically, the portholes functioned to provide air for the engine, but these are obviously ornamental rather than functional.  I liked how I was able to show the reflection of a powder blue 1957 Chevy in each of the chrome medallions.

One of the first cars to arrive was a 1955 Chevy.

I had some affection for this car, which had been very nicely restored, because my first car was a 1955 Chevy.  That was in 1963, and the car was in much worse shape, even though it was almost 50 years younger than this car.  Here is the car's identifying logo.

Another attractive car was a 1955 Studebaker, also nicely restored.  Here is a portion of the car's hood, showing its distinctive jet/rocket hood ornament.

I think the Studebaker was gone by the early 1960s.

Here is the front end of what I think was a 1950 Ford.

And here is what I think is a portion of the car's trunk lid.

The shot is perhaps a bit simple, but I did like the clear line of the trunk lid.  Here is a similar shot of the back quarter section of another car.

One of the things I was attempting was to get shots that would show other cars being reflected in the polished chrome or sheet metal of the cars.  Here are a couple of my successes.

Finally, the oldest car in the collection was a 1930 Ford Model A.  I believe all Model As were black, as was this, and I worked hard to capture the reflections in the car's highly polished sheet metal, but nothing seemed to work out.  I did, however, get a good shot of the car's radiator.