Hemmings Auto Blog

Given our recent discussions on preservation versus restoration, let’s take a look at this 1940 Indian Model 440 four-cylinder motorcycle for sale on Hemmings.com, a worn and dusty but perfectly serviceable scoot. Would you restore it? Would you ride it as is? Or would you seal it in an airtight Read more

The good thing about museum-kept cars is that they tend to be in pristine condition, cosmetically well taken care of. On the flip side, museum cars tend not to get much exercise, so their mechanical condition may not compare with their aesthetic condition. We don’t know how well this museum-kept Read more

Nowadays, the orange barrel – that piece of road punctuation synonymous with construction – is fairly standardized, but it wasn’t that long ago that road crews had to rely on makeshift barrels to warn drivers of hazards, as we see from this Temple University-sourced photo of a construction-caused bottleneck on Read more

From Jim and Chester’s Garage comes today’s street scenes of a shopping center parking lot, taken sometime in the 1970s in Margate, Florida, replete with a recent customer of Man At Ease. Either that or it’s a still from a 1970s detective TV series. Don Smith of Jim and Chester’s Read more

As we’ve noted previously, the one question we field more often than any other is “What’s my car worth?” It’s also the one question we can’t directly answer for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is that it’s impossible to accurately appraise a car without experiencing it Read more

1979 Chevrolet Impala station wagon front bench seat. Photos courtesy GM Media. Just as the manual transmission was once considered standard equipment – enough for people to use “standard” synonymously with “manual” when referring to their transmissions – so too was the bench seat. Yet both have been superseded by Read more

We’ll make today’s street scene – shot by Charles Cushman in May 1965 in Istanbul, Turkey – a little more difficult. Because Cushman was focused on the Galata Tower (also seen in a previous Cushman street scene), all we really see of the cars in the scene are the roofs, Read more

For those of you who’ve noted the lack of trucks in the Texas street scenes we’ve highlighted in the past, have a look at this circa 1970 shot of the East Texas National Bank on Spring Street in Palestine, Texas, courtesy the Portal to Texas History. What do you see Read more

Sure, the woodgrain’s not exactly correct, and the wheels and tires might not be everybody’s cuppatea, but this 1978 Plymouth Fury Suburban for sale on Hemmings.com, a rare car to begin with and one hardly ever seen today, looks like it’s been handled with care over the last few decades. Read more

Automotive dealerships in the Fifties had so many more things to ogle than today’s dealerships – besides the cars, there were printed brochures, cutaway engines and cutaway cars, and purpose-built sales tools, such as this Arthur Fulmer seat cover display for sale on Hemmings.com. From the seller’s description: This is Read more