Studebaker

SIR took us to the Studebaker Museum.

It was shiny and it was colorful 

and there was something for everyone.

She carried the tires and brought Daddy the ratchet and they added oil and fluids before they went for a drive.

The grown ups not tending the child wandered through American history, following an immigrant family teetering on bankruptcy while making goat carts

 and sleighs

until one brother returned from the California Gold Rush, ready to invest in the family business the fortune ($8,000) he'd made.... building and selling small wheelbarrows to the miners.  

   

The Studebakers created cars of surpassing elegance

often decorated to within an inch of their lives.... like the wheels of this fire engine:

The museum was mostly Studebakers, but there was this Hispano-Suiza, Phrynne Fisher's car, sitting smugly beside the mannequin.

There was so much to stare at.  There were big fat tires

and fantastic colors

and elegantly shaped rooflines.

There were fins

and more fins

and there was sheer elegance.

There was the original kiddie car

and there was the carriage in which Mr. & Mrs. Lincoln rode to Ford's Theater that night...

which stopped us in our tracks, too moved to take a picture, standing respectfully in front of the most impressive vehicle of all.  

It was a lovely few hours.  Here's the link, in case you are ever in South Bend.