Rat Rods vs. Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

I’ve been reacquainting myself with a wonderful lady as of late: Mary Shelley.  I haven’t read Frankenstein: The Modern Prometheus since I was a teen.  I have iTunes to thank for this reunion, because they had a special sale on Shelley’s Frankenstein and several other works of classic literature that I just couldn’t pass up.  It was either free or very cheap to download the electronic publications, and so I did, because as you know, I love cheap or free stuff.

Mary Shelley is a fascinating person and an extraordinary writer.  Rereading her Frankenstein now, I regret that I never read any of her other novels, of which there are a few (though I have set it as a goal to attain and read them in the future).  Her writing has just the right proportion of word density and eloquence of phrase to actual movement through the story the words impart and the detail in which the story is rendered.  The writing is ornate, but not superfluous.  I’m not sure I really appreciated Shelley’s voice and technique the first time I read her book as a teen.  In spite of the text being nearly 200 years old, the meaning of all that she wrote is clear and beautiful still.  A lot of people never actually read the novel, figuring that between the movies and Halloween decorations, they already have the matter pretty well sorted out.  If you’re one of those folks, do yourself a favor and read the book, because there’s so much more to it than just the plot and the creature.  But enough of my gushing over literature, we’ve all gathered ‘round to talk about cars… and so we shall.

I kicked this off with Shelley’s Frankenstein for a reason. Today, we’re going to talk about Frankencars… known more commonly as Rat Rods.  Though, to even say something is a Franken-anything is a misnomer, because both the book’s title and subtitle, “Frankenstein“, and “The Modern Prometheus” refer to Dr. Victor Frankenstein rather than the creature he cobbled together in his experiment gone awry…  Clearly Frankenstein is the guy’s name, but Prometheus was a Titan from Greek Mythology who is credited with being the maker of mankind.  Regardless, I’m pretty sure everybody knows what I meant with my use of the term “Frankencar“.

A Rat Rod is not to be confused with a hot rod, which is traditionally a stripped down, souped up coupe or roadster from the 1920’s-1950’s.  Hot rods were all about taking an inexpensive old clunker of a car and transforming it by cutting down weight while building up power for cheap speed and fun.  So, with a typical hot rod in the most traditional sense, you’ll see things like fenders and hoods removed, and interiors stripped down to basics.  You’ll also see some attempt to make the car look good.  A traditional hot rod is a do-it-yourself affair, or one that you do with your friends.  There’s pride in that work, and so there are also attempts made to elevate the appearance of the end result.  Despite how stripped down a hot rod is in terms of creature comforts, there will be paint and some effort to beautify what remains of the body and the interior.  Hot rods have evolved a bit since that particular car sub-culture first emerged, but the essence is still there for the most part.

*Here’s a pretty traditional hot rod - 1923 Ford Model T was used as the starting point*

*Here’s a sort of traditional hot rod with some major power enhancements*

*And this is less of a “Hot Rod” and more of what I would call a “Haught Rod”… that is to say, it involved a super expensive build, done not by some motor head and his buddies as an after work hobby, but more than likely built by a speed shop that was commissioned to do the heavy lifting.  It’s gorgeous, but it’s kind of lacking that old school DIY spirit a bit, don’t you think?  Though I wouldn't mind taking it out to play either way.

*This is what I would dub a “Craft Rod” due to its mixture of Hot Rod and a very precise and expert level of craftsmanship involved in its making.  Look at that beautiful woodwork!

Going back to Shelley’s Frankenstein, a hot-rodder could be looked at as akin to Victor Frankenstein, in that he altered the natural state of things in pursuit of his ambitions.  A hot-rodder will alter the “natural” state of an automobile to make it suitable for the desired application, which, in this case, is driving as fast as possible.  Originally, hot rodders used what was available and cheap, so you see lots of old Ford bodies that were otherwise just sitting around as salvage.  Likewise, Victor Frankenstein salvages parts to build his creation.

Whether you’re building a living being or building a hot rod, it’s a huge undertaking and requires a great deal of focus, work, and determination to yield results.  In Shelley’s writing, we first meet with lofty ambition through Captain Robert Walton, whose correspondence with his sister not only lays the groundwork for readers to meet Victor Frankenstein, but also shows us the lengths Walton is willing to go to in order to attain his goal, which is to explore the North Pole and thus gain fame for himself.  While not quite as demanding as abandoning everyone and everything you know to hire a ship and a crew to traverse brutal and cold seas on a potentially deadly expedition to the North Pole, there are sacrifices involved with the goal of creating a hot rod: time, chiefly and money secondarily (at least in original hot rods, money was the lesser of the two investments).   There’s also the sacrifice of the car in its original state.  Compromising or altering the aesthetic and outward design as well as its function could be disastrous if done by somebody who doesn’t have a good sense of what they’re doing.  So, in terms of level of risk (of disaster) and sacrifice, a regular hot rod, in Shelley terms, is about the same level or risk as Captain Robert Walton’s voyage.   That is, it’s ambitious, but not yet past the point of crazy.

*I'm not sure what this really is, but part of the front is a Lincoln, and the back is a Chevy.  Who knows what else is in the mix here*

Then there’s the Victor Frankenstein level of risk and sacrifice in the name of ambition.  Frankenstein wasn’t satisfied with merely learning how to save and preserve lives in his studies of medicine and science.  He wanted to create life…. Not from scratch, mind you, because that would be a little too simple -after all, lots of people have impregnated  women, thus getting half the credit for “creating” a life.  Frankenstein was more of a builder in that he wanted to reassemble and reanimate his way into creating a whole new being.  This level of hacking, dismantling, rebuilding and revival has its automotive equivalent in the Rat Rod.  Though, I would venture to say that a Rat Rod looks the way it does much more intentionally than Frankenstein’s creature looked the way it did.  Frankenstein set out to create perfection and ended up with a grotesque, whereas a rat rodder’s  idea of perfection is a grotesque in the best, most surly, nitty-gritty, rust-busted sense of the word.

*Here’s a pretty extreme example of a rat rod.  Note how much of the function was sacrificed for the sake of its extreme form.  Even some of the car’s mechanical functions seem just for display -note the lack of a belt connecting to the pulley on the supercharger, for example.

In Victor Frankenstein’s case, the sacrifice proved to be too much, and what he got in return for all his hard work and sacrifice horrified him.  The creature Frankenstein created was giant in stature due to the extremes the doctor had to go to in assembling and attempting to balance the pieces he had to some human like proportion though its overall scale ended up skewed toward the gigantic end of things… which would have been fine, and nowadays probably could have landed the creature a nice contract to play in the NBA.

*Rat Rod interior*

It was only when this leviathan was brought to life that its terrible artificiality became so shockingly clear to the doctor.  Whether it was the eerie pallor the creature’s nearly translucent flesh, the jaundiced yellow of its eyes, or the unearthly hollowness of its gaze, Frankenstein’s own creation horrified him, and he ran, abandoning the very thing he sacrificed so much of himself to create.  To bring this back to today’s car analogies, Frankenstein set out to build a hot rod and was terrified to discover that he had instead constructed a rat rod.  

For illustration, here are some pictures of 1937 Ford pickup trucks.  Longtime readers may recognize the dark cherry one as my dad’s, which is a resto mod.  The beige and brown one is restored and the other two are Rat Rod 37 Ford Pickups.  Amazing to think that they all started out as identical trucks.

When I was at the car show where most of these vehicles were on display this past summer, I was looking at one of the rat rod 37’s and a couple of guys about my dad’s age were sitting nearby in their lawn chairs next to their perfectly restored vintage autos.  They asked me why I was so fascinated by the rat rod truck.  Neither could understand what the appeal of the rat rod was.  One of the two was even muttering insults about the build and appearance during lulls in our conversation.  These guys hadn’t built hot rods, they restored something to its original and intended glory, and they just could not fathom why somebody would chose to leave a form incomplete, unfinished, damaged, mismatched, and rusty, let alone celebrate that state of affairs.  These guys were neither Frankenstein, nor Walton in our analogy.. These guys were cosmetic surgeons.

*1932 Chevy Rat Rod

But, we are linking two very different things here.  After all, Frankenstein’s creature was alive, with cognition and feeling, and very poor coping skills when it came to dealing with rejection, as it turned out.  Cars, on the other hand are sometimes thought of in an anthropomorphic sense…  How many people do you know who have named their vehicles?  I do it.. I even used to name some of the cars that I would sell back when I was in the car business.  Cars are not sentient beings, though… outside of Stephen King novels, that is.  Cars don’t have feelings and won’t skulk off all rejected if the person who designed them takes one look at the production model and runs away screaming as Victor Frankenstein did with his creation.  Cars won’t hide out in the wilderness to mope, nor will they reach out to strangers in search of acceptance, then go on a murderous rampage when they are once again rejected…. Cars are nice in that way in which unearthly science experiment creatures are not.

*Well, some cars are cognizant, it seems.. I forgot about the vehicles from one of my little nephew’s favorite movies.  Come to think of it, this one is a bit ratty, so he does fit right in with today’s subject.

But cars do take sacrifice of money, time, effort, and depending on how much time, relationships can be diminished in the process of building or maintaining a car.  Modifying a car or making a rat rod also requires the sacrifice of the car at its core.  It comes down to what the goal is, what the builder’s abilities are, what resources they have at their disposal, and what they’re willing to accept as completion of their goal.

*lest you think Rat Rods can only be rusty things or primered metal, take a look at this old 1954 Corvette.  There’s no rust here.. That’s a fiberglass body.  While it hasn’t yet been chopped and mated with parts from some other car, it’s well on its way to ratty-fabulousity.*

What one should ask before embarking on an automotive building excursion is what are they willing to sacrifice to reach the final goal?  Then, is that goal even worth the sacrifice?  Does its creation justify the ruin and neglect of the things that have to fall by the wayside during the pursuit?  Victor Frankenstein found out the hard way that it wasn’t. His failing was that in his relentless pursuit of pushing the boundaries of what he could do, he never stopped to consider whether it was something he SHOULD do.  After that, the question became which of the two was the real grotesque, the creature or its maker?  In that same vein, does having the best hot rod in the world justify going to extremes like draining retirement savings, neglecting relationships, or destroying the original intent behind what might have otherwise been a perfectly nice vehicle to create it?  It’s a balancing act.          

So, whether we’re talking pristine restorations, perfect preservations, resto-mods, Hot Rods, Haught Rods, Craft Rods, or nitty-gritty, outlandish Rat Rods: all deserve to have some acknowledgement of the sacrifice involved in their existence... and all have their admirers, even if those groups and sub-groups have radically different aesthetic sensibilities.  I love 'em all.      

Glare Ice and Creepy Parking Ramp Lurkers.

The return home from work last night was treacherous.  I knew the warm weather (relatively warm, anyway) wasn't going to hold up.  I thought I was being pretty clever parking in the ramp because we had those big, fluffy, goose down flakes of snow falling when I drove in and I didn't want to have to clear off my car when it was time to leave.  Well, I did manage to avoid having to shovel snow off the car, and it only cost me $3 to park in the ramp thanks to the odd time at which I entered.  There was a trade off, though.  I got a bit of a jolt when I was walking out to the car in the wee and dark hours of the morning.  Some creepy guy dressed in all dark clothing had tucked himself away around the corner outside the elevator.  I was almost all the way past him when I caught a bit of movement out of the corner of my eye and realized there was a person hiding there.  I don’t think he was planning on doing anything… at least I hope he wasn't.  When I glanced over, he was looking at me, but when I maintained my gaze, he stared down at his hands, and appeared to be texting on his phone.  Man, he gave me a good scare, though.

I decided right away that I was ready to whirl around and punch him with a fist full of car keys if I heard his footfalls behind me after I passed by.  Thankfully, he continued to mess around on his phone, or at least pretend to, and I didn't have to do anything.

Because I keep odd hours, I’m normally really good about maintaining situational awareness when I’m out and about.  What bothered me the most about last night’s Haaf ramp experience was that I kind of let this one slip, so it was nice that the guy wasn't up to anything particularly bad -that I know of.  The weird thing is that mine was the only car parked on the top and second to top level of the parking structure, aside from the city fleet vehicles that are stored there, so I’m not really sure what this guy was even doing on that floor of the ramp in the first place.  He sure didn't seem to have a car anywhere close by.

That sure got my blood pumping.  After I got in my car and drove by the spot where he had been lurking about, I saw that he had gone, and caught just a glimpse of him as the elevator doors closed with him inside.  Maybe I surprised him as much as he surprised me… I don’t know.

Anyway, it turns out, that little jolt was just what I needed to safely navigate my way to the gym and then home after work.  My situational awareness antennae was working overtime and so, I was acutely aware of just about everything around me…  particularly, the lousy road surface I was driving on when I left the ramp.

*here's a damaged Mustang I spotted outside a body shop a short while ago.  Enjoy gawking at it and be glad it's not yours.

The name of the game in Minneapolis last night was glare ice.  For those of you from warmer climes, glare ice, also known as black ice, is what you get when daytime temps are warm enough that falling snow or already accumulated snow gets melty and coats all the outdoor surfaces with water.  The sun goes down, the temperature drops, the wind picks up, and the wind chill gets brutal, and that’s when that damp coating of water on the roadways freezes into a fine finish of ice.  There is very little traction to be had on this stuff, so driving on it can be particularly treacherous when trying to stop the momentum of one’s car as it slides around.  I made it to the gym, where I got out my boxing gloves and pummeled the punching bag as practice for if I ever have to throw down while walking to my car, then I did a kickboxing boot camp workout video, which I’m sure annoyed the two other people who happened to be in the gym at the time, because playing it switched the music that had been pumping over the speakers to the audio from the workout DVD.  Personally, I find the instructor’s Aussie accent charming, but I can’t speak for the other two night owls at the gym who had to listen to it in the background of their exercise routines.  Well, whatever, I was keyed up and needed an outlet…  besides, I don’t complain when the guy who uses the free weights grunts and groans all dramatically ALL THE TIME, so I felt justified with my choice of activity.

*another view of that damaged Mustang to oogle*

I made it safely home after the gym, but you’d better believe I was ready for a fight on that walk across the gym parking lot to my car after my boxing and boot camp kickboxing activities.  I maintained that readiness on the jaunt from my garage into the house when I got home.

So, we’ll never know how I would have fared in a fight with the creepy parking ramp lurker, but I did defeat the glare ice last night.  That wasn't always the case though.  About fifteen years ago, I had a very bad experience with glare ice.  That time, I definitely did not win.

What you’re looking at in the photo is what was left of my 1989 Ford Bronco II.  That Bronco was the used car I drove for most of high school and into college for the first year or two of undergrad.  I loved that little rig, even though I realize it had some real shortcomings in terms of mechanical design and safety.

The Bronco II was kind of a comeback of the original Bronco compact SUV that Ford made in the mid sixties into the mid seventies, only not as cool, nor as collectible.  It was smaller than the big Broncos like the white one made famous in the OJ Simpson low-speed chase that took place for all to see in the late 1990’s.  The Bronco II shared an awful lot in common with the Ford Ranger, in fact.

In 1989, a Bronco II with 4x4, like mine was had a starting MSRP of around $15,000 -less for a 2WD version of it.  Under the hood was a 2.9L V6 that produced 140 HP and 170 lb-ft of torque.  As lacking in performance as those specs seem to be, you might think that it would have a trade off of decent fuel economy, at least.  Well, no, it didn't.  16/20 MPG was the estimated rating, but the way I drove when I was 15 years younger, those numbers went down by a few MPGs.

Prior to the tragedy that befell my Bronco II, it had been an adorable little two-tone maroon and silver 4x4, all stubby and stocky looking.  Even though it was four or five years old by the time my parents purchased it for my siblings and I to drive, it looked fantastic, and I was a demon about washing and waxing it on a regular basis.  That top-heavy, stockiness that I found attractive about the rig also contributed to the bad reputation these things gained for how easy it was to roll one over.

Don’t go off thinking that I totaled my Bronco II in a simple rollover, though.  Mine didn't roll sideways like the Bronco II was prone to do.  I flipped mine end over end… backwards, off an interstate bridge and down a ravine, at interstate speed.  My Bronco cart wheeled -or rather, back flipped for at least two and a half rotations before its axis skewed and it then heaved sideways for a rotation or two, crushing four little sapling trees before coming to a halt on its side.

What triggered this feat of automotive acrobatics?  Glare ice.  The roadways were fine when I set out that day, driving toward my parent’s home in Iowa after visiting my sister in Minneapolis all those years ago.  It was winter, and there was some moisture on the roadways, but it hadn't frozen yet, even after the sun went down.  What I didn't think about though, was the fact that certain parts of the road were more apt to freeze up than others… like bridges.  With all that cool air circulating underneath, there’s no geothermal warmth to keep that mist on the surface of the bridge from turning into glare ice.  So, when I was cruising along in my Bronco II, perfectly stable and sure-footed on the interstate, I lost control when my vehicle lost traction on the surface of the bridge.  The tires slipped, but then one rear wheel found some purchase.  The vehicle slid and fish-tailed.  I felt a surge in my belly, the likes of which signal an acute sense of doom.  The Bronco’s one rear wheel that grabbed traction caused the entire rig to whip around and flip its forward momentum into a backwards slide to the shoulder of the road where it met with the end of the bridge, from which the land fell away to a steep ravine.

For a moment, I felt weightless.  I realized immediately that my car was tipping down the ravine, lifting me up in the air as if I was strapped in for a carnival ride.  Though it happened quickly, I can clearly remember my thoughts as if I had enjoyed a great deal of time in which to ponder the situation.  First thought: “Oh shit“, followed quickly by the second: “My car is ruined!”  Then, oddly enough, a thrill as I considered the fact that I had never been in a major wreck before, and on the bright side, it would amount to at least some kind of learning experience… if I survived.  “Aww crap!” was the next thing that entered my mind..  That pesky survival instinct that ruins all kinds of smashing good fun had arrived, and it brought with its friend, panic.  “Close your eyes, You probably shouldn't see this“, I told myself as the angle of the ever-rising Bronco passed the tipping threshold for its first rotation, and time slowed even further for just a second before suddenly, it hit what seemed like warp speed, and my car began its end over end tumble down the ravine.
 The noise I heard was unforgettable; the thrashing sound of the ravine’s tall, snow covered grass snapping and crushing down as the weight of the toppling car ripped at its brittle winter remnants.  And finally, there seemed to be an explosion of blue sparks and silence.

I opened my eyes to surroundings that seemed so much darker than I recalled when I had first approached the bridge.  I was in an awkward position, and soon realized this was because my car lay on its side at the bottom of the ravine where it rested upon crushed vegetation.  There was a spray of snow on the dashboard and steering wheel, and much more of it by my head, forming a frigid pillow where the driver’s side window had been.  I was distressed by this broken window business and took a moment to utter some curses before orienting myself.  I realized the little Bronco was lying on its driver’s side in the snow, but somehow, it hadn't occurred to me that the missing window was the least of the damage to the vehicle.

“Dummy!  Worrying about the window?”  I then thought, “what if I’m paralyzed or really hurt?”  A sense of dread consumed me momentarily, and I was afraid to move.  That passed in short order, and I unfastened my seat belt and easily located my coat, as it had flopped against the door next to me during the accident. I maneuvered around a bit and planted my feet in the pillow of snow where my window had been, then climbed the bench seat to reach what was now the skyward facing plane of my car, the passenger side.

I opened the passenger side door, impressed by the weight of it.  I had never before realized how large my car’s doors were, and experienced some difficulty pushing it open far enough to pull myself up an out onto the upturned passenger side.  Of course, I later found out that these efforts could have been saved simply by crawling through the space where the windshield had been.  It hadn't occurred to me that the entire pane of glass was missing.

I remember sitting atop the side of my car for a moment or two after I climbed up from inside, kind of pulsing and shaking as I looked around and bled onto the silver portion of the painted fender.  It was the dead of night, but the ground was covered in snow, which reflected the moonlight.  I felt a sweeping sense of relief when I realized that my Bronco’s headlights were still working and augmenting the moon glow that was reflecting white, glittery light from the snow on the ground.  For a moment, I even thought that perhaps just uprighting the car and fixing a few dents and dings might make things all better.. I was unaware of the fact that the plural no longer applied to the little truck’s lighting array, as the passenger side headlight sat a few feet away in the snow.  The area illuminated was pale gold and sparkling white, the combination of the snow over dried grass and weeds.

Several dark clods dotted the light landscape, and I realized they were not actually clods of dirt like I first thought.  That’s my stuff, I realized.  Just as I was wondering where certain items of my luggage were, an alarming thought struck.  My car is on its side.  I've just been in an accident.  What if it blows up like pretty much every car accident in every movie I've ever seen?   Better run! my instincts screamed inside my head, and I plopped down from the rolled Bronco, landing on soft squishy grass-padded snow next to the underside of my car.  A shoe was lost as I scrambled away from the vehicle, slipping, sliding, and clawing my way up the ravine.  I was fine more or less, with a few cuts and scrapes and a mild concussion.  I flagged down a truck driver when I reached the roadway.  As I sat in his truck while he called State Patrol, I felt stupid for fleeing from my overturned car like I had -kind of traitorous, almost.  It hadn't blown up as I feared it would, and now, there it sat, all by its lonesome at the bottom of the slope.

The fact that I’m around to write this is a testament to what a great invention seat belts are.  The next day, my parents, who were less sympathetic about the fact that I had been involved in an accident than they were pissed off at me for wrecking the car, got in touch with a family friend who owns a towing and collision repair business.  Friends who know my dad can probably imagine the words that came out of his mouth when he found out about it:“God dammit! Val!” -a phrase that was practically my dad’s mantra when I was in my youth.  Together, we trekked out to the scene to haul my Bronco out of the ravine.  Our friend and his crew had to use his flatbed tow truck’s winch plus three or four very long tow straps and a couple of tow chains just to reach my car from the roadway.  I watched as they tipped it back onto its wheels, then repositioned the chains to drag it up and out of the ravine.  We counted and measured the indentations in the snow leading from the edge of the bridge and down the ravine to track the movement and flips of the Bronco, and that’s how we figured out just what my car’s gymnastics routine had consisted of.

The lesson to take from this is to just be careful in the cold.  Even when you think the roads are fine, keep in mind that the bridges are colder yet.  Glare ice is such a fine, thin sheet on the surface of the road that by the time you realize its there, you've probably already lost traction…. And wear your seat belt, for God’s sake -they really are handy things.

To this day, when I cross over that bridge along Southbound I-35, I can practically hear the echo from all that thrashing about as my Bronco crashed, crushed, and flipped its way down the grassy, snowy ravine all those years ago, and I can’t help but think of that little SUV and the last time I ever drove it.

The Black Stallion vs. The Ferrari 456M GT-A

While looking through my photo dump files to pick out a car for today’s post, I came across just the thing: a 2000 Ferrari 456M GT-A finished in black.  I’m not really a fan of cars that use alpha-numeric names in place of actual words, but when it’s for a car that looks this nice, who cares?  And besides, it’s not like Ferrari just plopped a bunch of letters and numbers together all willy-nilly.  The “456” part of the name comes from the fact that each of the car’s 12 cylinders (yep, it’s a V12) displaces 456 cubic centimeters.  This was the last time Ferrari utilized this precept to assign the numeric portion of their car’s names.  The 456 is also the last Ferrari built with pop up headlights, FYI.

The “M” portion stands for “Modificata” -or “modified” to us.  It’s in there because the 456 was made from 1992-2003, and in 1998, the model underwent a refresh that improved both form and function.  This is why, when looking at 456s that are for sale now, the pre “M” models sell for around $10,000-$20,000 less than the “M” models, but we’ll get into that later.

The “GT” portion is something we’ve seen before.  It stands for “Gran Turismo” and signifies that the car is a grand tourer.  That is to say, it’s a horsey that was born to run long distance trips in comfort, and at sustained high speeds.   Finally, the “A” portion signifies that this one has an automatic transmission, which is kind of a rare thing to find in a Ferrari, but not so rare in a Ferrari 456.  A 456M GT would be the same car but with a manual instead of the automatic.

Well, it sure looks lovely, doesn’t it?  Of course it does!  That body was designed by Pininfarina, which I’ve mentioned in several other posts.  I’m not sure that design firm is capable of producing something that doesn’t look great.  Absolutely, this is a good looking car, but what can it do?

With a thundering 5.5L V12 under the hood, this beast can pound out 442 HP and 406 lb-ft of torque, put to the pavement at the rear wheels.  Meanwhile, the car’s 2+2 seating arrangement can accommodate up top four people.  It’s got a top speed of 185 MPH (and can go one mph higher than that with the manual transmission), and a 0-60 time of 5.2 seconds.  The downside is the 10/15 MPG you’ll get while driving this machine, which means frequent and expensive stops at the gas pump.

One of the things about this car that was considered pretty cool at the time was how the frameless windows would dip down a tiny bit when the doors opened and pop back up when they closed to seal in the window channel.  That’s not so uncommon now, and in fact, my Mustang has that same feature, but it was initially a rare offering when the 456M was introduced.  That Pininfarina body work mentioned earlier is done in aluminum to keep the car nice and light.  In fact, the curb weight I was able to track down for the 456 is about 3,700 lbs, so it‘s a fairly lean, mean machine.

And here’s the famous badge that lets you know without a doubt that this is a Ferrari.  The black prancing pony, rearing up against a yellow backdrop is a gorgeous icon befitting of an equally gorgeous car like this.  And, since we spent a little while deciphering acronyms earlier in this post, let’s take a moment to talk about that “SF” on the emblem.  It stands for “Scuderia Ferrari” which means Ferrari Stable.  Usually, this is taken to mean Team Ferrari instead of like a horse stable where these mechanical prancing ponies are parked.  It’s a nod to the racing division of this illustrious automobile brand.

But lets go back to that black prancing pony for a moment, because it’s time to work in some literature.  This one isn’t much of a leap, so you won’t have to stretch too far to hop aboard my oncoming tangent.  In 1941, a novel called “The Black Stallion” written by Walter Farley was published.  I read it back in the 1980’s when I was a kid, and I even saw the movie that was made based on the book, because it was one that was shown quite frequently at the library where I used to go to check out books.  Now that I think about it, doesn’t it seem odd to show the movie version of things at the very place where people should be going to get the book version? -oh well.  

*This is a picture of a black horse.. a baby thoroughbred that belongs to one of my sister's friends who has her own little stable of race horses, actually.  I'm not sure if it's a male or a female, but either way, it's going to have to serve as our black stallion for this post.*

Anyway, the book and movie centered around an Arabian race horse who ended up stranded on an island with a teenage kid named Alec after the ship they were both traveling on sank.  There’s the touching story of the kid and the horse forming a bond over having to rely on each other to survive and blah, blah, blah, until eventually, they’re rescued.  When Alec and the black stallion get on solid land, they take up horse racing, and it turns out that they’re pretty good at it.

The kid, Alec, is apparently not too creative when it comes to picking names, and he names this black stallion “Black”.  I suppose it could be worse.  He could have named the horse something like “456”, but I digress.  Anyway, more books were written after the success of the initial Black Stallion novel, and in them, Black produces some offspring, one of which is named Satan, which seems like a good way to keep expectations low in terms of that colt’s behavior and conduct, but otherwise, kind of a mean name to give a little baby horse.  Whatever, we already determined that Alec is no good at picking horse names, so it’s not like this should be a surprise.

So, what does our Ferrari 456M GT-A have in common with Black, the black stallion?  Most obviously, they’re both black.  One is a black horse, while the other is a black car that features a black horse on its badges.  Both have some racing blood in their veins, and both are fast.

Whereas Black the stallion sired a successor named Satan, the 456 was replaced by a car called the 612 Scaglietti, which isn’t really a word so much as it’s a name, and no, it doesn’t translate to mean Satan, though at least both start with an S, so there’s that in common.  Scaglietti was an Italian coach building company that did a lot of work for Ferrari initially and is now owned by Ferrari.  Though, it should be noted that even the 612 Scaglietti was actually designed by Pininfarina.  Oh, and to make a little skip to another tangent, 612 just happens to be the telephone area code for good old Minneapolis, Minnesota, which is where I am situated right now, looking at my photos of today’s car and typing away about the Black Stallion…. And speaking of which, let’s get back to that comparison.

The Black Stallion can only comfortably seat one rider, whereas the 456M GT-A can accommodate 4.  Both, however, would have to be shipped across the sea to get from their places of origin to the US market.

Both the Black Stallion and the Ferrari 456 are expensive.  Brand new, the Ferrari 456 had a price tag that topped $200,000.  A race horse can cost millions of dollars depending upon its breeding and its history.  Both Ferraris and race horses are expensive to maintain.  Just to give some perspective, from what I looked up today on the Weekly Hay Market Demand and Price Report, the average price for prime grade hay is $275.83 per ton.  According to some poster on Yahoo answers, there are 308 gallons in one ton of gasoline, which as of right now, has a national average price of $3.29 per gallon, though I’m sure the Ferrari takes premium, but we’ll err on the side of keeping this simple.  So, 3.29 X 308 = $1,013.32 for a ton of gasoline.  The actual horse is cheaper to feed, it turns out.    

Of course, now that the 456 hasn’t been made for over ten years, the cost to buy one has gone down significantly.  Most of the post 1998, M model 456s that I found had between 10,000-20,000 miles on their odometers and were priced between $50,000 and $70,000.  Pre 1998 model years, and thus before the M 456s will ring up at around $40,000.  Personally, I’d take the Ferrari over the Black Stallion race horse, mostly because it’s a car that I love, but also because I don’t have a “scuderia” to accommodate an actual horse.                    

The Ecstasy of the Rolls Royce.

One of my favorite things to do is co-mingle art/literature/pop culture and cars.  So, for the post to mark my return from hiatus (which was spent relaxing, looking at motorcycles, and fending off ice dams on my house), I’m bringing you a mixture of art and cars that will leave you in ecstasy… or at least involves ecstasy.

This isn't so much about the art of an automobile as it is about the art on an automobile… specifically, the Rolls Royce, a brand that features a distinct sculptural element as its hood ornament known as “The Spirit of Ecstasy”.  You've probably seen this gal.  She was originally plated in silver, though later was typically featured in chrome, but has also been offered in crystal or even gold plated.  It’s a statuette of a female leaning forward with her arms flung up and back behind her as her vestments heave and flow around her like wings.  Yeah, she makes for a cool and kind of Art Deco style ornament, but did you know that she was an actual person… that is, that she is the sculptural representation of a model named Eleanor Velasco Thornton?

Back in the early 1900’s, Eleanor was having a fling with a guy who was a big wig in the automotive world.  So, when Rolls Royce decided they needed a fancy-schmancy ornament to ride atop their radiators, this big shot boyfriend of hers (who eventually married another woman even as he continued his affair with Eleanor) recommended Ms. Velasco Thornton as a model.  Thus, the automotive big shot hired his buddy, a sculptor named Charles Robinson Sykes to incorporate Eleanor into the design.  It took a few mock ups and prototypes before Sykes came up with the swoopy form of the Spirit of Ecstasy, but eventually, he did, and that’s what Rolls Royces wear on their hoods today…. Well sort of.  There have been a few changes made over the years in terms of scale, materials, even tweaks to the form and posture of the figure, but she’s certainly still recognizable.

Here are some images of some Rolls Royce automobiles to feast your eyes upon.  Sadly, at the time I took these photos, I lacked the foresight to know that I would need a nice close up shot of the hood ornament, so you’ll have to make due with a zoomed in shot of it.  Well, it‘s still nice to think that folks who buy Rolls Royces get a little piece of art with their car in addition to whatever artistry goes into the vehicle’s actual sheet metal.          

….Oh, but you don’t think we’re done, do you?  Why, I haven’t even launched myself off on a proper tangent yet!  And you know I can’t write a blog post without doing that.  So, strap in.  Away we go.

Since we’re on the topics of ecstasy and artwork, I couldn't possibly conclude this post without bringing up another sculpture that deals with a female form and the matter of ecstasy.  There are a surprising number of parallels to be drawn between Rolls Royce brand vehicles and what’s coming up next, in spite of the fact that we’re going to have to jog a bit further back in time and space than the early 1900’s in England (when Rolls Royce gained their Spirit of Ecstasy) to get to it.

Waaaaay back, in fact, to the mid 1600’s in Italy.  Long before Charles Sykes was sculpting Eleanor bowing into a dramatic sweeping form, there was another guy who sculpted a woman getting all hot and bothered in dramatic fashion.  Just so happens that this guy was the principal architect of 17th century Rome at the time.  Not only that, but he was an amazing sculptor and pioneer of the three-dimensional wing of the Baroque movement.  I’m talking about Gianlorenzo Bernini and his astounding, mostly marble, but also mixed media masterpiece, the Ecstasy of St. Teresa.

Given that she was sculpted before there were cars on the roads, it’s pretty safe to assume that St Teresa isn't swooning over the thrill of the Rolls Royce experience -but this lady is definitely feeling the spirit of ecstasy.  So, you might be wondering just what it is that’s got Teresa all-a-fluster.  You might also be thinking that for a saint, this gal sure seems to enjoy herself.  Well, according to Teresa’s version of events, an angel of the lord penetrated her heart with a flaming golden arrow.  Of this, she said, “the pain was so great that I screamed aloud; but at the same time, I felt such infinite sweetness that I wished the pain to last forever….. It was the sweetest caressing of the soul by God.”

….Well, then, you go on with your soul caressing, Teresa.  It looks like lots of fun.  It does feel a bit voyeuristic to look at the piece, though, doesn't it?  After all, “caressing” that gets this type of a rise out of folks usually takes place behind closed doors (Or, if you’re Eleanor, on the hood of a Rolls Royce).  Teresa may have felt this experience on more of an emotional or psychological level, but of course, that stuff doesn't translate well into sculpture -especially not Baroque sculpture with its overblown dramatics and exaggerated posturing.  And, thanks to the Baroque period and its drama-infused interpretations of the subject matter its artists set out to depict, Bernini is able to blast his work’s viewers with both barrels of melodrama and poignant gratification, but still get away with it in spite of the clucking of prudish critics at the time.  After all, this is a religious subject matter.  Who could possibly have a leg to stand on complaining about this back in the day?  Hey, if God saw fit to bestow an orgasmic religious experience on Teresa, who is Bernini or anybody else to poo-pooh the depiction of such divine intervention?  Especially after Teresa was kind enough to share the details of this romp of the soul for the record?

So, we know the Rolls Royce Spirit of Ecstasy and Bernini’s Ecstasy of St Teresa are both sculptures, both sculpted by men, and both feature women depicting (duh) ecstasy.  What else do they have in common?  Well, let’s see.  Remember how I mentioned earlier that you could get the Rolls Royce Spirit of Ecstasy ornament in gold plate (for an extra cost, of course)?  Just so happens that Bernini’s sculpture has its own share of gold, seen on the flaming, golden arrow shaft wielded by the angel of God, and plating the three-dimensional rays shooting toward Teresa from the heavens even as real light splashes down on the figures from a clever little hidden light source above.   Know what else has a nifty skylight?  The Rolls Royce Ghost V12 with its big, sunny, panoramic roof.  Of course a panoramic roof kind of pales in comparison to gleaming rays of sublime radiance from the heavens erupting through the atmosphere in a focused splay of gold to drench the seraphic spectacle of the angel and Teresa in hallowed luminosity -but then again, the Rolls doesn't have the benefit of having been created in the Baroque era, does it?

But what about ride quality?  Surely the sculpted silver gray cloud of marble upon which St Teresa swoons can’t compare to the luxury and smooth splendor of a Rolls Royce?  Actually, it can.  Heck, there’s even a Rolls called the Silver Cloud.  Speaking of which, here’s a picture of a 1963 silver cloud to gaze upon -try not to pass out from the ecstasy of it.

But whose silver cloud is better?  The Rolls could certainly take you for quite the ride.  Granted, it’s over 50 years old at this point, but you’d still look pretty darn austere being driven around in this Silver Cloud, with its preeminent upright design accented with just the right amount of swooping body work to let you know that somebody busted their hump working the English wheel to make that machine look so good.  The car, down to its nuts and bolts is extremely dignified.

St Teresa isn't exactly shown in her most dignified moment, by comparison.  Her silver cloud seems to be heaving her upward to meet those rapturous rays of light, in fact, driving her further from dignity and closer to, well, ecstasy.  That cloud is thrusting her right up into the sky, and judging from the way her garments are flopped and strewn about in piles, it sure looks like Teresa’s cloud imparts a very tumultuous ride.  I suppose it’s a personal choice between a velvety Rolls and a rapturous cloud, so we’ll call that one a draw.

Of course, the finery the two women, Eleanor, and Teresa wear is also something they have in common, and both suggest movement through space is taking place along with the upward thrust of air to whip the material about.  However, Eleanor’s clothing’s embodiment of a wing-like appearance takes the win for form over the flowing folds of Teresa’s fabric.  It’s not as detailed as Teresa’s clothing, either, but Eleanor’s outfit and the posture it hangs on wins in terms of dynamism.

Whether you find your holy-moley moment in a Rolls Royce, on a silver cloud, in its back seat, or in a spiritual sense that you might want to keep to yourself, lest some guy like Bernini should come along and makes a big ol’ sculpture of it for the whole world to see, there’s plenty of ecstasy to go around.