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GREATER VICTORIA Advertising Feature
Your One Stop Collision Repair Facility #2-2333 Government St.
250.380.3995 perfectionscustompaint@shawcable.com
Locally Owned and Operated 20 Years in Business
• February 8, 2013
Family keeps rolling with hot rods and customs Events & Activities... FEBRUARY 13 – The Vancouver Island Mustang Association meets at Jasmine’s Restaurant on the Old Island Highway in Colwood. Dinner begins at 6:30 p.m., with the meeting following at 7:30 p.m. Everyone is welcome to attend. FEBRUARY 17 – Steve Copp Construction Winter Hornet Series Enduro, 1 p.m. start at Western Speedway. FMI: www.westernspeedway.net MARCH 5 – Vintage Car Club meets, St. Luke’s Church Hall, 7:30 p.m. FMI: victoria.vccc.com
Send your driving, boating or biking-related events to
jblyth@telus.net
Bob Larson’s 1940 Mercury coupe boasts a 354 cubic inch Chrysler Hemi engine.
Vancouver contractor Bill Larson believes the support of his family and a wide group of car enthusiast friends is a big reason he is a cancer survivor today. By mid-2012, his ALYN EDWARDS future looked bleak as CLASSIC cancer and weight loss RIDES took its toll on his body. His hobby project to turn a 1937 Ford sedan into a hot rod remained in pieces in his garage. He didn’t know his retired mechanic brother Jim, Jim’s son Bob and a host of car friends and supporters had collected all the parts from Bill’s garage for the uncompleted 1937 Ford ‘flatback’ sedan hot rod and were hurriedly trying to finish the project. When Bill’s health took a significant turn for the worse last August, they promised him his car would be waiting to drive when he got out of the hospital. Pioneer hot rodder Jerry Abramson was the first to reach into his pocket and then encouraged other friends to donate money to finish the body work on Bill’s car. When the body was completed and painted, friends got together to install it on a new frame that had been built by his brother Jim the previous year. Bill was still in the hospital when Jim told him he would be able to drive his hot rod when he got out. Like magic, Bill began to perk up while businesses like Tom the Tire Guy, the Old Car Centre and Aldergrove A-1 Glass donated necessary items. Hot rod builder Dave Salter took the car to his shop to wire and fire the engine so it could be driven. When Bill was finally released from hospital last October, he was amazed to find the project completed by dozens of family members and hot rod friends who had donated money and labour.
Bob Larson’s radically customized 1940 Mercury coupe was inspired by a California custom built by the Barris brothers in 1950 in Los Angeles for Nick Matranga (right).
Bill and his older brother, Jim grew up in South Vancouver during the hot rod and custom craze of the ‘50s and ‘60s. They were into cars before they were old enough to have a driver’s license and between the two of them have owned more than two dozen hot rods over the years – all Ford products. Jim and Bill credit the support and patience of their wives, Jackie and Eileen for the long hours of garage time. It was in the summer of 1957 that Jim Larson saw his first car – a 1939 Ford tudor sedan – on a Main Street gas station lot while riding home on the bus. He has just finished peeling onions at the Pacific National Exhibition for 10 days earning $37.50. “The car cost $35
and my mother was really angry when I came home with only pocket change,” he recalls. His father bought him a low mileage 1954 Ford tudor sedan when Jim was 17. Jim and his friends eventually drove the Ford to Tijuana, Mexico for a custom green and white tuck ‘n’ roll naugahyde interior that took only one day to complete and cost $129. In the years following, Jim built a series of hot rods with a number of cars from the ‘30s and ‘40s including 1939 and 1941 Ford convertibles, two Model-A Fords and four 1950’s Fords. Continued on Pg. B3
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