MPR: Reporter's Notebook

Reporter's Notebook
By Elizabeth Stawicki, Minnesota Public Radio
July 20, 2001

My father briefly fell away from the religion of Pontiacs and a bought a brand new Buick LeSabre in 1969. He just never looked comfortable in it. Despite having several cars that all broke down at one time or another, the Buick was the one he'd yell at.

Elizabeth Stawicki with the prized Pontiac. It was sold in 1982. She reports she's almost over it, but cries in the newsroom regularly for no apparent reason. See a larger image.

He quickly returned to the fold and bought more Pontiacs. So it's not surprising that I learned to drive on one, a Star Chief Executive circa 1966. It was a long coupe in nightwatch blue whose paint would whiten like a plum under the sun. Its engine, a 389 two-barrel meant getting on the freeway was "Houston, we have lift off."

Not coincidentally, this particular father wasn't crazy about me learning to drive the Pontiac, or anything else for that matter. He told me I had a lead foot. Still, he genuinely worried that even his beloved Pontiac steel wouldn't protect me in a collision, and he'd have to buy another car.

One Saturday morning, he picked up a new, self-propelled lawn mower (a big innovation at the time). The trunk of the Executive could easily hold it; the trunk could house a family of five.

On the way home from the hardware store with the new mower in the trunk, he stopped behind a car making a left turn. Dad stopped, but the fellow behind him, reportedly driving a car of what I can only repeat as non-American origin, did not. Dad said he felt a jolt, heard a loud crash of crinkling metal and jumped out of the car. Behind him was a man wedged in what was left of the crumpled carcass of his foreign car.

Without thinking, Dad turned the key unlocking the Pontiac's trunk to retrieve a crowbar. And after helping the man out of his car, it finally hit him, "Uh oh, the new lawn mower." But the lock on the Pontiac's trunk worked fine. The lawn mower was unharmed. In fact, it was tough to find any damage on the Pontiac except for a small dent above the right blinker.

I drove the Pontiac Executive until I left home for college.

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