Along the Way: They sure don’t make ’em like they used to

Every now and then, sometimes for no reason at all, my grandfather’s Oldsmobile comes to mind.

It was a 1936 coupe, tan in color. Built to last. A bank vault on wheels. Indestructible.

They no longer make such cars, or such men.

He was a backwoods preacher and he piloted that magnificent Olds across hill and dell through the Ozark Mountains of southwest Missouri.

He banged into a few fence posts over the years, putting a dent in a fender and destroying the fence posts. He’d hammer the fender back to its original shape, for the most part. Sometimes a fender required suturing with baling wire and once in a while, a touch of welding.

There was scar tissue on all four fenders. But that Olds kept on running. And so did Grandpa, till he was close to 90.

I always like to add, when talking about the old man, that he once saw Jesse James and his brother Frank. Grandpa was a little boy when the famous outlaws — beloved by most Missourians — came riding up to the family farm in Greene County.

They asked for, and were given, oats for their horses by his dad, my great-grandpa.

Anyhow, my grandpa told me you could hear the James boys coming from a mile away because their pack horse was loaded with pots and pans clanking against each other — and because Jesse was singing, “Jesus, Lover of My Soul” at the top of his lungs.

But back to the Oldsmobile ...

My brothers Jim, Max and I spent the summer of 1944 with Grandpa and Grandma. We lived in southern Oklahoma at the time, not far from the Red River, which protects Oklahoma from Texas.

That summer, we’d accompany our grandparents on Sundays to some cabin-like church ‘way out in the woods somewhere. Grandpa and Grandma rode in the car’s only seat. My brothers and I rode in the trunk, with the lid held open by some contraption my grandpa rigged up.

How that car survived such commutes I’ll never know. But I seriously doubt that a pickup truck, a Jeep or a Hummer would hold up over those roads today.

Grandpa said it was a Freewill Methodist Oldsmobile and that’s why it was so durable. Maybe. But the roads were atheist.

The other day I drove onto the Safeway parking lot at Continental Shopping Plaza and pulled my Nissan Sentra up beside what was probably the last Oldsmobile, an “Alero,” circa 2004. It was sleek, metallic-gold in color and had been well cared for.

Consumer Guide said the stability of that final Olds model was “compromised over bad pavement.”

Hah! It would have fallen apart backing out of Grandpa’s unpaved driveway.

Of course, the Alero gets better gas mileage, I’m sure, than the ‘36 coupe did. And it surely rides better.

But on the whole, 107 years of Oldsmobiles didn’t necessarily produce the best car at the finish line.

And I can’t help but wonder what the old man would do if he were alive today, preachin’ in the Ozarks and having to choose from today’s vehicles. Knowing him, he would probably have negotiated with some neighbor farmer for a good mule.

More than 35 million Oldsmobiles were built during the lifetime of that proud nameplate. The company founded by Ransom E. Olds in 1897 pioneered chrome-plated trim and automatic shift, gave drivers the fabulous Eighty Eight series and the front-wheel-drive Toronado. In 1905, it also gave the country a hit song, “In My Merry Oldsmobile.”

I went like this: “Come away with me, Lucille, in my merry Oldsmobile. Down the road of life we’ll fly, automobubbling, you and I.”

I’m not sure what “automobubbling” was. Grandpa probably knew.

I never heard him sing that tune. But I’ll bet’cha Jesse James would have sung it, if a dirty little coward — named Robert Ford — hadn’t plugged him in the back 15 years before the first Oldsmobile chugged down some dirt road.

Former Tucson Citizen columnist Corky Simpson writes a weekly column for the Green Valley News.