Years ago we lived in Tacoma, Washington. I’d recently separated from the Air Force and since I had fond memories of Tacoma from the time I’d spent at McChord AFB we thought why not try Tacoma – that and the fact that I’d been offered a job at West Coast Grocery’s headquarters in Tacoma.

One of the guys I’d met at church (Dennis) asked me to come by and help him with a wiring project he was doing for his elderly neighbor. Sitting in the elder gentleman’s garage was a bone stock 1957 Nomad – ivory and dusk pearl paint, 283 and a three speed on the tree. It was dusty and the tires were real low and obviously had not been out of the garage in a long time. Well, we finished the electrical project (circuit for a new microwave oven) and I asked if he had any plans for the Nomad and told him I’d be interested in making him an offer if he wanted to sell it. He explained that his grandson was also interested in the car and that he’d promised to him. Oh well.

Fast forward a year or so and I again had occasion to visit Dennis. When I pulled up in front of Dennis’s house, the Nomad was sitting in his neighbor’s driveway. I was shocked to see the car had changed so much so I detoured to inspect the car. Much to my horror, I observed close up what the grandson had done to this car – huge Indy tires on the back (sticking out at least 4” from the side of the car); rear wheel wells looked like they had been enlarged with a Sawzall and long shackles holding the distressed springs nearly parallel to the driveway. He had skinny, dragster like wheels and tires up front. There was a scoop sticking through the hood (again, a Sawzall cutout job) and fender-well headers routed to what I believed to be Thrush aluminum side pipes. The extreme nose-down, ass-up stance must have made it impossible to sit in but he’d taken care of that by installing what looked to be a pair of funny car seats complete with five point harnesses. And let’s not forget the little chrome plated chain steering wheel and a floor shifter that sported a skull knob. A roll cage made of 2” galvanized water pipe (complete with elbows) was bolted to the floor pan behind the seats with pipe flanges.

While standing there (with my jaw on the ground), grandfather and grandson (guessing early 20’s) came out and waved with a big smile on his face and started the Nomad (huge cam with way too much timing – imitating an elephant flatulating as it struggled to fire) and took off – slipping the clutch as the beast would barley idle below about 2,000 – and left us in a cloud of raw gas fumes and burnt clutch. I wanted to cry. Grandpa shook his head and muttered something about, “… I should have sold it to you.” And walked a bit stooped over back into his house.

I may have forgotten the "exact" details - but this really happened folks.