Out to the Road

It is on the Mackenzie Highway fifteen kilometres south from Manning, Alberta. A green and white, four-door, 1954 Ford Crestline sedan sits there. It’s on the west side where a township road intersects the highway. It is there to attract a buyer interested in restoring this Crestline. It has a straight-six 223 CID engine – it does not hold V8 nor Fordomatic insignia. Its chrome jet hood ornament is missing. Its front passenger door has been dented. Making this Crestline roadworthy will involve work.

I like this Crestline’s green and white colours. They bring out a nostalgia associated with a former era – from the decade before I was born.

This Crestline holds the narrative of families who have been driven in it. There were things a family could do with this vehicle; vacations, trips to town, grocery-getting, banking, doctor’s appointments – day to day things all occurred driving this Crestline. There were things dreamt of but never attempted with this vehicle – destination dreams. This Crestline’s weight, suspension and Armstrong steering gave it a forgiving kind of movement in acceleration and cornering. It had a range you could drive with one tank of gas. It had a feel in how you looked out to the road. And, not only the driver looked out to the road. Others, passengers, would have looked upon the land going by as they travelled.

I would like to drive this Ford Crestline, in the same way I would like to drive former cars I’ve owned – to return to a sense for how it handled and perhaps a sense for who had driven and ridden in it (the story of this Ford). Here, it is noted that in the following year (1955), the Ford Crestline would be replaced by another well-known Ford, the Fairlane.

In terms of the photographs, I am happy with where each edit has brought me.

Quote to Consider / Inspire – “Developing a composition is a continuous flow of ideas, where the artist combines, adds, reduces, adapts and discards the various elements in an unending discovery of the new possibilities (Alessandra Bitelli).”

Listening to – Tommy Emmanuel and Billy Strings’ ‘Guitar Boogie,’ Bill Kirchen and Redd Vokaert’s ‘Hot Rod Lincoln’ and Molly Tuttle and Billy Strings’ ‘Sittin On Top Of The World.’