Hot Rod Garages by Peter Vincent
There are garages and then there are GARAGES. The garages in this book are not where you and I park our daily drivers or even where we park are prized possessions. These are the garages of masters, of artists of the places we know exist we just don’t know where. These are the garages we want to hang out in.
These are the garages of guys such as: Roy Brizio, Cole Foster, Pat Foster, Cam Grant, John Gunsaulis, Gary Harms, Ron Jolliffee, Pete Eastwood, Terry Hegman, don Small, Cal Tanaka, Billy Vinther, Bob Lick, Steve Moal, Dick Page, The Rolling Bones, Vern & Keith Tardel, and Dale Withers.
All of the builders are shown at home in their shop and usually at work on a car. Here is Steve Moal in his shop.
Roy Brizio in his shop.
This book just published in early 2009 by Motorbooks is a look inside the garages of some of America’s greatest Hot Rod builders. These range from the little garage behind the builders home to the large and immaculate garages of renowned builders.
The author, Peter Vincent, tells the stories of the garages, the cars and the men in his own words and shows you the locations and the project cars through the lens of his camera. Many of the subjects of this book have been friends of the author for years and some of the photos are taken over a period of many years.
Here is the author’s own garage!
Each garage is different but the creations being birthed in each are equally exciting. One section of the book even deals with the key points of fabricating a top notch hot rod. Photos and text explain the highlights of a build and then conclude with photos of the finished master piece!
The Table of Contents should make you want to rush out and purchase this book for your library.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1: Roy Brizio
Chapter 2: Cole Foster
Chapter 3: Pat Foster
Chapter 4: Cam Grant
Chapter 5: John Gunsaulis
Chapter 6: Gary harms
Chapter 7: Ron Jolliffe
Chapter 8: “The L.A. Group”
Pete Eastwood
Terry Hegman
Don Small
Cal Tanaka
Billy Vinther
Chapter 9: Bob Lick
Chapter 10: Steve Moal
Chapter 11: Dick Page
Chapter 12: The Rolling Bones
Chapter 13: Vern & Keith Tardel
Chapter 14: Dale Withers
What did I like best about this book? We are so taken by the few really big name builders that we forget where hot rods came from. There was no assembly line building hot rods. There were guys with mechanical skills who wanted something different. They wanted something better. Many were artists and wanted to express themselves. They went out to the garage, took a bunch of old parts they had scavenged together and built a car, a hot rod.
Here is one of the several hot rod projects demonstrated in the book.
Here is the completed project rod.
It is neat to see some of the real talents in this hobby making a living and creating works of mechanical art one car at a time out of a garage in there back yard. This book covers a lot of exceptional folks. However, it should also remind us that there are men and women all over America doing the same thing in their own backyards. Some of those cars are just as outstanding as those in this book. We all know guys like this. They may work at a regular job all day but in the evenings and on weekends they are working on one car; one car any of us would be proud to own.
The men in Vincent’s book are some of the most recognized and most successful. The photos of their “special places” will make any real car guy want to go out to his own garage and get to work on that special project.
