Only in America (part 1)

As a teenager in the 1970’s the television fed me a diet of America cop shows and movies – and with it their American cars. These seemed light years ahead of the cars in Britain at the time and absolutely huge – although they all seemed to have tremendous acceleration and handle like a sports car!

I can easily remember:

• Starsky & Hutch – Starsky’s red Ford Gran Torino / Hutch’s battered Ford Galaxie
• Cannon – Frank drove a Lincoln Continental befitting of a high-end private-eye
• The Dukes of Hazzard – Bootlegging in a Dodge Charger
• Duel – A Plymouth Valiant chased by a psychopath in a Peterbilt tanker truck
• Charlie’s Angels – Jill Munro had a Ford Mustang
• Kojak – The bald-headed cop drove a Buick Century
• Shaft – He drove a Dodge Charger in the series
• The Streets of San Francisco – Lots of Ford Galaxie’s (Ford sponsored the series)
• The Rockford Files – Jim Rockford’s Pontiac Firebird
• Hawaii Five-O – Mercury Marquis / Chevrolet Camero / Ford Mustang
• Mannix – A Plymouth Barracuda (convertible)
• Bullitt – A Ford Mustang on San Francisco streets
• Ironside – Usually in a van, for obvious reasons

So when I found out that Oulton Park were having a new event devoted to American motoring (called U.S. Autoshow) it was an opportunity that I couldn’t miss. Maybe I could get photographs of some of those cars from my teenage memories.

Here are a few tasters from the day and I’ll upload a further gallery shortly.

I’ll be adding more images in Part 2 later in the week including some of this fantastic Studebaker Starlight.