A Rumbling Old Chevrolet Camaro - Tonawanda News

[camaro5]

The Tonawanda News

There exists in my Kenmore neighborhood a rumbling old Chevrolet Camaro, a Z-28 in some indeterminate shade of dark, that fires up at all hours of the day and night, wakes me from sleep with its racket and generally disrupts the steady-going bonhomie of the street with a one-driver presentation of a scene from the film “Streets of Fire.” And before you get the idea these opinions are better served in the “Sound Off” column of reader opinion, be assured I heartily approve.

It’s a genuine rolling piece of history, an example of what the General Motors Corp. built and what a segment of the American public bought when one’s first thought was driving what you wanted to drive, not what was ecologically, economically or politically correct.

Just look at this thing, all curves and menace and low ground clearance. It was considered a small car back then, although it takes up nearly as much square footage as a full-size car of now, with a remarkably wasteful lack of available interior room and a back seat so small you wonder how it is so many people could have been conceived back there.

Turn the key and light it up, and it growls to life with an attitude that suggests it wants to find a Honda to eat. The needle on the tachometer moves like a windshield wiper. So does the needle on the fuel gauge. If you’re willing to pay for the care and feeding of 300-odd horsepower, be aware they are available to you. Then it takes off down the street, gently but loudly, and the windows of the Village of Kenmore rattle in their sills.

Chevy Camaro. The name excites some bloodstreams the way “Hawaii,” “Buffalo Sabres” or “retirement” excite others.

GM’s 100th birthday celebration in September included a party and reception in Plant 5 of the Powertrain facility on River Road in Tonawanda, the massive manufacturing complex responsible for the building of 28 million engines since it opened in 1938. Red carpets were laid out, the men were in suits and ties and the women were in cocktail dresses, and the invitees saw, among other things, the 2010 Camaro.

At an entry price of $22,995, it has the curves, the attitude and probably the noise, but it was like an honored guest at the wrong party. As a cleaned-up and socially-responsible little hot rod for the 21st century, I wonder if there is a place for it anymore.

The same goes for its manufacturer. There was a time, in the late 1940s, that the shops on Delaware Avenue in Kenmore stayed open late on the nights prior to Christmas. With no malls to visit, the overtime-heavy employees of GM and that bundle of smokestack-intensive industries at the west end of Sheridan Drive brought their paychecks, in their spare moments, to Kenmore to buy gifts and things. Get in your time-travel Camaro and drive to 2008, where rumor has it much of GM will take this December off, the better to dust off the begging bowl and hit Washington for a loan.

Rumor is the prevalent means of communication on a shop floor. The facts (or better, the informed opinion) is that GM might run out of cash by January, that a declaration of bankruptcy will ruin and not reorganize this corporation (would you buy a car from a company that might not outlast the loan?) and that its 3 million or so employees, retirees, suppliers and the like will lean heavily on the government to keep them going. A solution is a loan (pronounced bail-out) of your grandchildren’s tax money that will keep GM and its Detroit competitors alive long enough to redirect themselves to manufacturing energy-efficient vehicles of such quality they can be exported, let alone sold with great success in America. Whether this will work, whether anyone is willing to try it, whether it’s a philosophically acceptable idea, remains to be batted around by a lame-duck Congress and an incoming administration that has change on its mind.

One of the disadvantages of growing older is one’s frame of reference. You don’t hear young people thinking about the days when things seemed to be better; they deal with situations without the baggage of reminiscence. We read the newspapers like the Roman god Janus (the month of January is named after him), the god of doorways and of beginnings and endings. He’s usually depicted as having two faces, one looking forward, the other backward. We read of what General Motors can no longer do without government assistance, and a synapse in our brains goes off to remind us of all they once did, and how did it get to this?

Simultaneously looking back and looking ahead isn’t easy. That’s why it requires two faces, or maybe an old Camaro.

Ed Adamczyk is a Kenmore resident whose column appears weekly in the Record-Advertiser. Contact him at EdinKenmore@gmail.com.

http://www.tonawanda-news.com/opinio...yword=topstory

[Stingr69]

I used to live in Tonawanda off Kenmore avenue. I worked close to the GM Tonawanda engine plant and drove my loud-azz black '69 Z/28 back and forth to work every day back then unless it was snowing.

I havent been there in maybe 17 years but that article was fun for me to read. The first part of the article anyway. Brings back memories.

Thank you very much for the post.

-Mark.

[camaro5]

I'm glad you liked it.

Perhaps you used to rattle those windows in Tonawanda.

I see you have a diiferent Camaro now. Those badboys are why I lost my mind when GM said no BLUE SS. So nice they added it now. Blue with white stripes, oh the memories.


Dan

[Stingr69]

Same car, different color back then. I had it painted black and white at the time. Yes I did rattle a few windows with it. I had Eagle headers with Thrush Super Turbo header mufflers and no tailpipes. You could hear it rumble from blocks away.

Here is a "back in the day" picture of it.



-Mark.

[TainoWarrior316]

nice