Here is a wee bit of the background to Linda’s Monaco.
Back in 2003 she had the opportunity to go to an institute, the CTI, at Princeton University for four months. As this was the USA and a car would be required she investigated the cost of hiring a car, but for that sort of duration it was expensive. At the time the MMA forum was blessed with Farmer Ted from Michigan’s input, he having been introduced by Andy (Tweetie), an ex-pat who lived in NY state. Ted was a great Mopar guy and caretaker for the Warpig racecar (I can’t remember exactly what model of old Mopar wagon it was but it truly was one of those pig ugly early to mid sixties Mopars?). Farmer Ted had posted up on the forum that he had a 67 Monaco wagon for sale. He had taken it to the US Mopar Nats and was using it as a bit of a ‘hack’ car.
I PM’d him and asked for photos and he sent some over. I showed them to Linda and she said, ‘I’ll take it’. The actual specifics of the deal and the ability for Linda to use the car road legally in the U.S. proved a bit trickier to arrange. Insurance especially was a problem and very expensive until, somehow, we found out that if you joined the AAA, you could swing a better deal, which we did. AAA membership was, and I can’t remember exactly now much the cost was, but about $20 with them saved us about $500 in insurance costs.
We then made arrangements for collecting the car and Linda flew out to the U.S. and I flew out to visit about a week after she went and the first weekend I was there we flew from Philly to Chicago, then back across the lake (in an all female crewed small airliner, that was a first) to Grand Rapids. Arriving mid evening there was Ted, waiting at the airport. He took us back to his house in his Dodge Ram truck. He really was a Mopar guy.
Ted lived with his brother Ed (work that one out?) and they both made us very welcome with a meal and hot drinks. Unfortunately, they were in the process of remodelling their house and the room in which we slept was freezing cold with no heating but many blankets and bed clothes.
In the morning Ted showed us the Monaco and urged us to take it for a test drive. This seemed a good idea as it was the only means we had of getting back to Princeton. So off we went on the test, happy as could be until vast quantities of smoke started pouring out of the dash. Somewhat worried we returned to Ted’s and he determined that the radio had ‘burnt out’ and to avoid further drama, its fuse was removed.
Ted fixing the radio
Linda and the Warpig
We had a great time with Ted, and he showed us the Warpig in its trailer. Then we set off for, what turned out to be, our 1300 mile trip back to Princeton, for which we had allowed three days.
Our plan was to take in the Henry Ford museum in Detroit as well as one or two other places en route but as we got closer to Detroit, Linda became more and more ill, to such an extent that on entering Detroit we had to find a hospital quick. Quickly we did find one, but being attended to quickly was another matter. Don’t let ER or any of those US hospital TV shows fool you, it took hours for Linda to be seen and it was quite a worrying time. However, eventually the doctor saw her, did some tests and sent us off to find a pharmacist for many lotions and potions. By this time it was dark but we tracked down a 24hr pharmacist and asked them if there was a motel nearby and they said there was one just up the street. In the dark, it looked fine, but less fine inside (not quite Bates Motel) but not exactly the best. We tried, as best we could, to get some rest but it was noisy outside, music, engines, doors slamming, more music. In the morning, in the cold light of day we discovered we were alongside a rather nice lap dancing bar and the hotel was obviously a popular pit stop.
Detroit motel
Anyway, Linda felt better so off we went to the Henry Ford museum where we saw one of the turbine cars, the colour of Linda’s Monaco being Turbine Bronze metallic, allegedly the same as those cars, but it doesn’t look very similar.
Turbine car
We also saw a Big Boy, the largest and most powerful locomotive ever in the West.
Linda and the Big Boy
We continued back to Princeton through some lovely scenery, good roads, great tunnels and entering Pennsylvania at one end of the Penn turnpike we zipped from one end of the state to the other on the same road, much to the amusement of the young guy at the toll booth leaving Pennsylvania. We was bored, charged us something like $4 for the 380 miles of turnpike them took a closer look at the car, ‘Like WOW, you came all the way in that!’.
To comment just a bit on the U.S, if you are at all ever worried about U.K. bureaucracy, believe me it is nothing compared to the U.S. Realising that the Monaco had a Michigan plate and out of states plates are frowned on we thought it best to get a New Jersey plate. Easy, I sell a car to Bob in the U.K. it costs me the price of a stamp to the D.V.L.A. In N.J. no. ‘You have to go to the DMV’, they said. ‘In the state capital,’ they said. ‘Take all your documents,’ they said. ‘And lots of money,’ they said.
So down to Trenton we went and, well, queued, then got shunted to another queue, then another, and another. After four or so hours we gave up. Luckily, the Monaco may have had Michigan plates but they were valid until after Linda came home in early January. So she just drove around on the Michigan plates and it only caused a minor snag once when, good grief, the Mercer!! County police (sorry about that) gave her a ticket for parking on the wrong side of the road facing oncoming traffic. A slap on the wrist and a fine for that. Regarding the DMV, the show stopper for Linda was not having a Social Security number and being a furner. It turns out that all but one of the 9/11 hijackers had been given NJ driving licences so the DMV were having no furners getting past them ever, never again.
I came home to the UK and Linda drove the Monaco quite happily through quite a harsh NJ winter, battling snow, ice and all sorts of hazards without the big old car giving any problems and having the huge benefit of a furnace like heater, which it still has, chucking out massive gobs of heat in a remarkably short period of time.
Merry Christmas from Monaco-land
Luckily the house the institute provided Linda was large and had a large three car garage so the car could be kept undercover overnight.
Linda’s house in Princeton
Linda’s work, the CTI, in Princeton
In the meantime she met an older guy who had a 67 four door Monaco who was friendly and helpful and interested in the car which would have been handy as we hadn’t really worked out what was happening with the car when Linda’s stay finished. I went back out in late December, 2003 for the last two weeks of her stay there and we had great fun with it. It was, apart from a 71 or 72 Cutlass and an old Mustang the only old car we ever saw around Princeton, by about 20 years. Just nothing old at all.
Two 1967 Monaco’s
Linda came home and the institute were happy for her to leave the car in one of their garages. The guy with four door was keen to buy it but not keen to pay much money. Linda was due to return to the institute in May 2004 for a week and, suddenly, the decision was made to ship the car back to the U.K. Andy (tweetie) was great as he recommended a shipper he had used at Port Elizabeth and when Linda went over she popped the wagon into a garage that the four door guy recommended and he gave the car a service, redid all the brakes and fitted the redline tyres (which were expensive even back then). Linda took the car to the docks, left it with the shippers and flew home. A couple of weeks later we were told it was in Thamesport and could be collected. At the time you could get BTI and lots of folk were bringing in supposedly rare cars (wink, wink) and claiming they were of massive historical importance. Linda determined that the person who was reading the BTI applications probably wasn’t a car person so she wrote a happy wee story about how she got the car and how much she liked it and so decided to bring it back to the U.K. and that is why she paid 72GBP import duty and tax. Then again, the car cost $1200 in the first place.
And it has been fun ever since. Not much has gone wrong over the years. I have put in a mini starter, a new water pump and a new fuel pump. It seems to dislike driver’s side exhaust manifold gaskets. I managed to track down someone breaking a 68 Monaco wagon on Moparts when the car was still in the US and he sent us three point seat belts and some vital wagon specific trim bits for the car, but the real ace in the hole was, he had a spare wagon fuel tank. These bits came over in the car and while a couple of boxes of polishes and small service bits went missing on the trip, these bits arrived okay. That spare tank has been in, then out, then in, then out over the years as either it or the original have needed repairing, but without it, it could have been emotional. I changed to electronic voltage regulation early on as it stopped charging, and we had the radio fixed here in the UK some years ago and then again just recently when I broke the on/off rotary switch by sending it to Robert Pacini in the U.S. for repair and a tune up.
Until the recent puncture I have never had a wheel off the car, but we need to source two new tyres as Coker no longer do those Redline radials in that size. The car has done over 220,000 miles.
I doubt Linda will sell it.
All the best
