Quote:
Originally Posted by Rain Man
Nice ride! I've never heard of Oakland cars before.
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Most people have not. It was a major car maker in the 20's and a part of GM. The car lines in GM were price stratified with Chevrolet being the cheapest, then Oakland, Oldsmobile, Buick and finally Cadillac. By 1926 the prices had spread enough that they decided to start "little brother" marques. For Cadillac this was the LaSalle, Buick had the Marquette, Oldsmobile had the Viking, and the Oakland had the Pontiac. By 1932 the depression was bad enough that they killed the little brothers, except that the Pontiac was outselling the Oakland so the older brother was the one that was killed off.
Our car history is that it was bought early in the model year in late 1923 by the wife of a doctor in Spokane. As already told, she drove the car until around 1940 when the block froze.
One more item of interest (I love this car in case you can't tell!): our car is painted as close the original Dupont color available today. One of the reasons for so much interest in the car in Oakland, Mi is that it is advertised as being completely original but it is a much lighter shade of blue than ours. The suspicion is that it has to do with when in the 1924 model year it was made. That was the year that they went from hand painting cars to being able to spray paint them. The old way meant that they had to paint them and then park them outside to dry. You may have seen pictures of old car plants with a bunch of cars parked in a line. Those are drying! But it is an interesting mystery about a car make that is little known about now days.