Re: An unusual 56 400

Posted by HH56 On 2014/9/5 16:27:09

I remember those cars. Just south of 152 -- 99 junction. For a long time I thought they were part of the junkyard that was a little farther south of there. I was told it was not part of the junkyard but was a private collection. The story I heard was the owner was a long haul trucker that would run across the cars in his travels -- some almost dirt cheap. If he was coming back empty, would buy one and bring it back. The collection was supposedly to fund his retirement. Don't know how much of the story is true but he had quite a number of cars at one point.

The cars were auctioned off I believe in two but might have been three stages. Seems like that happened in the mid to late 80s. A friend and I went up for one of the auctions but didn't buy anything. Some of the popular cars went in the first auction for decent money but the Packards mostly languished. I remember one or two of the 51-4s sat on an almost empty lot next to the large tank visible in the bottom photo along with an old truck and some scrap metal for quite some before they finally disappeared.

I think that 56 is the same car Doug and I had questions about -- not for the items you mention but for the stainless trim above the windows and the sort of eyebrow piece across the rear window chrome band. IIRC, we hadn't seen anything like those pieces before and couldn't decide if it was Packard or well done customizing.