FORD FINDER:
Doug Blamey has an uncanny nose for finding old Fords and is the go-to-guy for restorers needing rare parts
believe that some people are born into the wrong time,” says Doug Blamey. “And I was born too late.”
How late? Probably a half-century, the 64-year-old figures.
The longtime Maple Ridge resident — he’s owned his Dewdney Trunk Road corner lot house for four decades — has been many things during his well-lived life: husband to Bernice, father to five kids, CP Rail worker, movie extra.
But ‘parts picker’ is what he’s considered himself the longest, a passion he discovered when he was still in short pants.
“I got my first car — a 1949 Ford convertible — when I was eight, and by the time I was 10, I’d owned three cars,” Blamey says, citing a Model A and a Model T as the other early acquisitions. So what exactly is a parts picker? Essentially, it’s someone who locates hard-to-find automotive parts — things like headlights, radiator caps, windshields — for clients involved in the restoration of old vehicles. And in some cases finding an entire car. Rare parts can range anywhere from a few bucks to the thousands.
Part detective, part treasure hunter, a parts picker isn’t something you learn in school. And, no, there’s no app for it either.
Instead, at least according to Blamey, who is considered one of the best Ford parts picker around, it’s a skill honed by years of experience and, yes, natural instinct. He says he could, and did, make a living off it, though these days its more of a hobby. One of many, it seems.
“People will call me up and say, ‘I need a part for a 1914 Model T Ford,’ and I’ll say check back with me in a month or so,” he explains.
“What I then do is I go into old towns, ghost towns sometimes, and I find out where the old Ford dealership was. Then I go look in all the old buildings looking for parts.”
It you head out to a Metro Vancouver car show today for Father’s Day, there’s a good chance you’ll see Blamey in and among some chromed classics, as shows and swap meets are places he often finds parts he’s looking for, and clients, too. He’ll also use old phone books to track down leads, noting that his most fertile picking grounds are in the small towns and farms on the Prairies.
“If you go into a town in Saskatchewan and find out there used to be a Ford dealer there, for 40 miles around you’ll find old Fords,” he notes. “No dealer, no Fords.”
Sounds logical, but there are also intangibles to becoming a great parts picker.
First and foremost is an obsession for cars that borders on the ridiculous.
“When I was in Grade 8, my friends used to tell me things like, ‘oh, I saw a ’32 Ford on the weekend in Port Moody at a house on Water Street,” says the Coquitlam-born Blamey. “‘Well that was it. Skipped school and down to Water Street going door to door looking for that car. I went down a few days until a friend finally said, ‘aww, we were just joking.’ ”
Then there was a family holiday 20 years ago where he fixated on an old farmhouse and abandoned barn located across from the house they were staying in near Woods Lake in the Okanagan.
“Every night when I was out at the barbecue, I kept looking at it thinking, ‘my god there’s an old Ford in there, I can just smell it.’ ”
But with 11 kids in their charge — five of them their own — his wife Bernice wouldn’t let him go look.
“I knew I wouldn’t see him again for the rest of the trip,” she said.
Sure enough, six months later he heard about a 1933 Ford Sedan Delivery stored in an old barn in the Okanagan.
“I went back to work that day and I couldn’t even connect the hoses on the cars, my hands were shaking so much,” he recalls. He booked off sick and headed back to that Okanagan property. Sure enough, that old Ford was inside.
Blamey’s abilities as a parts picker are renowned in the tight-knit classic and collector car community in B.C.
“Doug is the ultimate scrounger, scouring want ads, the Internet and swap meets looking for old cars and parts,” says collector and classic car columnist Alyn Edwards.
“He has been relentless in his pursuit of relics and almost always has one or two for sale.”
It’s difficult to say how many parts pickers there are in the province, but few if any rise to the abilities and longevity of Blamey.
And he doesn’t think there are many in the coming generation that will follow in his work boot steps. Though that isn’t to say he’s not doing his part to pass on his parts picking passion to younger ones.
“I like finding cars that can be great hobby cars for a father and son looking to restore a car together. Turn the TV off, forget about the crime and the drugs and all that stuff, and go into the garage and build a car. The old-time way.”
Sure enough, there are a couple of vehicles on his property that have ‘For Sale’ signs in their windows. Ah yes, his property.
“His house in Maple Ridge is famous, or infamous depending on your point of view, for its public display of vintage transportation,” notes Edwards. “He loves everything that is old, and spends most of his time in his shop working on old vehicles that few other restorers would tackle.”
Here’s a list of the vehicles, in varying states of repair, that currently occupy the Blamey’s lot, some tucked into garages, others out in the open: a 1912 Ford Speedster, a 1932 Ford convertible pickup, a 1933 Ford Coupe, a 1933 Ford Sedan Delivery, a 1932 Ford Coupe he bought when he was 18, an 1885 horse-drawn, Western Sprint Delivery wagon and a 1917 Sopwith Pup. Yes, a First World War biplane. Its cracked fuselage is tarped on the trailer by the side of the house, and the wings are tucked between two garages.
Any one of those would be a life’s work for a restorer, but Blamey still finds time to find parts, though these days they are more often for his own projects than for clients.
“I just found a sidelight for a 1912 Model T a week-and-a-half ago in an old house. I had to do some horse-trading to get it. It’s for the Speedster race car.” So what’s his current Holy Grail? “I’m currently looking for 1895 to 1910 Baldwin Steam Locomotive,” he says matter-of-factly.
Don’t bet against him finding it.