1941 Buick Super brings memories of a family photograph
A family photograph taken on Easter Sunday in 1950 is one of Wayne Burch’s treasured possessions: The family is posed in their Easter finery in front of their black 1941 Buick Super.
A few years later, Burch’s father replaced the Buick with a newer car. Burch, however, never forgot the details of the 1941 Buick, nor the comfort it provided while rolling on the 121-inch wheelbase. “I remember washing and waxing the Buick,” Burch said.
As the years passed, Burch would occasionally peruse newspapers, magazines, and later on, the Internet with an eye for a 1941 Buick.
The cars he could afford were too far gone, he recalls, and the really nice cars were too pricey. Perseverance finally paid dividends in the summer of 2011, when discovered a Buick for sale in Mankato, Minnesota, seemingly in great condition at a reasonable price. The only problem was that Burch was in Kingsburg, California.
Burch contacted the AAA office near the car’s location and a sympathetic office employee agreed to go see the car to verify its advertised condition. A few days later, Burch received a glowing report on the car.
Burch has always been conservative in financial dealings, but in this transaction he threw caution to the wind, and in July 2011 he bought the Buick sight unseen and became its third owner.
An apprehensive Burch anxiously awaited the truck delivering his car. The day of the homecoming, Burch said, “I was thrilled.”
Since then, Burch has learned that his Buick was built in October, 1940, in Flint, Michigan. Until this trip to California the Buick had always been in Minnesota. Despite decades in the land of a thousand lakes, the car surprisingly shows no signs of rust.
Now, as when it was new, the 3,770-pound four-door sedan is propelled by the 248-cubic-inch straighteight-cylinder engine that develops 125 horsepower. A compound carburetor setup feeds fuel to the engine.
Its hood is opened not from the front or rear but from either side to provide access to the engine. The 15-inch wheels add sparkle to the Buick compliments of the large hub cans and trim rings. All eight of the side windows have individual hand cranks to open or close them.
A task facing Burch is restoring the AM radio to working condition. The radio antenna is designed to be parked on the divider of the two-piece windshield and can be rotated to an upright position by twisting a knob located inside the car above the windshield.
The windshield wipers are vacuum-operated and Burch points out the 120-mph speedometer is overly optimistic. An under-seat heater must have been comforting in the car’s early days in Minnesota.
The banjo-style steering wheel has three spokes. The gearshift lever to control the three-speed manual transmission is on the steering column. On the same side of the steering column is the built-in turn signal indicator.
When Burch acquired his Buick, the odometer showed it had clocked 23,800 miles, which he believes to be accurate. The current reading is 31,000 miles.
On the right side of the trunk is a vertically mounted spare tire. The broadcloth interior, like most of the rest of the car, Burke said, is original.
Before World War II Buicks were aimed at professional-class customers, and for a base price of $1,185 the buyer of a Buick Super received a lot of car for the money.
In order to maintain the pristine condition of his car, Burch said, “I pretty much stay out of modern day traffic.”