Long road to restoration for this Caddy
Dale Mackie’s 1926-27 Cadillac limousine will be featured in the Rock and Roll for Little Souls car show at Pearkes Arena in Saanich today, Friday and Saturday.
The event, sponsored by the Saanich Fire Fighters Charitable Foundation, is to raise money for local children’s charities.
I was working for a tour company in Victoria with my 1954 Cadillac limousine when I was told in April 2012 of a Dunsmuir car for sale. After contacting the owner of the car, a 1926-27 Cadillac limousine, we made arrangements to meet the following day. It took the better part of five hours and two ferries to get to Langdale, where the car was.
While I was examining the car, my wife, Kathie, was taking photos of it inside and out to be used for future reference. Satisfied with what I saw, I crawled out from under the car and made a deal.
It took John Pietroniro and me 21 months to disassemble and rebuild it back to new condition.
The wood that needed replacing was replaced, four layers of paint were removed, the body was taken off frame and the frame was cleaned and repainted. The aluminum body, used only on custom-built cars, was in good condition only needing minor repairs. The floor boards were in such good condition that the factory work order, body style and assembly numbers were still legible after nearly 90 years.
Before putting the body back on the frame, minor mechanical repairs were done. The motor turned over by hand so it was not opened up except to change the timing chain.
With the body back on the frame, it went in for paint and a new interior. The finishing touches were then done, to what we have today.
While John and I worked on the car by day, I spent many hours in the evenings searching for missing parts. Door handles and window cranks came from Australia, the horn from Florida, and the list goes on. The inter- com, a Stentor phone, eluded me until this spring. The only thing missing now is the correct fabric for the window shades.
The limo is the factory-correct colours, Cadillac blue with black fenders and top. The interior has been restored to its former glory with corresponding blue fabric and royal blue carpeting. It was one of the luxury cars of its day. The fold-down jump seats for extra passengers, a curved roll-up division window and roll-up windshield for added ventilation are some of the features that make this car special.
The car has a 314 cubic inch, 80-horsepower flathead V-8, a three-speed non-synchromesh transmission, 17inch brake drums, 21-inch tires and a 138-inch wheel base. All major components have correct matching numbers.
The car has a colourful past.
It was purchased new on Dec. 8, 1926, from Begg Motors in Victoria. The sales price was $6,904.35. The Cadillac was a chauffeurdriven vehicle on Vancouver Island during the 1920s and ’30s.
During the Second World War, the car was transformed into an ambulance. The divider window and both seats were stripped out, and the centre post between the suicide doors was made removable to allow a stretcher to be loaded lengthwise beside the driver, who sat in a bucket-type seat.
At the end of the war, the limousine was returned to The Canadian Colliery Company (the Dunsmuir family) which gave it to the chauffeur, Percy T. Fallick.
Eventually the car ended up in Prince George at a salvage yard. A local car enthusiast took the engine off the back seat and rebuilt it.
The next owner of note was Vancouver businessman George Patey. He was in show business and became famous for purchasing the bricks from the Chicago garage where the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre took place. The limo was similar to the getaway car used that day in 1929, so he bought it and had it brightly painted and upholstered.
He used the limo as a backdrop to his massacre exhibition. He closed down the exhibition in 1968 and the bricks were retired until 1971.
In 1971, he had the wall reconstructed, behind plexiglass, in the men’s room of his new Gastown night club, the Banjo Palace. The limo was used to promote the Roaring Twenties-style nightclub until 1976, when it was closed and the car was sold. It ended up at the B.C. Transportation Museum in Cloverdale.
When the museum closed in the late 1980s, the car went to the Nanaimo Heritage Initiative, with its connection to the Malaspina College History Department. The Heritage Initiative was dissolved in 2002; the car then went to The Vintage Car Club of Canada, Nanaimo Chapter.
With much work needed on the car, it was sold by the club to a shop in Langdale. The plan was to make a resto-rod out of it. Luckily this did not happen, so it was available for me to buy and rebuild.
Many people shook their heads in wonder at the amount of time and effort we put into this project, some thinking it would never get done. At times I had to consider if this was more than we could do, but we carried on. Since the completion, we have taken the Cadillac to local car shows on the Peninsula. Every now and then, we drive to the Inner Harbour so tourists can see and enjoy the 1926 Cadillac.
The whole family likes the car. Our oldest son has seen it and just shakes his head at what he sees now compared to what it looked like in 2012. The youngest son and his family have only seen photos of the completed car and are in awe.
The car will not leave the family. Both sons appreciate the time and effort that was put into the restoration, and both know it represents my interest in vintage automobiles.