1952 Pontiac Chieftan - Mr. Connolly's Car

A goal of mine in 2015 is to finish writing about every car in my life that has had some sort of impact on me. Today, I look back upon the Pontiac Chieftain that belonged to the kindly gentleman who lived across the street from my family and I back in Baldwin. Coincidentally, that family shared our last name.

Between 1949 and 1958, Pontiac's top of the line model was the "Chieftain"

We always referred to Mike Connolly, who lived across the street from us, as "Mr. Connolly". We never batted an eye about doing so although you could possibly understand how that could be a bit awkward in the same way you feel a little bit awkward addressing someone who has the same first name as you do. Even though we had the same last name and even shared what I understand to be the least common spelling of "Connolly", we were not related. My parents had a nice relationship (which is saying a lot considering how difficult my parents were to get along with) with Mr. Connolly and his wife, Sally whom, and for whatever reason, we did not refer to as "Mrs. Connolly". In an event, I remember Mr. Connolly, who had to be at least twenty years older than my father, being quiet, kind and keeping mostly to himself. A tinkerer of all sorts, he kept a meticulous home and took exacting care of his old, seemingly gigantic, black, Pontiac sedan.

Chieftain is the leader or head of a group, especially of a clan or tribe.

Pontiac offered two models for sale in 1952; the Streamliner and the upmarket Chieftain like Mr. Connolly had. Riding on a generous 120 inch wheelbase, the Chieftain was available with inline, flat head sixes and eights and had Hydramatic (automatic) and 3 speed manual transmissions available. Mr. Connolly's Chieftain had the odd looking flat head 8 and an automatic transmission. I remember sticking my head under the long, open hood of his Chieftain and marveling at the massive, old engine that seemed like it came out of the 19th century what with the spark plug wires coming out of the top of the engine and all. And that's what was so odd about that car; it really wasn't that old. Not by today's standards anyway.

My older son in front of the house I grew up back in Baldwin. Through the trees to his right you can see the garage doors of Mr. Connolly's house.

My memories of that car probably date back to the early to mid '70's so that means that it was at the most, twenty, maybe twenty two or twenty three years old at the time. Certainly old but it seemed so much older than that because of how different it looked from everything else on the road at the time. Older kids than me in the neighborhood used to chide Mr. Connolly about his old car, goading him about getting a car that was more with the times and frankly, I agreed with them. However, seeing that Mr. Connolly was retired and on a fixed income, it makes all the sense in the world to me now that he was holding onto a car that was working for him. Cars back then were as expensive as they are today (adjusted for inflation) after all.  

Motor Trend tested a 1952 Chieftain sedan, recording a 21-second quarter-mile time at 95.24 mph and 16.4 mpg. Abysmal numbers for an automobile today but on par sixty years ago.

I went on several jaunts into "town", (that sounds so quaint being from Long Island and all, especially growing up in Nassau County), with Mr. Connolly and found the car to be something out of a movie set in the 1940's. Seating position was way up, seat springs were very "springy". The car smelled musty, the dashboard looked like an old fashioned radio and Mr. Connolly drove it very slowly. I'm not sure if he was driving it slowly or the car was that slow. With maybe 115 horsepower from that odd, flat head in line eight, the car was not exactly overpowered.

Overlook Place is named so because the street overlooks a county park on the other side of that Dead End sign. Mr. Connolly's house is directly to the right of my son in this picture.

Still, as far as cars go from my youth, nothing personified someone quite the same way that that Pontiac personified "Mr. Connolly". Whenever I see one at a car show or online, I can't help but think of him and his wife Sally puttering around Overlook Place and Fairview Avenue or coming up Foxhurst Road from "town". Thing is, though, apparently, Mr. Connolly didn't see the Chieftain as "him". One day, sometime in the mid 1970's, a canary yellow, rotary engined Mazda RX-2 appeared in his driveway were the Old Pontiac had always been.