Confessions of a J. C. Whitney Abuser – The iPhone of its Time,

curbsideclassic. ^ | By

[virgil283]

"Kids: Want to know how we (once) pre-teens and teens spent the way-too-much free time we had back in the electronic dark ages of a half-century or so ago? We read books. The classics, of course, like the famous J.C. Whitney Automotive Accessory and Parts Book (J.C. deliberately called it a book in order to let us tell our parents we were indeed reading a “book”– as though they really cared then, before the invention of helicopter parents). Now, one simply didn’t read a JC W book cover-to-cover or randomly, without some higher purpose; no, we exercised our developing minds by using this book in a very specific manner, kind of like an app.

Before even opening it, you had to pick a certain make, year and model of car that, for some inexplicable reason, was of intense interest to you– and no,not a new one; that didn’t really work. You’d pretend that at the age of 12, you somehow had the requisite amounts of money and legitimacy to buy a used car...."

.....;

[rabidralph]

Amen! I remember borrowing the catalogs from my dad’s side of the bedroom floor and paging through, looking at all the great parts for my non-existent Mustang.

[bunster]

Thanks for the great Father’s Day gift — the memory of my Dad on getting his Whitney in the mail. We knew he’d be busy for days — and want so much to share his “great finds” with my Mom, sister and I but we just didn’t get it. It’s a guy thing and a wonderful memory for me. Wish I’d shared more with him when he was here.

[blueunicorn6]

I’m so glad you posted that cat ad. Our neighbors had a cat like that in the rear window of their car whose eyes would glow red. I thought it was satan’s cat. Now I know it was just a fake. Wait a minute. That cat was grey.

[Hot Tabasco]

Nowhere else on eart could you buy an under-dash 8-track player for $20!

Yea, you saved bucks on the player but spent a fortune replacing the tapes they ate............LOL!

[Paladin2]

I still have both the book and the car.

[Sequoyah101]

A Holley Double Pumper with two fuel lines. 650 to 1150 cfm. You had to be running a lot of revs to keep the thing from strangling on the fuel. 4.11 rear end, valve springs so tight to slam them closed fast nothing would hold them in place.

The Quadrajets had two fuel dump jets. A secondary spring picked them up when you romped on the gas and just dumped gasoline into the intake from a reservoir until the vacuum could pick up.

I tuned almost every Saturday and cleaned spark plugs, filed points, set advance springs.

I learned about engineering from vendor catalogs. They were chock full of rules of thumb, nomographs and formulae.

I remember one late summer night coming through the mountains and a long banked curve, a full tank of 18 cent gasoline, a new pickup, a blonde farm girl and KVOO on the radio. Life has never been any better than that. It was the height of Nam, we young men were anxious but we had FREEDOM!

I married the girl and still have the pickup and her.

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

***women’s lingerie and a bunch of other junk.***

Remember when the models wore black leotards with the undies over them?

When they did away with the black leotards, I know of some moms who tore those sections out of the catalog before the kids and the Old Man saw them.

[MeshugeMikey]

ahahahaha I underwent a very similar set of “window shopping” “buying sprees”

[Liberty Valance]

And also Allied Catalogue - for electronic parts, tubes and speakers for amplifiers and ham radio gear.

[lewislynn]

I still like JC Whitney “books” but I miss the Western Auto store.

[virgil283]

'Anyone remember Herter?'....Yes I sure do. Their catalog was a favorite for perusing camping and hunting gear. .....I bought one of their odd sheath knives;

[mowowie]

I used to LOVE receiving my J.C. Whitney “book” in the mail each month!
the good old days.....

[upsdriver]

Yep, that’s the one! My cousin and I ordered a reloader and supplies for 12 gauge shot shells back when we were in our teens.

[Steely Tom]

When I was in fourth through about tenth grade, I was an abuser of the Fisher Scientific catalog.

[moovova]

Oh, the lists I used to make from that publication...

Let’s not forget Hemmings, either.

[Impala64ssa]

Nowhere else on earth could you buy an under-dash 8-track player for $20
I have such fond memories of 8-tracks. Remember how the cartridges tended to get "car sick" and they unraveled inside the tape deck?

[Impala64ssa]

My first real job at age 16 was working the parts counter at an auto parts store.
I worked at a parts store back way back when also. I remember going through those books chasing down parts for the customers. Speaking of old VWs, one of our regular customers converted his garage and back yard into a small repair business, he was the local go-to guy when it came to German cars. I only knew him by his nickname, Sputnik. We called him that because years earlier he his wife and then newborn son escaped from E. Berlin with only the clothes on their back and whatever money they had. If communism is such a great thing, why was that damn wall built in the first place? To keep the Mexicans out?

[razorback-bert]

Herter’s ...yes I spent hours huddled under the basement stairs AKA my fly tying shop lusting over feathers, fun and hooks.

I saw the name Herter’s on ammo and hope soared...only to be dashed.

[Flick Lives]

Wow. I remember seeing those glowing-eye cats in cars! It was like a furry precursor to the third brake light.

[gura]