Getting a Showcase on the Road to Recovery : Nostalgia: A Sherman Oaks hairstylist recaptures a 1940s vision of things to come in a 10-ton, eight-wheel Art Deco behemoth: the ‘Futurliner.’

Bob Valdez is going back to the future, but not in the sleek DeLorean sports car of the popular film series.

Instead, the 49-year-old Sherman Oaks hairstylist hopes to recapture the 1940s vision of the future in a 10-ton, eight-wheel, rolling Art Deco behemoth called a “Futurliner.” Valdez has spent the last seven years, and $22,000, restoring the 35-foot-long monster, one of an estimated four remaining of what was once a fleet of at least a dozen. During the 1940s and early ‘50s, the vehicle was a rolling showcase for the technological wonders the future held--television, atomic power, jet propulsion, stereophonic phonograph records and microwave ovens.

The red and silver Futurliners, resembling sleek 1930s locomotives, traveled the country in a caravan called the Parade of Progress to show off General Motors’ vision of America’s future--and advertise futuristic Chevys and Buicks along the way.

But Futurliners fell victim to the very progress they promoted. By 1956, television advertising had replaced the Parade of Progress as a way to introduce people to the latest technology, and Futurliners became a thing of the past.

That is, until Valdez stumbled onto a rusty, gutted carcass of what looked like a hybrid bus, locomotive and motor home in a Sepulveda storage yard in 1984. All the windows had been smashed, pieces of the shell were falling off and the original back had been cut away and replaced with a boxlike body. Still, the engine worked, and the heap had its original double wheels, center steering and high driving position 12 feet above the ground, Valdez said.

Valdez said he doesn’t know what attracted him to the vehicle at first. “Perhaps it’s because I’ve always wanted a Greyhound to convert to a recreational vehicle,” he said.

So Valdez looked up the owner and bought it for $2,500.

The next step was finding out what he had bought. Finding a couple of Fisher Body GM registration tags inside the vehicle helped. Valdez sent a letter and some pictures to a friend who worked at GM, who in turn looked through a recently published history of the auto company. In the book were photos of the original Futurliner fleet.

Knowing he had something special, Valdez said, he “took the Futurliner around to a couple of places to see what it would cost to restore. One guy said hecould do it with no problems. But it would only cost me $250,000!”

That was more than his hairstylist’s salary could afford, so Valdez learned welding, metal fabrication, auto mechanics and fiberglass work. The plan, Valdez said, is to continue cutting hair on Fridays and Saturdays and devote the rest of his time to restoring the Futurliner.

What then?

“I’ll probably take it around to car shows, motor-home shows, state fairs--let people walk through it and see the history of the Futurliner.”