Circle the Wagons
As children, my brother and I would lie in the back of the station wagon, the glow of each passing street light sweeping over us steady as a heartbeat. Against our cheeks, the floor of the wagon’s well, its pattern of grooves worn smooth by our hands and knees and backsides, was a warm hum, like the road passing beneath us. In the front seat, our parents were worlds away--this was our galleon, our spaceship, our movable nursery. Here we learned to negotiate boundaries, the effect of the social order and the value of location. We, and millions of other Americans.
“If we were really good, my brother and I got to sit in the ‘way back,’ ” said 27-year-old Chrissy McBride of mid-Wilshire, whose parents drove a 1976 Dodge Aspen, a stick shift that was a rarity in Southern California. “If we had been bad, we had to sit next to each other in the middle seat. It was a real punishment.”
Everyone on our block had a station wagon, everyone we knew, a lucky few with a third bench seat that faced the rear window, which was to a child the ultimate in traveling luxury (and now the only way to legally ride in the “way back”).
“That’s where the littlest kids sat,” said my cousin Rory Heffernan, 40, the fifth of six children. For years, my brother and I idolized the Heffernans--when their leviathan of a Pontiac hove into view, we would stand on the front lawn slack-jawed with admiration as they emerged--all long legs, long hair and cutoffs, an impossible number of people from one car. Even the youngest Heffernans were our elders and seemed the epitome of sophistication and glamour. It wasn’t until years later that we realized they had their own social divisions.
“The teenagers didn’t want to be near us,” Rory said. “They wanted the window seats and to be left alone. But we loved the back. It was our little fort. Sometimes, if it was really full, one of the little kids would have to ride in the front with Mom and Dad. And that was the worst. For everyone. After that, the next worst seat was the middle in the middle. No one wanted that. And of course, there were imaginary lines that must not be crossed--to be touched by a sibling was unacceptable.”
We went to the drive-in theater in our station wagon, on trips to the beach and the homes of distant relatives, to the grocery store and the county fair. Redolent with the inky newsprint of our comic books, the waxy smear of crayons and the sweet dust of crushed peanut-butter wafers, our station wagon smelled of safety and adventure. Of the American road.
Mercedes understands the importance of this. So does BMW and Saab. And Volvo always has.
While so many auto makers have lately abandoned the station wagon in favor of SUVs and minivans, the luxury market has embraced it--not that most of us can afford a new, $47,000 Mercedes station wagon. But it’s the thought that counts, and there are signs of a trickle down effect--Saturn is focusing on station wagons, Ford has a new one (the Focus) and a redone one (the Taurus), VW has the Passat, and Suburu has at least three models on the market.
Meanwhile, rumors abound that 2002 will be a turnaround year, with Honda, Toyota and Chrysler reconsidering their betrayal of the all-American car.
Station wagons were invented shortly after the automobile by enterprising business types who simply dropped the body of a wooden wagon on the chassis of a Model A and used the resulting creation to tote people’s luggage from train stations. Hence the name. In 1937, Ford caught on and began producing these woody wagons at the factory.
If the covered wagon was the vehicle that settled the American frontier, the station wagon tamed the resultant suburban sprawl. During the 1950s, station wagons were the fastest growing sector of the automotive market--if you are an American, chances are you have station wagon lurking somewhere in your past.
Although the energy crisis in the ‘70s caused many folks to trade in their Fairlanes for Fiestas, and then in the consumption-mad ‘90s trade up to an Explorer, nothing has come close to replacing the station wagon in the American consciousness. Mercedes and Saab are not in the station wagon business for their health. They understand that for boomers and post boomers, it is the station wagon, not the SUV, that is the race memory.
It was, of course, the car we rebelled against when we reached adulthood, preferring sporty two-doors or pickup trucks. But like so many parental preferences youngsters eschewed--things like savings accounts, church, and polyester blends--station wagons are suddenly objects of desire. Scores of Web sites, complete with cheesecake photos of many makes, offer paeans (the most comprehensive of which is https://www.stationwagon.com). There are fan clubs, owner clubs and, for two years running, a Midwestern Great American Wagon Meet.
The Great American Mini-Van Meet. Doesn’t have quite the same ring to it, does it?
Mary McNamara can be reached by e-mail at mary.mcnamara@latimes.com.
