Many of us took a look at the DOTS '56 Willys Station Wagon and imagined ourselves tearing through the woods or desert in such a fine specimen of vintage off-road machinery. Thing is, parts are getting tricky to find for these proto-SUVs, trickier even than fitting a Super-Fructo Distendo-Abdomen™ five-gallon soft-drink bucket into an undersized European cup holder. What you need is a parts car! That's why you'll be overjoyed to find this pair of Willys Station Wagons, a '51 and a '58, for the survivalist-friendly price tag of one thousand dollars (or a bit more than an ounce of gold, for those of you who fear the Trilateral Commission/Federal Reserve cabal and their so-called "currency"). One of them has a complete-looking Tornado 6-banger (and is "Tornado" one of the best engine names ever or what?), and both have at least half their components; you might even find enough unrusted parts to assemble one good body! Oh yeah, and with a Willys Station Wagon, you don't use a goddamn cup holder for your drink of kiddie sugar-water- you use a canteen full of manly swamp water!

But let's say the SUV/cup holer stigma is so powerful that it manages to taint even such an excellent motor vehicle as the Willys Station Wagon (impossible, but just for the sake of argument). You want cars for your Two-For-One Hell Project, do you? Step right up for this Mercedes/Pontiac deal, folks! For a very optimistic- yet subject to relentless downward negotiating pressure- price tag of $4,000, you could have a 1958 Pontiac "Fire Chief" (we're assuming it's actually a Star Chief or Super Chief) and a 1962 Mercedes-Benz 220. The Benz "has not run in a few years," but we're talking about a car that's just getting broken in at 500,000 miles! How hard could it be to get this Heckflosse rolling again? It's in Reno, so maybe rust isn't a problem... in fact, think of all the things that might not be problems here! Then, once you've finished getting your Mercedes-Benz into perfect condition, you can look forward to many happy decades weeks working on your '58 Pontiac. It "needs engine and rearend," which doesn't make it clear whether you get any rebuildable components. That won't matter, however, because you'll be building up a monster Tri-Power 421 with the biggest, shiniest blower your food money can buy sticking through the hood, and the factory differential might as well be carved from Velveeta when it comes to dealing with all that power. OK, so this project might cost a few bucks, but your Mercedes will give you the requisite feeling of wealth to keep the stress down.

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Venturing yet again to the old-iron-studded byways of Alameda, I've found this '57 Pontiac Star Chief. While obviously a first cousin to the '57 Chevy, the Star Chief had distinctive- if busy- styling and packed a bigger engine than the Chevy, at 347 cubes versus 283. You could even get the 347 with a triple-carb setup that yielded 290 horses...

This one's pretty rough, and those rusty wire wheels probably came from a yard sale in 1974.

But still, it's still driving at age 50 and it doesn't live a gilded-cage life of garages and trailers. And that means something!

In fact, this car may well be driven by its original owner; this is quite common with 50s and 60s cars on this strange David Lynchesque island.

In fact, I'm starting to think GM needs to do a retro'd-out Star Chief modeled after this thing. Look at those curves!

Yes, you can just about taste the optimism in this design. Why, there'd be nuclear-powered Pontiacs on the Moon Base by 1980!

Sadly, the Moon Pontiacs were not to be. But hey, it could be worse- at least Pontiac still exists! – Murilee Martin

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