There was a man who loved Corvairs. He bought his first in 1961 and fell in love with it. It wasn't a good idea to mention Ralph Nader to him. He'd talk your ear off. Explain to you why Nader didn't attack Volkswagen but went for GM instead.
He got to be an expert. People brought their Corvairs to him when they started throwing serious quantities of oil. Sometimes people would abandon them, like babies before his door.
He filled his back field with Corvairs. People complained. Said they were unsightly. He lined them up in neat double rows - there were fifty of them by 1980. Then he was told he must put a fence around them so he did that. Corvair owners came from far and wide to look for parts or even to buy whole cars. He had them all. Pick-ups with side loading, the vans, the slab shaped early models, the elegant later ones.
``First turbo charged production car,'' he'd say proudly, ``well, except for Jaguar.''
He'd show you that not a wrecked car on the lot had rolled, as people claimed they did.
``That wasn't the problem,'' he'd say. He didn't say there wasn't a problem.
``The early ones, they'd tuck under,'' he'd say, ``but they fixed that by 1962 - after that they just got better.''
He drove a ruby red '65, his wife a sky blue one.
When he grew tired and wanted to move to Arizona and play golf he had to face the problem of his field of Corvairs. So many of them mere shadows of their former selves, having been deprived of most of their removable parts over the decades. He put ads for the collection in the specialty magazines and on the net, but he got no takers.
Over a period of three years he got rid of the last remaining salable parts until all that was left was good for nothing but the crusher. The last call he took was from a man who had been on the Corvair line in the sixties. He needed a 1960 oil heater.
``Sold the last one I had a couple of years ago.''
``Win a few lose a few,'' the caller said.
When the last Corvair was hauled away, he quickly plowed up the field, glad of the fence that hid the oil patches.
He sold the house and he and his wife left for Arizona, he in his red Corvair, she in her blue.
They got there safely with only two unscheduled repair stops on the way.