Member: Brent Marcinyshyn

Car: 1967 Beaumont Custom

When I was little, my father had always bought GM cars, so it was no surprise that the first car I bought was a GM product. It now seems like a lifetime ago (over 26 years). A lot of 41 year olds talk about their first car, but I am guessing there are only a few who can say that they still own their first car. From as early as I can remember, I loved cars and as I got closer to being able to purchase one, I wanted to get either a 1967 Chevelle or Beaumont. There was something about the style that had me hooked. I saved up for a car while working a part time job during high school. When I had saved up about $2000 dollars, it was time to start looking. I eventually bought my 1967 Pontiac Beaumont Custom (white with maroon interior) with 76,000 original miles from the second owner.

The seller told me that he bought it off of a farmer in Morden Manitoba and later that story checked out as it was dealer shipped from Saskatoon to Morden. The car has been with me since 1981 and has gone through various stages of restoration. The first major work I had done was an engine rebuild at 100,000 miles (162,000 on the odometer today). Both main seals were shot and I needed reliable transportation to and from university.

The second was after university graduation when I had all the rust cut out and replaced with new sheet metal, including a new driver's side door. That paint job lasted until 2001 when I was involved in a small "fender bender" which facilitated another complete paint job. Older and hopefully wiser, I tried to restore it to an all stock appearance while adding a few items that the car did not originally come with, but which I would have ordered it with from the factory (I was only 3 when the car was built).

). I swapped out the bench for buckets (with headrests) and a console, changed the interior from maroon to black, detailed the engine compartment back to original (with the exception of a Quadrajet and dual snorkel air cleaner), added a big block hood, and Coker classic 14" redline tires. A couple of years back, the rear end needed to be replaced, so I put in a 3.36 posi and ripped out the manual steering and replaced with a factory power steering setup. The car is still a numbers matching 283 with Powerglide.

The car has been with me through high school, university, marriage and the birth of my 2 children. My wife has grown up with the car as well and has always been very supportive of my hobby. In fact, our first purchase as a married couple was the big block hood bought at a swap meet in Winnipeg the day after our wedding!

This was our only car after we were married and we used it to pack "everything we owned" into it as we moved to Calgary. Although these days with 2 small children, I don't get much time to work on or play with the car as I used to, my wife and I want to keep the car with hopes that one or both of our children will take an interest in cars. I don't know what to do, however, if they both want the car.

I try to get out at least every Wednesday (weather permitting) to the Home Depot at Chinook Center and also manage to squeeze in a few other car shows (Three Hills, Calgary's Spring Thaw and Taber seem to be regulars for me). I can't honestly say that I have ever come close to selling the car and as I have heard more and more sad conversations starting with "I wished I had kept that old car of mine...", it just reinforces my desire to keep it forever. I am planning to replace the eyebrows and align the grille for my winter project this year. Even after 26 years, there is always something to tinker with...

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