Tuesday, November 23, 2010 - Posted by PTourist
Till Her Daddy Takes the T-Bird Away
Agnes probably owned various cars over the years, but the one closest to her heart may have been her Ford Thunderbird custom-painted in lavender. From the time she purchased this car she had it with her for the rest of her life. There are references to the lavender Thunderbird in Quint Benedetti's book -- he used to drive it and perform maintenance and repairs on it -- and in Warren Sherk's book. This is what Dr. Sherk has to say about the car, in chapter two:
After seeing and talking with many friends, acquaintances, and theatrical people, I left it to Fred Carmichael to enlighten me as to why Agnes never drove. Many mentioned that she always needed to be chauffeured. I supposed that perhaps she had never learned to drive. Not so.
Carmichael: "She was driving the lavender Thunderbird home from a set one evening when she became so deeply engrossed in thinking about a new character she was portraying that she drove by instinct until she 'came to' way down in a very undesirable part of Los Angeles. She had no idea how she got there. 'That did it,' she said to herself. 'I'll never trust myself behind the wheel again.' And, true to her word, she didn't. This was divulged during our all-night drive that time from filming Delilah as we drove her home to her farm."
Fred Carmichael worked with Agnes in 1970, as Production Manager for the film Dear Dead Delilah, and would keep in touch with Agnes for the remainder of her life. A final note about the car from Dr. Sherk in chapter nine of his book:
Anything violet or purple mauvish won her instant adulation and praise. Her purple Thunderbird is still parked in the back driveway.
Neither author mentions the model year of the Thunderbird, but I have seen references online to 1956 and 1957. Until now I had not come across any photos of the car, either from the years Agnes owned it or afterward. Thanks to an Australian reader of Aggie's Place I've just learned that what appears to be Agnes' Thunderbird was offered for sale earlier this year by its owner in Colorado, who was asking $27,000. Here's a look at the 1957 T-Bird, painted an electric blue by the dealer who had sold it for Agnes' estate:
The car looks to have survived the years pretty well. The owner provided documentation that this was Agnes' own Thunderbird, such as the itemized factory invoice dated 19 January 1957 from a Ford dealership in Riverside, California. With customizations it cost her just under four thousand dollars:
And the car's registration along with a form to release ownership of the vehicle from Agnes' estate so it could be sold, signed on 13 December 1974 by her executor Franklin B. Rohner:
The new owners are currently refinishing the Thunderbird. They have stripped off the electric blue paint, finding the layer of lavender paint underneath it, and the original white paint below that. They are planning to repaint it the original white.
