Growing up Volkswagen™
in West Virginia
written by Barbara McQuain
© 2003. All Rights Reserved. Email for permission rights to reproduce.

This little gem, a 1950 Volkswagen Beetle™ Sedan featuring a split-pretzel back window, was probably never meant for export. A G.I. stationed in Germany shipped this beauty back to America in the late 1950s. Over the next couple of years ownership changed hands only a few times. My dad ended up buying it and fell in love not only with the Beetle™ but in it too ~ Mom and Dad had their first date in the little green machine. Guess you could say all parties were smitten by the Love Bug!

Dad always said the Volkswagen™ was the best car he'd ever driven. The only vehicle that ever came as close to being as near and dear to his heart was a 1937 Buick Sedan. He had a Buick, among other vehicles, in high school. When Grandad complained that at least one car had to go the Buick ended up being sold to a junk man for $15.00. Remember, it was the '50s -- back when $15.00 meant a little more than it does nowadays. Still, Dad regretted the decision almost immediately. Enter the 1950 Volkswagen Beetle™ and the start of a life-long love affair.

I can't tell you how many Volkswagens™ our immediate and collective family had over the years. Dad started the tradition with the '50. It saw him thru the Army (how fitting as the Volkswagen™ was originally a military vehicle) and Dad made several road trips between home -- the mountains of West Virginia -- and Fort Jackson in South Carolina where he was stationed. Dad remembered driving back to camp on one of those trips and seeing the buildup of troops during the Cuban Missile Crisis. There was a cold Christmas trip to Michigan to see the new nephew (VWs™ never did have good heaters) and a W.Va. trip home when, alone in the Bug™ late at night, the wheel came off on a mountain. It just kept on rolling and Dad slowed to a 5 m.p.h snail's pace riding on the wheel rim until he found a gas station around dawn.

I don't know when but somewhere along the way, in the early days of our '50, it went from ugly green (as Mom remembers the color) to bird egg blue. Soon after that first (and only) star-struck date in the '50, Mom and Dad got married. The '50 quickly went in the shop for body work. That "quick" restoration took a mere 35 years.

Truth be told, neither I nor my brothers or sister would tell you that we readily remember the 1950 Beetle™ in the shiny shape as it appears today. We remember it as a kind of fifth sibling -- albeit banished to sitting in the backyard near the dog house and second-hand swing set. Only later did it take up residence in an indoor garage and warehouse. In all fairness, however, our family did give the VW™ its rightful and kingly due. It may have sat idle and in disrepair for 35 years but for most of those years it wore 'the' royal and protective cloak. Otherwise known as the polka-dotted tarp from the game Twister™.

I assume the other Twister pieces got lost in a yard sale along the way but the playing mat always seemed to have a calling. Somehow the 1950 VW™ (or any Volkswagen™ for that matter) just doesn't look the same without it. To this day a Twister tarp is still part of the package when recalling any part of our own familial Volkswagen™ experience.

The Tale of the Tan Tornado ...

By 1964, the '50 was in semi-retirement but that didn't stop anyone in our lineage from owning a Beetle™. Grandad Okey bought a brand new tan colored Bug™ in 1966 for a few thousand dollars. (OH! To get them at that price now!) After several years he sold it to Dad. That's the jewel that serried a family of five (young sis was yet to be born) to Georgia and back. Along the way, three children could easily sleep on the folded down backseat, albeit I remember the indented black vinyl causing an uncomfortable prickly feeling after several hours in one position.

That's the trip on which Mom and brother Kelly got out at a picnic table alongside the road and attempted to feed a black bear while Dad filmed with the Super 8mm. As a souvenir, Mom and Dad bought each of us tiny plastic bear figurines at a tourist stand. I was immediately (and secretly) jealous of Michael, the oldest sibling, as his figure had the distinction of standing on a base and thus appearing slightly larger to three year old eyes. My, how I harbored owning that bear for years to come. Fairness never reared its head in sibling rivalry -- and the backseat of a Volkswagen™ could be a tight place to duke it out at times.

In the dead-of-the-night, later on in the trip, somewhere near Stone Mountain I believe, Kelly promptly threw up all over the car. In hindsight I think he sees it as retribution for the bear picnic incident -- or what he recalls as trying to feed the young to the animals. From then on Dramamine always made it into the medical bag on vacations.

Oh, the stories the Tan Tornado could tell now! The Raggedy Ann™ short set Gammie gave me when we came to visit at the lake near Atlanta. The excursion to Six Flags Over Georgia™ where we all got hats with our names embroidered on them. A shopping trip for shoes that plum wore our mother out, prompting a then six-year-old Kelly to ask her why she just couldn't open her tummy up and stick us all back in? The photo of siblings and a grandmother in a beehive hairdo standing in front of a tan Beetle™ hides and tells all those secrets. 

The Ballad of Baby Blue ...

Later the tan Volkswagen™ was replaced by a baby blue Bug™. One lazy summer Sunday, when I was four or five, we took a jaunt to nowhere in particular. We stopped to pick wild flower bouquets by the side of the road and, in one of my earliest memories, Mom revealed to me the bright colors of black-eyed Susan flowers. The Blue Baby continued to make trips here and there, visiting friends and relatives near and far.  VW™ road tradition had now been firmly established in our family.

We panned for gold in Cherokee, N.C. and lived for the taste of orange Tic Tacs™ bought with an allowance. We drank 7-Eleven slurpies in super hero tumblers until our tongues were blue and our bellies full. A huge stash of comic books Grandad Paul had given the boys made its way back from Lake Linear, GA, to the Mountain State as cargo. We visited Dad's Jaycee friends in Kentucky and cousins in Tennessee. We witnessed the changing of the locks on Watts Bar Dam near Spring City which lead to my temporary fear of heights. Such were the adventures of a hillbilly family traipsing to and fro in whatever Beetle™ was running at the moment.

The Racing Red Rocket ...

The speed of an Apollo rocket had nothing on our Aunt Judy. She could take off and stop in her bright red Beetle™ like an F-14 Tomcat on a Navy carrier deck. Mom managed similar maneuvers once we inherited the Red Rocket, although she never quite possessed the same precision (or elicited quite as dramatic a stomach assault) as good ole Aunt Jude. Dad probably would have told you that it was all linked to feminine control and dexterity in handling the gear shift and clutch; but as kids we thought we'd discovered the greatest thing since tail fins: the Volkswagen™ amusement ride.

No longer did one have to travel on long vacations for adventure. Now a simple trip to the grocery store could provide a cheap thrill of excitement. We never let on how much we actually enjoyed the rides, lest we be told for future reference that "a car is not a toy and should not be drag raced down city streets."

Bud's Big Buses ...

By the mid 1970s our VW Beetle™ inventory had grown to a small fleet. At this rate there would be no doubt that we kids would be assured of some classic wheels once we came of driving age -- if the Bugs™ held out another 5-15 years. You see, when one new addition arrived the others were never sold or scraped, they were merely put out to pasture. Literally -- in the backyard.

If it wasn't being driven it was on display in the "lot". Dad had become his own one-man Volkswagen™ dealership of sorts. With not enough Twister™ tarps to go around (all those polka-dots would have driven even a blind man insane), Mom finally gave Dad an ultimatum. She was going out of town for a teacher's conference and made Dad promise that the number of Volkswagens™ would change by the time she got back.

True to his word, and honest man that he was, the quantity had indeed switched by the time Mom returned home a week later. Dad had purchased a Volkswagen Bus™! With the family having expanded to six upon the birth of my sister Erin, more room and luxury is just what a growing family needed. Or so I venture is how Dad explained it to Mom.

We had at least two VW Buses™ that I recall, but it may have been three . The two I remember were both maroon red with a white top and I admired the flat front that made a VW Bus™ stand out from other types of vans. A third may have been brown and tan. Dad's family nickname was Bud, hence the monikers given to our new siblings.

Looking like a bread box on wheels, the family set out on yet another vacation excursion, this time with Grandma Jack in tow. The destination was Woodbridge, VA, just outside of Washington, D.C. Boy, were we set for fun with the cousins in Virginia -- and Grandma Jack to boot! Nothing could go wrong because Wonder Woman™ was our co-pilot. (Translation: Erin was at the height of her Underoos™ craze. For a two-and-a-half year old girl, a VW Bus could easily transform into the Amazon woman's invisible plane.)

A trip to the National Air & Space Museum, the Smithsonian, and other national treasures was on the agenda this time. Seeing the Spirit of St. Louis, the Wright Brothers plane, the Hope Diamond, and the Declaration of Independence made one wonder. Why wasn't a Volkswagen™ displayed somewhere? Hadn't this German import earned a place in every American's heart? Hadn't the VW™ become a naturalized citizen of sorts? We certainly thought of our Volkswagens™ as members or our family.

We returned home packaged like sardines in a can. To passing motorists we must have looked like something out of National Lampoon's Vacation™. Not only did we have Mom, Dad, four kids, and Grandma Jack, but a visit to Kings Dominion during the trip had yielded a bounty of treasure. Packed with the seven of us were five gigantic stuffed animals: two Saint Bernards, one pink dinosaur, one Astro™ dog from The Jetsons™ cartoon, and a 15 foot snake named Wilbur that I was inheriting from my cousin Sue. Dad was right, the family was indeed growing.

Driving on ...

Eventually the family moved and little by little the VW™ inventory dwindled -- but never the thought of the '50. Mostly the flock just gave out from years of loving use and it became harder to find little gems in our area. Dad probably would have kept each one a little longer except he would have looked like Fred Flintstone -- bare feet on the pavement running his beloved Beetle™ to the utter end. Most of the cars were scraped or salvaged for use amongst our army. Dad continued to pick up parts and items here and there at auction, via the trading post, or wherever his nose would lead him. If we were on the road and saw a Volkswagen anything we invariably stopped.

In his final years, Dad made one last investment in our VW™ family. He found a fiberglass dune buggy built on a VW™ chassis. We are looking forward to reassembling and restoring this new son.

The Volkswagen™ is the car that has helped tell the story of my life and my family's. Each has been unique and supplied a piece of the fabric that has woven our story. Like threads, the memories they invoke hold us together. The most basic glue, however, has always been Dad's original passion -- the 1950 Volkswagen Beetle™. This one started it all when Dad gave it a loving home so many years ago. We wouldn't trade it, or the memories, for anything.

GROWING UP VOLKSWAGEN IN WEST VIRGINIA
written by Barbara McQuain
© 2003. All Rights Reserved. Email for permission rights to reproduce.

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