OTTAWA — They were four Carlton University engineering students completing their four-year program in the spring of 1970.
Their grad celebration would be a three-week-long, 16,000-kilometre road trip across the northern United States to Yellowstone Park, south to San Francisco, then crossing through Los Angeles and San Diego, then along the southern states to Miami, and then north back to Ottawa. Clearly, they needed a reliable car.
Barry King, one of the four students, offered to use his father’s aging 1958 Mercury. The others refused to go if that was their only option. So, King set out to buy a car that was suitable. Ample trunk space and low fuel consumption were critical.
Barry King’s Dodge Monaco on a trip to Port Dover, Ontario.
Supplied, Brian King
Fellow student George Justice said his uncle was about to trade his 1967 Dodge Monaco for a new car. It had 63,500 km on the odometer and was equipped with a 318-cubic-inch ‘Poly’ engine and a two-barrel carburetor so fuel consumption wouldn’t be an issue – at least in those days.
Although the Dodge didn’t have air conditioning, it had a unique vacuum-operated damper at the rear window that, when open, would provide amazing flow-through ventilation. King bought the car for $1,800 in February 1970. He calculated the anticipated operating costs per mile for the car, including fuel, insurance and depreciation. Each passenger would pay his share. The four students left Ottawa right after their final engineering exam.
The Dodge performed perfectly, with the only problems being a tire failure and a universal joint that King replaced himself. The average fuel consumption for the trip was 19 miles per gallon, or 14.8 L/100 kilometres.
The restored interior of Barry King’s 1967 Dodge Monaco.
Supplied, Brian King
The Dodge was King’s first car. He would drive it to work and on family trips for 18 years. King and his wife have twin boys who are now 29 years old. In 1986, they came home from Ottawa’s Civic Hospital in the Dodge.
In 1981, King decided to take the car off the road for the winter. He stored it in the loft of a barn in Quyon, Que., west of Ottawa, and stopped driving it altogether in 1988. By then, the car had travelled nearly half a million kilometres. It sat unused for 17 years, but when he retired in 2005, King decided to restore the car.
He had already been accumulating parts for the car such as original vinyl top material and new front fenders. He had bought a similar car in the 1970s, disassembled it and stored the parts in his attic. The restoration took five summers to complete with King doing most of the work himself. The exception was welding to repair rust damage, bodywork, reviving the upholstery and installing the vinyl top, as well as updating the suspension, engine, transmission and paintwork.
The restored car turned out to be better than new in many ways due to ample sound-deadening material, a fully balanced engine and the new base coat/clear coat paint application and radial tires. King spent nearly $45,000 restoring the car and that doesn’t include his labour. Its appraised value is less than half of that.
When the restoration was complete in 2010, King prepared a video about his Monaco, presenting an archive of photos and video taken over the life of the car – including the restoration process. One of the first trips was to take the original owners for a cruise through the Gatineau Hills north of Ottawa in the vehicle they had bought in May 1967. Two of the remaining crew from King’s 1970 U.S. road trip also came along.
In the five years since the restoration, King has driven the car 15,000 kilometres and is frequently at Ottawa-area classic car shows.
Will the car ever be for sale?
“Definitely not,” King says. “My sons wouldn’t hear of it. After all, it’s the first car they ever rode in.”
Alyn Edwards is a classic car enthusiast and partner in Peak Communicators, a Vancouver public relations company. Contact him at aedwards@peakco.com.
