Pro-cars Have High Profile at Cadillac & LaSalle Club's 2014 Grand National

Gregg D. Merksamer

PCS Life Member / PCS Publicity Chairman / PCS Ele
Though I’m well-known in the PCS as an Avowed Lincoln Partisan, I still believe our relationship with the Cadillac & LaSalle Club is the most important one our group maintains with a larger, marque-focused car club, for the elemental reason that more funeral vehicles and ambulances have been built on Cadillac chassis than any other brand. It was, accordingly, most satisfying to see professional cars enjoy such a high profile at the 2014 C&LC Grand National that took place in Lake George, New York the weekend before last. This was evident the instant attendees arrived at the Fort William Henry Resort and Conference Center where the C&LC’s New York Capital District Region hosted the event from July 8th-12th, as the entrance sign was flanked most-visibly by PCS VP Daniel K. Herrick’s 1970 Superior Rescuer 51-inch headroom high-top ambulance and Joseph K. Kelley’s 1958 Superior Model 604 Combination from Schenectady, N.Y.

Given that the Lake George “GN” ultimately attracted 278 display cars in total, it was even more significant that both the pre-and post-World War II Best-in-Show Awards would wind up going to Series Seventy-Five Cadillacs, with the former earned by Jeffrey S. Hansen’s 1942 vintage, partition-equipped 7533 Imperial Sedan from Newark, Delaware - it’s always a thrill, in my opinion, to see ANY car from that war-abridged model year! - while the latter accolade went to H. Fred Caldwell of Cramerton, North Carolina for a 1968 Cadillac 69723 Nine-Passenger Sedan I profiled two years ago as an OLD CARS WEEKLY mini-feature after admiring it at the 2012 C&LC Grand National that took place in St. Augustine, Florida the weekend preceding the PCS International Meet in Daytona Beach.

Professional Car Society member vehicles shown at the Lake George Grand National also included …

- An unusual, limousine-style 1969 Miller-Meteor Classic 3-way loading hearse brought from Hampton, Connecticut by 1990-92 PCS President Paul Cichon

- A 2006 Eureka Cadillac Landau Hearse fielded by 1999-2000 PCS President Tom Hoczyk of Ft. Wayne, Indiana

- Clifton, N.J. funeral director Roy Garretson’s 1942 Cadillac Series Seventy-Five 7533L four-window Imperial Sedan, which appeared on-screen in the 2004 Martin Scorsese film THE AVIATOR as Howard Hughes actually owned the very next 1942 model 7533L completed

- Joseph A. Puleo’s 1959 Series Seventy-Five 6733 Limousine from Watchung, N.J.

- A 1992 Eureka 6-door Limousine fielded by John E. Foust of Justin, Texas

A 1967 DeVille Convertible shown by 1995-7 PCS President Mike Barruzza of Bensalem, Pennsylvania also earned a Preservation Award and top-tier Senior Crown status in Judging Class 5, while James Anderson of Margate, Florida and Earle Whitcher of Chester, New Hampshire also attended the Lake George GN without the 1970 Series Seventy-Five Limousine and 1978 McClain Coupe DeVille Flower Car Conversion they respectively displayed to justifiable acclaim at PCS Daytona 2012.

Notable professional and livery Cadillacs shown in Lake George by non-PCS members included Jerry Steinard’s 1976 Fleetwood Seventy-Five 6DF33 Limousine from Southfield, Michigan; Louis J. Filardo, Jr.’s 1978 Fleetwood 6DF23 Limousine from Fairfield, N.J. (still bearing an original trunk badge from Brogan Cadillac of Ridgewood); a 1994 Krystal Fleetwood 6-door fielded by Frank Cottone of Fort Ann, N.Y.; a 1999 Superior Fleetwood Limited “stretch sedan” owned by Tom Pirog of Towaco, N.J.; and a 1991 Superior Crown Sovereign Landau Hearse owned by Adam Szeluga of Rochester, NY, which would need to ditch its driver’s compartment skeleton and “Angel of Death” hood mascot before it’s ready for exhibit at a PCS event.

My biggest personal thrill at Lake George, despite all the prominently-displayed pro-cars and the Sheriff-escorted, post-show parade through the streets of Lake George Village, was being asked by Walt McCall to accept on his behalf the truly-prestigious Maurice Hendry Award, which was established by the author of CADILLAC, THE COMPLETE HISTORY to honor any C & LC member “who excels in journalistic contributions in furtherance of the purposes of the Cadillac & LaSalle Club.” Shortly after I accepted Walt’s plaque from outgoing C&LC President Lars Kneller, a Plymouth, Michigan banquet attendee named Sue Pashukewich approached me and volunteered to bring the award the rest of the way to Walt, who will deservedly claim it at a Great Lakes Fire Truck Club event that’s taking place in Frankenmuth, Michigan this Saturday, July 26th. Incredibly, the wonderful weather the Grand National attendees enjoyed all week came to an abrupt end with a cloudburst that clobbered Lake George not ten minutes after the awards banquet concluded - now THAT’S luck!
 

Attachments

  • Cad.42 Hansen 7533 w. Garretson 7533F THUMB.jpg
    Cad.42 Hansen 7533 w. Garretson 7533F THUMB.jpg
    69.3 KB · Views: 645
  • Cad.68 69723 Fred Caldwell Fqtr THUMB.jpg
    Cad.68 69723 Fred Caldwell Fqtr THUMB.jpg
    66 KB · Views: 802
  • Superior 1970 Rescuer Dan Herrick 2014 THUMB.jpg
    Superior 1970 Rescuer Dan Herrick 2014 THUMB.jpg
    62.4 KB · Views: 654
  • Superior 58 Joe Kelley w. John Foust 92 Eureka THUMB.jpg
    Superior 58 Joe Kelley w. John Foust 92 Eureka THUMB.jpg
    49.5 KB · Views: 612
  • Miller-Meteor 69 Classic 3-way Paul Cichon THUMB.jpg
    Miller-Meteor 69 Classic 3-way Paul Cichon THUMB.jpg
    60 KB · Views: 689
  • Cad.76 6DF33 owner Jerry Steinard THUMB.jpg
    Cad.76 6DF33 owner Jerry Steinard THUMB.jpg
    77 KB · Views: 668
  • Cad.78 6DF23 Louis J. Filardo Jr. 2014 THUMB.jpg
    Cad.78 6DF23 Louis J. Filardo Jr. 2014 THUMB.jpg
    70.3 KB · Views: 642
  • Merks accepts Hendry Award for McCall from Lars Kneller THUMB.JPG
    Merks accepts Hendry Award for McCall from Lars Kneller THUMB.JPG
    43.6 KB · Views: 610
Notable professional and livery Cadillacs shown in Lake George by non-PCS members included ...(snip)... a 1991 Superior Crown Sovereign Landau Hearse owned by Adam Szeluga of Rochester, NY, which would need to ditch its driver’s compartment skeleton and “Angel of Death” hood mascot before it’s ready for exhibit at a PCS event.

Had wondered who owner was. Thank you for such comprehensive coverage Gregg.

14558201778_594318eef4_b.jpg
 
You're welcome, Attila! Were you in Lake George too?
I didn't see you there, but then again there were 381 registered C&SC members and 812 people in total attending the meet. They actually had to set up two separate dining rooms for Saturday evening's awards banquet, with diners in the far-off room watching the speeches on a video screen.
If anyone in that room won an award, there was a golf cart on standby to get them to the trophies in the barn.
 
Great report as always Gregg. Looks like the relationship between the two groups is improving. I belonged to the CLC for several years but never felt welcome or accepted in my area and dropped out but maybe there is hope at the end of the line somewhere.
 
Fred Caldwell's 1968 Fleetwood Seventy-Five may actually be black as opposed to Regent Maroon, though I can't confirm it personally as I'm color blind and really dark reds and browns (along with pink vs. white and tan vs. light green) are in those areas of the spectrum that truly give me fits ID-wise. I can, however, detail with confidence these partition-less Model 69723 Seventy-Five sedans were the rarest 1968 Cadillacs with only 805 examples produced, while the partition-equipped Model 69733 Limousine variant accounted for another 995 sales that year.

When I interviewed him at length in St. Augustine in 2012, Mr. Caldwell - who is the President of a Chevrolet dealership in Clover, S.C. on the North Carolina border southwest of Charlotte - told me he had found this beauty four years earlier on a Gastonia, N.C. used car lot, and was especially amazed to find “The glove box still had the original registration cards up through the first 25 years. I knew the man who owned it new, but I didn’t know he had this car. His name was John Gibson, and he owned the Gibson Tool & Machine company of Dallas, N.C. When this car was new, a local Dodge dealer who was Gaston County’s G.O.P. Chair in 1968 told me that Ronald and Nancy Reagan used it (in our area), maybe while he was campaigning for Nixon. (My wife) Vicki and I were at an event at Ashley High School where we heard him speak.” The glove box documents detailed Mr. Gibson owned the Fleetwood until the 1997-8 time frame, when a Gastonia Cadillac technician purchased it with 56,000 miles accumulated and kept it for perhaps another dozen years.

Once Mr. Caldwell became the current owner, he found “the hardest part of the restoration was the vinyl top material, which was extremely hard-to-find and expensive, especially as I needed ten yards of it to cover the roof.” Worse yet, “the person putting it on started at the wrong end (the front), and the seams were not correct at the back. It took me 20 hours to scrape it off. Luckily, SMS in Oregon had more of the top material and found me a person to put it on.”

Even if this car hadn't ALSO won Postwar Best-of-Show at the 2011 Cadillac & LaSalle Club C&LC Grand National in Columbus, Ohio prior to earning the very same accolade in Lake George, the effort was well worth it as this is one of only two 1968 Model 69723s in the C&LC's 2014 membership directory; a Walcott, Connecticut C&LC member named Mark Paoloni owns the other, while Missouri PCS member Dennis Goethe owns one of the three 1968 Model 69733 Limousines also listed and our own Ed Renstom and Mike Barruzza have Commercial Chassis Cadillacs of that vintage.

While I have your attention, I also trust you'll all get a kick out of the attached bonus shots of Dan Herrick's 1970 Superior ambulance, Roy Garretson's 1942 Imperial Sedan and Joe Puleo's 1959 Limousine representing the PCS in the post-show parade through Lake George Village, especially as our VP got the space right behind the Warren County Sheriff Taurus leading the procession up Canada Street.
 

Attachments

  • CLC 2014GN Lk. George Parade 70 Herrick TH1.jpg
    CLC 2014GN Lk. George Parade 70 Herrick TH1.jpg
    61.2 KB · Views: 509
  • CLC 2014GN Lk. George Parade 70 Herrick TH2.jpg
    CLC 2014GN Lk. George Parade 70 Herrick TH2.jpg
    60.5 KB · Views: 534
  • CLC 2014GN Lk. George Parade 70 Herrick TH3.jpg
    CLC 2014GN Lk. George Parade 70 Herrick TH3.jpg
    70.8 KB · Views: 473
  • CLC 2014GN Lk. George Parade 42 Garretson TH.jpg
    CLC 2014GN Lk. George Parade 42 Garretson TH.jpg
    79.5 KB · Views: 444
  • CLC 2014GN Lk. George Parade 59 Puleo limo TH.jpg
    CLC 2014GN Lk. George Parade 59 Puleo limo TH.jpg
    80.4 KB · Views: 450
Thanks for the interesting info, Gregg. The car in your first set of pictures is regent maroon, no doubt about it. I know a little of the early history of my car, but not much of its later years. It was owned by a funeral home in 1993, but was then sold at a used car lot in Smyrna, Delaware, only to make it's way to Carlisle, PA to be sold at the famous swap meet to the man I purchased it from.

I have always been told to be glad mine didn't have the vinyl top option, due to rust issues under the edging, but I have to say that Fred's looks great with it. Also, I guess mine is the rare model being just a sedan with no partition.

Hard to believe that CLC only has two of the sedan models on their registry. Maybe I should join CLC as well.....
 
Though I don't currently own a Cadillac myself and the armor-plated 1984 Fleetwood Limousine I once owned was such a project I was DELIGHTED to sell it at a several thousand dollar loss, I firmly believe C&LC membership should be a priority for any PCS member who owns a Cadillac or LaSalle-based funeral vehicle, limousine or ambulance. First-and-foremost, I believe a high-profile PCS presence at C&LC activities encourages their members (aside from having them consider PCS membership) to present and preserve any pro-cars they might own in the PCS fashion, without skeletons, cobwebs or other macabre miscellany that distract the judges and the show-going public from the aesthetics and fine craftsmanship of the coachwork. Secondly, the relative size of the C&LC member body deploys a lot more eyes, ears and pocketbooks toward the PCS mission of saving any interesting pro-cars for posterity that might surface in in the future, as opposed to seeing their grilles, dash pads and engines pulled for an Eldorado Biarritz Convertible restoration while the balance goes to the scrapper.

I should, of course, take this opportunity to thank THE SELF-STARTER's Editor-in-Chief Steve Stewart and his Photo Consigliere Tim Coy for the invaluable attention they've devoted to authentically-presented, PCS standard professional vehicles of late, as exemplified by my May, 2014 cover shot of the Gold Cross EMS 1937 LaSalle ambulance on Milwaukee's Lake Michigan shorefront and July's 50th anniversary restrospective on the 1964 Cadillacs, where four full pages of the issue was devoted to professional car photos from past PCS Internationals and my factory image archive. There are also an appreciable host of newsletter editors and webmasters in C&LC's regional and affinity chapters who have devoted added addition to pro-cars and the PCS in the past few years, so we owe them our thanks as well.
 
I do have to say that although not a current CLC member, I have been to one of their shows in Cleveland, which is where the my avatar pic was taken. PCS members were invited to join them for that show, "the gathering of the land yachts", so Dan Skivolocke, Jerry Jacobson, Ron Devies, Mike Stevens and I went. It was alot of fun and I was really glad I went. Although previously posted somewhere here, here are a few pics of the professional cars from that show, I think it was summer of 2012.
 

Attachments

  • CLC2012 042.jpg
    CLC2012 042.jpg
    98 KB · Views: 233
  • CLC2012 017.jpg
    CLC2012 017.jpg
    97.1 KB · Views: 227
  • CLC2012 004.jpg
    CLC2012 004.jpg
    97.7 KB · Views: 230
  • CLC2012 034.jpg
    CLC2012 034.jpg
    99.2 KB · Views: 228
  • IMG_0524.jpg
    IMG_0524.jpg
    102.8 KB · Views: 233
  • CLC2012 033.jpg
    CLC2012 033.jpg
    98.8 KB · Views: 232
  • CLC2012 032.jpg
    CLC2012 032.jpg
    96.6 KB · Views: 225
Gregg

Did you happen to see this newly finished '59 in Lake George ?

The owner lives 15 minutes from where I store my collection.

We were out at a car show yesterday.

Darren
 

Attachments

  • 59 Husky 1.jpg
    59 Husky 1.jpg
    73.6 KB · Views: 193
  • 59 Husky 2.jpg
    59 Husky 2.jpg
    66.3 KB · Views: 192
  • 59 Husky 3.jpg
    59 Husky 3.jpg
    65.9 KB · Views: 195
  • 60 Husky.jpg
    60 Husky.jpg
    86.2 KB · Views: 197
DEAR DARREN: I believe the attached photos from Lake George show the same 1959 Eldorado Seville Hardtop - the windshield card listed the owner as Gary Nolan of Ontario without detailing his home town - suggesting the suspension is EXTREMELY height-adjustable. The red 1959 model 6267 Convertible pointing its tailfins at his car in my photos belongs to Peter A. Poneros of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, while the silver blue Biarritz Convertible in the adjacent space didn't have a dash card.
 

Attachments

  • Cad.59 Poneros 6267 w.Nolan Eldo HT 2014F.jpg
    Cad.59 Poneros 6267 w.Nolan Eldo HT 2014F.jpg
    98.6 KB · Views: 164
  • Cad.59 Eldo Seville HT Gary Nolan 2014B.jpg
    Cad.59 Eldo Seville HT Gary Nolan 2014B.jpg
    99.2 KB · Views: 166
I firmly believe C&LC membership should be a priority for any PCS member who owns a Cadillac or LaSalle-based funeral vehicle, limousine or ambulance.

I joined, or at least think I did, CLC after learning that their 2015 national meet will be in Milwaukee. Part of it is because it is going to be local for me so I'd like to attend, and part of it is to compare it to our Milwaukee meet from last year. Though I do have to say that two months have passed since I sent in my membership stuff, and while they didn't waste any time depositing my check, I have heard nothing from them. Frankly, I can't help but think that they don't seem very interested in new members.
 
Patrick

I joined the CLC in November and didn't get anything until about Jan or Feb of the next year.

Then it starts coming often !

The roster is like a big city phone book ! PRINTED !

I haven't attended a meet since joining but I will when it is close enough.
Depending on when and what's happening next year, I may go to it.

I won't be driving to Texas so that may be my summer drive next year.

Who knows but keep positive and it will all work out.

I have a lot to learn about Cadillacs in general but my real interest in Cadillacs is the Professional Car side for sure !

They must be doing something right, every issue has a few pages of new members !

Darren
 
Ledt me assure the fence-sitters that the Cadillac & LaSalle Club's Member Registry is definitely worth the wait, as its exhaustive detailing concerning owners, spouses and especially model numbers has always proved most useful in my stories on the Grand Nationals for OLD CARS WEEKLY and Great Britain's CLASSIC & SPORTS CAR.

While finishing up this year's stories for both publications, I happened to notice a small correction should be made to my initial Lake George posting. Clifton, N.J. PCS member Roy Garretson’s partition-equipped, seven-seat, four-window 1942 Cadillac Series 75 Formal Sedan is a 7533F as opposed to a 7533L, which actually designated a nine-passenger Business Imperial. Maurice Hendry's Cadillac book further details only six Business Imperials were produced during that war-abridged model year, while Roy's car is the first of 80 model 7533F Formal Sedans built. A five-passenger Formal Sedan designated model 7559 accounted for another 60 units of production before Cadillac switched over to military materiel post-Pearl Harbor.
 
Back
Top