He had purchased a 1965 Corvette that had originally been delivered to the Bob Beck dealership in Lorain, and thought that it would be nice to have a Bob Beck keychain to go with it.
I told him that the search for a keychain would have been a lot easier in the 1970s or even the 80s, rather than fifty years later. But after some detective work, we may be closing in on one. I’ll let you if and when it happens.
In the meantime, here’s a nice Bob Beck ad that ran in the Journal on Feb. 1, 1971. Although Bob had passed away in February 1970, the dealership knew the power of his name was still strong. I like the tagline: “A Name That Means A Great Deal.”
Maybe someone connected to one of the men pictured in the ad (including Roger Noak, Buzz Gibson, Frank Camera, Ron Crowe, Roth Garrett, Darwin Harmon, Ron Kokinda, Joe Krall, Dewey Mann, and John Mitchell) has an old keychain or other piece of dealer memorabilia in their junk drawer.
The funny thing is, after looking at this ad, I remembered that my parents bought a used 1970s Chevy Impala for my sister to drive. (I don’t remember what Chevy dealer’s name was on it.) It was the rare used car they bought that wasn’t a Cutlass.
That Impala was huge – about as big as the boat-like 1963 Buick LeSabre that we later drove to Admiral King High School.
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All this Chevy talk reminded me that your humble blogger posted what is probably the only image on the whole internet of the cartoon caricature of Commander Ray of West Park Chevrolet.
