[Home]  [Headlines]  [Latest Articles]  [Latest Comments]  [Post]  [Sign-in]  [Mail]  [Setup]  [Help] 

Status: Not Logged In; Sign In

Israel Iran Double Standard

Soros Funneled $8.3M into Leftist Group Trying to Turn Lone Star State Blue

California Democrats Under Fire for Buying Bricks During Protests

ICE Launches Campaign to Crack Down on Marriage Fraud Could Ilhan Omar Finally Face Justice?

Joe Rogan's podcast predicted violent LA riots two years ago leaving viewers stunned

Anti-migrant rioters shouting 'f*** off foreigners!'

Amazing things happen when you actually cut government spending.

25 Vaccine Death Stories To Share In Social Media

The White House just posted this:

US Anticipating Potential Israeli Attack on Iran

Grok Is Using a Far-Left Fact Check website to Smear and Censor Conservative Outlets on X

Over 300 UK Foreign Office staff told to consider resigning if they disagree with government's Gaza policy

Jimmy Dore: Here’s How Israel’s Massacres At Aid Sites Work!

Iran successfully tests missile with 2-ton warhead

Liberal Teachers Union Presidents Rally Behind LA Rioters

Ilhan Omars Daughter Applauds Anti-ICE Riots, Urges Death to Colonial Empire: U.S. and Israel One Oppressor

California Leaders Want United Nations Blue Helmets to Expel Federal Forces from the State

Tulsi Gabbard Warns of “Nuclear Holocaust” in Chilling 3-Minute Plea

LBMA Silver Short Position Now 2nd Largest In History

Chumbawamba - Tubthumping

Something BIG is happening right now in the Middle East, Israel ready to attack Iran

AMERICA ON FIRE: Riots & Chaos as Trump Quadruples ICE Raids!

THE BANKRUPTCY OF THE UNITED STATES (Emergency Banking Act)

In France, young women are starting to buy pet pigs to avoid being harassed by Muslim men

Elderly Veteran kills 3 Home Invaders

Number One Longevity Food

Inflation Highest In Democrat States, Lowest In Republican Deep South

TikToker admits to being paid $150 a day to protest Trump’s deportation policies in LA

A GREAT update on the Trump fraud case ($454.2 million judgment) at the appellate court.

Mexican Senate President Revives Territorial Claims Amid Los Angeles Civil Unrest


History
See other History Articles

Title: Her car is 82. She's 102. Both still going strong
Source: Detroit News
URL Source: http://www.detroitnews.com/article/ ... -s-102-Both-still-going-strong
Published: Oct 4, 2012
Author: Bob Dyer/Akron Beacon Journal
Post Date: 2012-10-04 21:25:34 by X-15
Keywords: None
Views: 197
Comments: 2

Jackson Township, Ohio — Not many folks change their own oil anymore.

Fewer still are women.

And I'll bet you a week's pay there's not another woman on the planet who continues to change her own oil at the age of 102.

Meet Margaret Dunning of Plymouth.

I'm serious. Born in 1910. Still sharp. Still spunky. Still crawling around under the hood with a funnel and an oil pan.

Of course, this is no ordinary car. It's her baby, a 1930 Packard 740 Roadster.

She bought it back in '49 when it was in sad shape. Four upholstery jobs and 22 coats of hand-rubbed lacquer later, it became the first vehicle to be awarded a perfect 100-point score by the Classic Car Club of America.

Dunning exhibited her gem recently at the 18th annual Glenmoor Gathering of Significant Automobiles at Glenmoor Country Club in Canton, Ohio.

The fact that she's a generation older than her 82-year-old automobile merely amuses her.

"I love the old cars," she said, seated in front of her stately Packard. "I love the smell of gasoline. It runs in my veins."

Dunning not only changes the oil, she says, but the spark plugs as well.

She started driving at the age of 8 on her family's big dairy and potato farm west of Detroit.

She suffered her first crash at the age of 10. She was cruising around in her dad's Overland touring car when she couldn't quite navigate a turn and bumped into the barn.

"I'm a little short," she says. "I tried to put on the brakes and I couldn't. That was a disturbing development in our family."

She laughs.

"My father never spanked me. He never said a word. He just said, 'Well, just get out.'"

Other than a bruised ego, the damage was minor. The barn suffered the worst of it, a broken board.

Since then, Dunning has experienced few accidents, all of them fender-benders. But apparently she has run up her share of speeding tickets.

"I have lead in my feet," she jokes.

"It disturbs the policemen very badly, but it doesn't bother me at all."

If you haven't already noticed, Dunning is a hoot. A regal-looking woman with thick white hair and penetrating eyes, she is witty, engaging and razor sharp.

On a recent Saturday, with friends encouraging her to assume various positions for photographers, she bounds up onto the running board of the Packard, then steps smoothly back down before seating herself on the board as instructed.

Although she owns a number of other collector cars, the Packard is by far her favorite.

"The lines of a Packard car are very artistic as far as I'm concerned. My family drove Packards, and I was very proud of the fact. I guess I got indoctrinated," she says.

She still drives her Packard occasionally, but not as often as in recent years.

What wears her down is not so much shifting the manual 4-speed transmission, but turning the enormous steering wheel.

Her everyday car is a 2003 Cadillac.

Mind you, this woman has had a driver's license for 90 years. Got her first one at the age of 12.

Really. Her father died that year, and her mother, who didn't drive, needed someone who could. The family was politically connected, and Mom was able to wrangle a license for little Margaret.

It was a good life, growing up on the farm. She had some interesting neighbors, too. Henry Ford's family lived only a few miles away.

"I'm proud to say I (also) lived very near the Gleasons," Dunning says.

The head of the Gleason family, John, was universally referred to by the neighborhood kids as "Grandpa Gleason."

"He hired Henry Ford as a very young man to come and run his steam engine. I understand Henry Ford acquired his mechanical knowledge for internal combustion engines from his stint with Grandpa Gleason."

Ford never forgot his roots, Dunning says.

"Even after he became quite famous, he would like to go back to his childhood haunts. He would stop in at the Gleasons and the Dunnings. …

"He was a very kind man, very much of a gentleman and very interested in the young people of the community. He did a lot for the young engineers. He loved, as he would say, the 'raw recruits.'"

Dunning never married. She enrolled at the University of Michigan, but dropped out during the Depression to help at her mom's real estate company.

Later, she was a success in banking and retail.

After her mother died in 1957, Dunning built a library for the town in her honor. She also has given more than $1 million to the Plymouth Historical Museum.

"I've had a very interesting life in this old world," she says.

"My mother kept telling me what a beautiful old world this is, and as I gain a few years, I realize what she was talking about, because each year I see more beauty in the things that I observe."

Takes one to know one.


Poster Comment:

(1 image)

Post Comment   Private Reply   Ignore Thread  


TopPage UpFull ThreadPage DownBottom/Latest

#1. To: X-15 (#0)

Awesome car !

"In an unjust society, the only place for a just man is prison."

Thoreau

noone222  posted on  2012-10-05   2:15:49 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


#2. To: X-15 (#0)

Sometimes you just run into amazing people. I found a small restaurant owned by a woman who is the only employee, rides a Harley and works on the bike. The first time my girlfriend and I walked in she was sitting at her laptop with a copy of Charles Dicken's "Little Dorrit" in front of her.

This woman, however, is even more amazing.

Women cannot tell you what they want because they do not consciously know what they want. Their desires can only be ascertained by their actions, not their assertions.

Turtle  posted on  2012-10-05   10:44:22 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply  


TopPage UpFull ThreadPage DownBottom/Latest


[Home]  [Headlines]  [Latest Articles]  [Latest Comments]  [Post]  [Sign-in]  [Mail]  [Setup]  [Help]