Actor Ralph Garman from the Joe Schmo Show, for his voice work in Family Guy, and as the entertainment reporter and impressionist for the Kevin and Bean morning show on Los Angeles radio station KROQ talks about his TR-7.
TR-7 ‘The shape of things to come’ … A Door Stop?
The winter of 1999, I was driving around Snohomish County north of Seattle, in the rain (of course) driving through the Cascade foothills looking at properties with my wife. We were driving around a right-hand sweeping turn at the base of a steep hill. The hill had been clear-cut of all lumber at some time in the mid-80s. A flash of red-orange caught my eye on the hillside adnI looked out of the rain-dappled window to see a Triumph TR7 at least 150 feet up this hill, with an alder tree growing right up through the middle of it! The tree had obviouslyeither taken root in the car’s floorboard, or grown up through a rusted out floor, who knows. I made a mental note to come back in the summer and take a photograph of it as it was such a bizarre sight. How did it get up there? This was a steep hillside awith no obvious route to the top.
Of course I completely forgot about it until some years later, and have since driven every back road I can find looking for it. By now, a decade later, I’m sure the hillside it completely overgrown and the Coventry Steel has been completely consumed by the tin worm.
A fitting end for The Shape of Things to Come.
–chuck goolsbee
65ots, 1E10715
arlington, wa, usa
Yes, a very fitting end to the door stop 🙂 When I was putting together the post I forgot to mention that the TR-7 gets ranked 26 in the 50 Worst Cars from a Time magazine story.
Ace,
What do you think about the Triumph GT6? Is that going to be a “collectable”? I love the lines of this car. A buddy of mine had one in high school in the mid 80’s, and that is where my love for Triumph’s started. I have owned several Triumph motorcycles, and am thinking about getting a GT6 for a project car. Any thoughts?
Thanks,
Donivan
I worshipped a girl from afar. A friend of friends. We were hanging out at a bar, waiting for friends, and she saw a TR-7 drive up. She said it was her favorite car.
Things were never the same. The flame died out.
My first car was a 1978 triumph spitire, when i was 17, i was born in 1978 so this car was also 17 years old, and it broke down about once a week, i drove it for one year, never fixing it with literaly tape and sting. I sold it for more than i bought it for after turning back the odometer 30,000 miles, not that would make a difference, this car was shitty no matter what the mileage. But it looked sweet and i was the only dude driving a convertible in small town saskatchewan, canada.
I had a 1976 MGB. I understand everything he said about the TR-7. I think they both had the same randomly opperating electrical system. Mine had an added advanage, the guy who had it before me thought he was a mechanic. He wasn’t.
I talk a bit about it in my blog.
http://here-in-my-car.blogspot.com/2010/02/welcome-to-my-blog.html