Painting of car 1938 Buick Century

Interested in a portrait of your car?  Please contact artist John Robertson.

Painting of Tom Brizuela's 1938 Buick Century from the Ventura, Ca. "Classics on the Coast" car show on Main street.  The painting is 6 feet by 10 feet, ink and acrylic on unstretched canvas.

Tom Brizuela's.  I met Tommy at a recent street car show on Main Street in Ventura, Ca. (Classics on the Coast).  There were over 300 cars on display and I took the opportunity to photograph this beautiful Buick Century. Tom has worked for BMW for a number of years, and, as you can see his main hobby is auto body restoration on pre-1960 vehicles and he does  custom painting. 

Some of the interesting facts about a 1938 Buick Century is that the base price started at $1,297. They made a little over 12,000 of these cars.   It had an Overhead-valve straight-eight, cast-iron block and cylinder head with a displacement of: 320.2 cubic inches.  Horsepower @ rpm: 141 @ 3,600 and Torque @ rpm: 269 @ 2,00.0.  The transmission was a Three-speed manual, floor lever.  Steering - Saginaw worm and roller. I just put this information in about the steering because I liked the sound of the words " Saginaw worm and roller."

When I was growing up in the 50's my step dad had a gas station and garage.  It had one bay and he did every imaginable kind of work on a car.  He did ton's of engine exchanges outside with block and tackle suspended from an "A" frame wooded structure,  besides rebuilds from the ground up.  Anything a customer wanted he could do.  I grew up around a lot of different cars, first working as a gas station attendant, pumping gas, washing all the windows around on the car, checking the oil, water, etc.  Later, as I got older I helped out in the shop with the engine work, starting with cleaning parts and working my way up to assembly.  I learned a lot about mechanical cars.

My first car was a 1940 Studebaker half ton pickup.  I was 15 years old and would get  about to get my driver's learners permit in a half of a year..  My step dad brought the truck home from work (as I recall I paid $100 for it with the money taken out of my earnings at the station) and parked it in the driveway.  I had already driven a few cars around so I had some confidence driving.  I remember getting into the driver's side of the cab, with my dad next to me.  He was going to let me back it out of the driveway.  I promptly engaged the clutch, put the three speed floor shifter into reverse to back out of the driveway.  I popped the clutch and promptly drove the truck forward through the garage door.  I had put it into first instead of reverse.  Thus began my experience of driving my own car.