“We always had Packards, until the war, when they stopped making them; then we had a Cadillac.” June Carter Cash
From the front -- Photo by Pat Bean
Adventures With Pepper
You can’t visit Amarillo and not take a little detour off of Interstate 40 to Cadillac Ranch. It just wouldn’t be, well Texan.
It’s not exactly a ranch, just a large field minus the cows. There’s not even a ranch house, just 10 half-buried old Cadillacs with psychedelic paint jobs, courtesy of whomever visits with a spray paint can. The color décor is constantly changing.
The Cadillacs are what Texas millionaire Stanley Marsh, who planted them back in 1973, calls an art installation.
And from the rear -- Photo by Pat Bean
I like it. It’s fun art. And the installation tells a story, part of which is the heydays of automobiles and Historical Route 66, which Interstate 40 replaced.
Back in the 1970s, I briefly owned an old Cadillac. It was a 1965 model if I recall correctly. I needed a car and back then, when the cost of gas started escalating, the Cadillac was the cheapest thing on the lot.
That old Cadillac was smooth running, but a big old gas guzzler and quite expensive to repair. It wasn’t long before the Cadillac was replaced with a used VW Bug, which cost more but was cheaper in the long run. .
According to Wikipedia, the eccentric millionaire Stanley probably paid only about $200 for each of his Cadillacs, which he picked up at junkyards before giving them a half-butted burial.
You just gotta love Texans.
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