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| 1925 • Packard • Paddy Wagon |
See on the rear side of the Fort Lauderdale cop wagon? It says "P" Wagon. Odd about this. People use the “P” word with impunity, but never the “N” word? Hmmm... and the Ps came here to escape the Brits’ attempt at genocide during the potato famine, were discriminated against and despised (No Irish Need Apply). and here’s a 1925 vehicle with the “P” word painted right onto it??? My family lost uncles who were impressed off the boat into the Union cause where they died to end slavery. Yet we celebrated St. P*ddy's Day earlier this month when millions got falling down drunk.
Wonder what’d happen if someone painted “N-Wagon on a cop vehicle today? Don’t ask, I know.... Sigh...
GEEK STUFF: Fort Lauderdale has an internationally acclaimed Packard museum. The collection's totally hot. I captured this 1925 Paddy Wagon (Look at the back panel... that's what it reads) with my Canon 7D hand held then washed it through PS CC with help from my tool-making friends at AlienSkin and Topaz. Oh, the classic cop-truck runs wonderfully.
2 comments:
Nicely done Ted. I can imagine what this would look like in the museum, standing in front of this exhibit and I'm certain it looks nothing as good as this.
Archeologists create whole cultures from a handful of relics. So d we. There is no one alive with a memory to report on the 1925 culture. It's so close, yet just out of any net we can toss over it. So we look at relics like this Packard cop truck and imagine an environment ... a culture... that would probably be toxic to modernists like you and me. Yet we never imagine it that way do we? Nope. We recreate t through the filters of our life. Make it safe. And yet it was the world of your grandparents and my parents (my dad was born in 1902).He was a union leader at a time when people died for that cause. Imagine that?
Imagine... because it is all we can do as we peer at the very expensive cop truck that rounded up Paddys, like my dad. Hmmmm..... And should I actually be there... well, I probably wouldn't have been in the front seats of that truck. Which brings me back to the toxic nature of culture....
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