Primarily Petroliana Shop Talk Forums Like Post

Ok Kim, I am going to give this story a shot. It is hard for me to compare my stories to yours. You are a great original picker. Anyway, my wife I was driving down the interstate or some huge highway going around NYC pulling my junky trailer. I was constantly about to have a wreck or run off the road looking for leads. LOL. Anyway this dealership was visible from the elevated major highway and I saw these signs. It was an operating dealership in White Plains, NY. So I jump off at the next exit and wound around trying to navigate back where I was to find the dealership from "ground" level. I find the dealership and walk in asking to speak to the owner. Guy says "who are you". I said I want to talk to him about the signs which he did. Great old man. He asked which ones and I said all of them. He said that he would sell me the big letters because GMC no longer made coaches. I paid him that day and grabbed a couple of socket wrenches, grabbed a ladder from his service mgr, got on the roof and had no idea how "BIG" they were or how I would get them down. My wife and I lowered them down with a rope using the frame as leverage because of the weight (picture below). I asked about the others and He said the GM might be making him replace them in the next few years, but to stay in touch; and that he would call me if anything happened. I was thinking to myself "good luck". One thing about junking in New England is business owners are rich guys and a few thousand dollars doesn't do much sometimes. So I kept in touch with him for several years and one day the phone rang. Yep, he said "do you still want these old signs". I said "yes sir, when do you need me there". He said his sign guy would take them down and put them on my truck. 2 months later in the spring I was there with his sign guy who took all the signs down on the ground. I had to load them with my wife because the union workers would not help. Anyway, this was a great ending and I never got the window neons because I could not make the timing work and the owner was finished. The dealership is no longer there and the property was redeveloped. I had to strip the ugly maroon layers of paint off each letter; all the cans were rusted out, and I hand made the new metal cans for each letter in my garage, mounted the neon and restored them all. I think the "M" on GMC was 12 ft. wide. I have a couple of more stories worth sharing, but no pictures except maybe here in my house. There were not really any picture phones back then and I didn't take pictures when I found something. Enjoy!