Tampa funeral director C.P. “Pat” Brewer’s Henney-bodied 1938 Packard 120 hearse and 1937 Packard Super 8 limousine drew a lot of double-takes as they traveled up world-famous drivable Daytona Beach, Florida, during the Professional Car Society's 2004 International Meet.
Vintage funeral vehicles parked outside the world’s largest Harley-Davidson motorcycle dealership include Fred and Dorothy Feiser's 1976 S&S Cadillac Victoria from New Oxford, Pennsylvania. This Centennial Edition coach features oval-shaped quarter panel medallions and interior fabrics incorporating the imprint of a horse-drawn hearse of the sort that William Sayers and A.R. Scovill started building in 1876.
Hearses by the Sea
story and photos by Gregg D. Merksamer
merks62@warwick.net
After Mike Barruzza and Victoria Breed got married in a poolside ceremony at Daytona Beach, they climbed aboard their vintage ambulance and drove down the beach. They were in Florida not only to tie the knot but also to attend the Professional Car Society’s 2004 International Meet, which drew nearly 50 vintage hearses, ambulances and funeral-style six-door limousines.
The event, held July 27-31, was the southernmost such gathering in the organization’s 28-year history. The Professional Car Society was founded in 1976 to champion authentic restorations of funeral cars and ambulances that would focus the public's attention on the aesthetics and traditional hand-craftsmanship put into these rare, virtually custom-built vehicles.
Vehicle owners from as far west as Missouri and as far north as Massachusetts made their way to the Hilton Oceanfront Resort in Daytona. Attendees without cars came from even farther, with Carl Kietzke and Palle S. Jensen flying in from Seattle, Washington, and Denmark, respectively.
Barruzza, who was PCS president in 1995-97, and Breed are from Pennsylvania. Their imposing high-top vehicle, whose roof cap had to be replaced after melting in a 1981 fire at the Cheesequake Volunteer First Squad Headquarters in Old Bridge, New Jersey, won the Best of Show award.
Younger spectators at the car show were especially intrigued to learn that before community-operated paramedic squads became common in the 1970s, ambulance service in many small towns was provided on a part-time basis by funeral directors who owned “combination” coaches equipped with removable roof beacons, reversible casket rollers, slide-out cot hooks and fold-away attendant seats.
Recalling the color schemes typically chosen for such multi-purpose cars, two of the nicest examples displayed in Daytona were a baby blue metallic 1966 Superior Cadillac Sovereign driven more than 1,000 miles from Holt's Summit, Missouri, by Matt Taylor and an all-white 1967 Superior Cadillac Crown Royale (distinguished from Taylor's Sovereign by its rooftop tiara band and wraparound rear corner windows), brought from Spartanburg, South Carolina, by John Burchfield. The Crown Royale featured 44,000 original miles, “rear air that works” and, incredibly, an ashtray and lighter on the patient-side wheelhouse.
Funeral vehicles and ambulances from a dozen states assemble at the Daytona International Speedway. The last car in line is the 1986 Eagle Pontiac Americana that earned Peter Jennings of Ludowici, Georgia, a First Place award in the Hearse Class. The original owner of this incredibly well-preserved coach with 47,000 miles on it was the William F. Brooks Funeral Home of Turbotville, Pennsylvania.
A 1967 Superior Pontiac combination brought from Beaufort, South Carolina, by Jon Van Dermark had been finished to resemble a U.S. Navy ambulance with a “Non-Specular Blue/Gray” lower body, a white roof and magnetic ambulance crosses for the rear door and D-pillars. “I was inspired to do this because I'm the residency director of the Naval Dental Center at Parris Island,” Dermark said, “and it attracts a lot of attention when we use it for recruiting and parades.”
Since Dermark’s coach was originally owned by a funeral home in Odessa, Texas, the restoration also involved the removal of “about 15 years’ worth of west Texas dust from everywhere. It’s like talcum powder, and it still seeps out in places, but at least it wasn’t rusty.”
The Funeral Directors’ Choice
In addition to holding the PCS’ official welcoming barbecue on Tuesday evening, meet host Bill Wright’s co-workers at the Volusia Memorial Funeral Home were called on to select the recipient of the prestigious Funeral Directors’ Choice Award. Drawn to its real wire wheels and attractive two-tone paint work (Georgian silver lower, metallic charcoal upper), they selected a Henney-bodied 1938 Packard hearse owned by Tampa mortician C.P. “Pat” Brewer, whose identically-finished 1937 Packard Super 8 limousine (originally purchased in Hartford, Connecticut, by boxing champion Jack Dempsey) also received Hilton’s Choice honors from the host hotel employees.
Modern V-8 engines linked to automatic transmissions and electric cooling fans, with the limousine powered by a 1977 Cadillac 425 V-8 and the hearse by a 350 cubic inch Chevrolet “crate” motor, were retrofitted to both Packards for easier maintenance. Brewer emphasized that the hearse’s original in-line “straight eight” had proved unsalvageable anyway. “The collector in New Bedford, Massachusetts, who I bought it from 18 years ago had purchased the car, which was originally an ambulance in the Massachusetts General Hospital fleet, from a rock band that threw a rod in the engine. The oil was like mud; they basically drove it until it died.”
As both cars accumulate 10,000 miles annually in the service of Brewer’s eight central Florida funeral homes, it was perhaps inevitable that they would also take part in Friday's pro-car convoy to Daytona International Speedway and an all-day Thursday driving tour of Daytona Beach that took in America’s second-tallest lighthouse at Ponce Inlet, the world’s largest Harley-Davidson dealership, the 1937-58 beach contest exhibits at the Living Legends of Auto Racing Museum, the sprawling HQ of Volusia County EVAC Ambulance (whose 1,207-square-mile service area is bigger than the entire state of Rhode Island) and an evening old car “Cruise-In” at the Highlander restaurant on old U.S. Route 1.
First place in the low-top ambulance class went to the oldest entrant in the Professional Car Society’s 2004 International Meet, this beautifully restored 1932 Nash Adams senior ambulance, bodied by A.J. Miller of Bellefontaine, Ohio, and owned since 1986 by Robert Cosgrove of Port St. Lucie, Florida. It was originally ordered by the O.B. Davis Funeral Home of Port Jefferson, New York.
The standards of preservation that the PCS championed were epitomized by an all-white 1932 Nash Adams Senior ambulance bodied by the A.J. Miller Company of Bellefontaine, Ohio, and exquisitely-restored by Robert Cosgrove of Port St. Lucie, Florida. Based on a top-of-the-line 990 Series Ambassador chassis powered by overhead valve “straight eight” engine touting twin ignition, nine main bearings and a nickel alloy cylinder block, this one-off rig was originally constructed at a then-staggering total cost of nearly $4,800 for the O.B. Davis Funeral Home of Port Jefferson, New York. It later served a succession of Long Island fire departments until a rotten water jacket plate finally forced its retirement in the early 1960s.
“It was out of service for over 25 years and in pretty rough shape by the time I purchased it in November 1986,” Cosgrove recalled, “so I actually bought the car for parts to finish my restoration of a Nash 999 Victoria that is one of only two known. But once I got it running, it ran better than the Victoria. And after I did some research, I found out it was the only one ever built, so we knew we couldn’t cut it up.”
He added that the vintage emergency kit, including a circa-1940 resuscitator in the patient compartment, a hand-pumped fire extinguisher on the driver's side running board and a cowl-mounted warning bell that rings several times with a single pull of the cord thanks to a built-in centrifugal device, was put together from several different collectors to serve as a “compilation of the equipment the car would have added during its time in service. Originally, the radio was a one-way unit that was incoming-only. If you got a call, you had to pull over and use a pay phone to respond.”
Martin Shepherd’s 1958 Eureka Cadillac flower car from Alexandria, Virginia, has been almost completely restored. Prestwick gray paint complements its stainless steel flower deck and matching boot.
Shown in primer without trim or bumpers at the 2003 PCS International in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Martin Shepherd's 1958 Eureka Cadillac flower car from Alexandria, Virginia, appeared at the Daytona meet with its restoration nearly completed. Beautifully complimenting its height-adjustable stainless steel flower deck and matching casket compartment, the paint scheme was Prestwick gray metallic with a metallic black roof.
Originally delivered to a Pittsburgh-area livery service, the Cadillac was one of only four constructed at Eureka’s Rock Falls, Illinois, plant during the 1958 model year. Shepherd said that the also rare parts car he managed to locate did not help with the restoration. “Since a different person worked on each side of the body,” he explained, “this car was different from side to side and different from the parts car, so the trim off it won’t fit this car and vice-versa. If you build only four examples of a body style, there's no tooling involved, just some basic tools and some skill.”
Since the vehicle will be regularly used for funerals, Penn-Dutch Restorations L.L.C. of Glen Rock, Pennsylvania, subtly incorporated several modern touches such as purple processional strobes in the grille and lower front and rear fenders, a small diameter billet aluminum steering wheel with a padded rim and a Cadillac logo (“the original plastic wheel was beyond repair,” Shepherd said) and a 2,500-watt Pioneer stereo with Boston Acoustic speakers. Most significantly, high-back front seats with integral three-point safety belts were obtained from a 2000 Dodge Ram pickup, custom-upholstered in leather and adorned with a diamond-shaped Eureka logo that was digitized, embroidered by a company that usually makes custom coats, and sewn into the seatback.
The festivities in Daytona concluded with the traditional post-awards banquet “light show” furnished by the ambulances' rooftop beacons. It was reported that a bride having her wedding reception on the top floor of the Hilton was none too pleased to see so many of her guests sneak downstairs for a closer look.
The Professional Car Society’s 2005 International Meet will take place at the Hilton Tech Center in Denver, Colorado, August 2-6. Full details on the itinerary, which is already scheduled to include tours of the Denver Botanic Gardens, the Coors Brewery and the world-renowned Forney Transportation Museum, is available by clicking here.
Details on joining the PCS can be obtained from Membership Secretary David Petke by calling 423.288.3454, writing him at 5405 Heritage Lane, Kingsport, TN 37664-9506, e-mailing fdpetke@chartertn.net or logging onto the club’s official Web site by clicking here.
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Copyright ICFA 2005
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