1947 Hudson: I Fell Out of a Classic Car

We were going to pick up my sister, Bobbette,  after her week of wilderness experience with the Camp Fire Girl troop.  Uncle Andy and  Aunt Vella  rode up to Pasadena with us. My uncle was riding in the front seat as Dad drove, and I was in the back with Mom and my aunt.

 There was a large "lump" in the floorboard of the 1947 Hudson, both in back and front-- the drive shaft or something , which was really not unusual in those days, but in addition to that, the car had some peculiar features.

The back doors opened from the front and were hinged in the back. The door handle on the inside was pushed downward to open the door, and the door locking knob was locked when the little stick button was pulled up. (Most cars  locked with it pushed down).

I was between my mom and my aunt in the back seat, with the doors locked and Mom  on my right. My hair was rolled in aluminum curlers, to give me the "Shirley Temple" look. Around my waist I wore a leather cowboy belt and holster with a toy six-shooter cap gun. I stood to peer over the top of the front seat and to look out of the front windshield, standing on the floorboard "lump".

Suddenly, Dad made a turn and I fell toward my right across Mom's legs with one of my arms striking the door handle, and the other simultaneously hitting the door lock and shoving  it down into the unlocked position.

Dad was a very careful driver, so it was not an erratic or reckless move. I just lost my balance.

I kept going as the door opened, but Mom somehow caught me by one ankle. There was a lot of screaming and hollering  inside the car, for Dad to stop.  I guess I was as surprised as anyone that the door opened -- and the car was still moving.

My cap gun went flying out of the holster and into the street. Cars were coming behind us, so I was sure one of them would run over it. I could see underneath the car with the wheels bouncing and spinning swiftly. The pavement flew by below, as I hung upside down.

"Hmmm, interesting", I thought. I had never thought about looking under the car before and didn't know it had so many moving parts. I did not feel particularly frightened. After all, I KNEW mom was holding my leg.

I KNEW she would NEVER let me fall.

She liked me.

I also knew I would soon be back inside the car where I was supposed to be. At the time I didn't realize that she was also holding the door with her other hand so it wouldn't close on me when Dad slowed to a stop. It's a wonder we both didn't fly out. (Remember, no one had ever heard of car seat belt at this time.)

Dad didn't know why he was supposed to stop, and with traffic all around, he couldn't make a sudden move. I don't know how long it took, but after a few moments I was back in the car, on Mom's lap. She was dabbing my curler-covered head with a kleenex tissue which was dripping bright red blood.

"It's just a scratch," she told me " just a scratch,
it's going to be OK. "

She kept repeating this over and over and she seemed to be a little shaky. I didn't have much pain, and wasn't really aware of having hit my head anywhere. I still wasn't worried... at least not nearly as worried as Mom.

I did think that it must must have more than a scratch, after three kleenexes full of blood, but I went along with the scratch theory so as not to upset my mom any more. She was normally a very calm person and seemed unusually nervous about the incident. My feeling was that everything was OK now, so what was the worry?

In business since at least 1914  Hudson Motor Car Company was making a sedan with a larger interior , a smoother ride  and a more powerful engine than its competitors by 1936.  It had a steering column gear shift which freed up some space in the front seat and seemed to be aiming for the family market. Of course, it was still the depression era and few families could afford such luxury.

American auto  companies  like almost all other producers of consumer goods, ceased commercial production in 1942 by order of the federal government, as manufacturing was switched toward wartime production of military vehicles, aircraft and ship parts as well as weapons. The Hudson "Invader" engines powered many landing craft for the 1944 D-Day invasion of Normandy.

After the war Hudson resumed making cars for American buyers. The 1947 sea-foam green, four-door sedan was my Dad's first car, and one of the first new models on the road since the start of World War II.

Somehow we found a hospital or clinic of some sort.  I believe my  uncle had shouted out the window to a pedestrian on the street for directions, as we were in an unfamiliar town. We found an emergency room.

I was taken in and sat on a high hard table where a nurse looked at my head while and my mom continued to tell me it was "a scratch".

 At five years old I knew what a scratch was, and there was never a scratch  in the world that could produce three kleenexes full of blood.

But I wasn't really worried, it didn't hurt much except when the nurse put some stinging stuff on it.

It was a weekend and we had to wait awhile for a doctor to arrive.

He came through the door with a broad smile on his face saying loudly,"Well, I hear you have a big hole in your head!" I thought my mom was going to fall over!

The jolly doctor had blown her story. I tried to act surprised at his comment, so mom would think I believed her "scratch" story, when I knew all along she was just trying to keep me calm. Maybe my acting lessons helped out here a bit.

They laid me down on the high table and put some towels around my head and a sheet over my face so I couldn't see anything... this was the scariest part so far. The doctor continued to talk in a rather loud and jovial manner as he proceeded to prep the area and got ready to sew me up.

With sheets over my face, I couldn't see what they were doing. I could hear the clink of metal instruments on a metal tray. The high table was uncomfortably hard.

NOW, I had pain. Apparently they did not have a good way to deaden the feeling in my scalp. After five awful stitches I was declared "as good as new" though I had a little bald spot, and would be needing at least one less curler for a while.

The doctor's opinion was that the aluminum curlers I was wearing , some of which were a little dented or scratched, may have saved me from a nastier scrape wound. All I had was one rather neat L-shaped scalp cut from the edge of a metal curler. It was closed by five stitches.

I had no memory of hitting my head against anything, either the car door or the street. . . and to this day don't know what (other than the curler) caused the cut.

We waited at the hospital for a time, because after Dad found out I was OK, he continued on his way to pick up Bobbette, and would come back with her to get us.

By this time, of course he was late... she was the last Camp Fire Girl waiting at the pick up point in a Pasadena park, and tearfully sure that she had been forgotten or abandoned by her family at the age of 12. At the time I think she kind of blamed me for her worrisome experience. Well, heck, I lost my cap gun, after all. That was the really bad thing.

No one seemed overly concerned with her dismay , but everyone was giving a lot of attention to the little squirt with the "scratch", or the hole in her head . . . according to which story you believed.

I can remember going out to the driveway a day or two later, when the Hudson was parked there, to take a look under the car again.

"Hmmm, interesting", I thought... though it WAS more interesting when all the parts were moving.
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Do you have an elder relative that might enjoy a nostalgic gift? Maybe a model Hudson or a poster icture might bring back fond memories.