Long Haul T-Bird

When the man who would later become Rita Burns’ husband bought a ‘57 Thunderbird, he had no thought of keeping it forever or of it ever becoming collectable. After all, it was 1958. He was just buying a late-model car with classy looks that he liked. He still had it when he and Rita married in 1967. She liked the I-Bird, too, so they used it as their daily driver for twenty more years, even taking it on vacations across the country. In 1987, her husband developed cancer. The car was getting old and was just too much for Rita to maintain by herself, so they sold it to their handyman who promised to restore it to its original condition. He was true to his word, but then decided to sell it in 1992. By that time Rita’s husband had passed away. She felt the car would be much more dependable since it was restored and bought it back.

Since then she has taken it to car shows, club runs and road trips. After moving to the area in 1996, she became involved with the Roamin Angels and has had many, many such opportunities with them. She has driven the bird to Snowmass, CO, Lake Havasu, AZ a couple of times, San Bernardino, CA and Victoria, B.C., as well as on numerous runs of a less venturous variety. And her T-Bird faithfully gets her there and back. It’s there for the long haul.

Ford introduced the T-Bird in 1955 as a sporty competitor to the Corvette. In 1957 Ford added fins and a completely redesigned the grill. The color of Rita’s T-Bird is original, a rare Dusk Rose. She added subtle, pin-striped flames.

Everything is bone stock except the A/C, which is aftermarket. The 312 CID “Y” block V-8, so named because the deep skirting gave a Y shape to the block from the front, was Ford’s high-performance engine for 1957. P/S and P/B were original options on the T-Bird.

The interior is Colonial White with the Thunderbird logo embossed on the seats. 1957 was the last year of the single bench seat and had a dashboard unique to that year, with the first padded dash in a T-Bird. The Fordomatic auto trans is a three speed, but only uses two unless you manually shift it

Story and photos by Roamin Angel Ron C. ©2007