From: Chris Davis (cdavis@webworldinc.com)
Date: Wed Jan 14 2004 - 16:06:55 PST
It seems to me vehicles, wether they be motorcycles, cars, trucks, or even
planes, seem to have a life cycle that goes something like this:
1) Produced for a given use or market and used for that purpose
2) Become dated... new and/or better machines become available to take
their place in their original rolls
3) Find a home in a secondary market... used car for teenage son, or farmer
using a WWII jeep for orchard work, B-17 converted to passenger airliner, etc
Many, probably most machines are used up and discarded at step 3. But if
they don't find a home for step 3, they'll likely go direct to the scrap
heap.
4) After years in the secondary/used market, remaining examples start to be
seen as "classics". How classic depends on a lot of factors, time, and how
many were produced for example, but a cultural recognition doesn't
hurt. An early 60s Mustang... or same period VW Bug were both produced in
large numbers, yet are collectable today. Same with the WWII jeep or WLA.
Different folks are going to have different interpretations of when or even
if a machine becomes a "classic". Ultimately, the owner should be able to
do as he sees fit, but... WWII was a huge event(s)... the repercussions of
which shape how we live today, perhaps in ways we don't even
recognize. Artifacts from that period should be preserved when possible.
I would argue there are plenty of converted WLA's in the world today, and
that if it wasn't too far altered to begin with, a military restoration
would have been a better project for the bike rather than being "restored"
to a #3 use.
That said, at least nothing permanent was done. It can be returned to its
original state without too much effort if some future owner desires. I
guess if you can't follow the Hippocratic oath and first "do no harm", at
least you can try and "do no PERMANENT harm".
My .02
Chris Davis
MVPA# 20000
Centerville, UT
'45 WC51 Weapons Carrier
'42 GPW jeep
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.4 : Sat May 07 2005 - 20:28:01 PDT