I was stationed at Kelly Field, San Antonio, Texas in 1949 and 1950, teaching instrument flying to pilots in a C-97 Transitional Training Unit.
Two of my friends and I decided to look over the used car lots for an automobile. We found a 1939 Bluick convertible for sale. It was a beauty, black in color with lote of chrome and the interior was in fine shape. We purchased the car for $75 or $25 each. We had a glorious time driving the car around the Texas countryside.
We had the car for almost a month, when, on our way back to the base the car listed to one side in front and would not go forward. We looked under the car and found that the front coil spring had jumped out of its base which kept the spring in place.We worked and put the spring back in place and were ready to roam again. We found that the spring popping out was a rather frequent occurance.
We decided to sell the car to someone for $50 and chalked up the loss of $25 to experience.Click on photo to enlarge.