[Closed] PICs - Daily Dose of Diecast...Friday

Great model John. I started collecting funeral coaches but, have since decided that I have enough other areas of interest that I do not need another.

Great

Gorgeous pics, John. Love the Brooklin Packards. Thanks for sharing these beautiful images.

Love that style Packard. Very nice model.

I never understood the desirability of cars associated with tragedy..

...call me old fashioned, but hearses and flower cars and ambulances are just creepy. What joy flows from acquiring and viewing cars associated with the worst moments in life?

Why I collect them...

I like collecting hearses, funeral limos and flower cars because they are often elegantly rendered. And yes, while they represent someone's passing, it's a solemn and respectful way to honor them.

By your statement, one could argue that they should avoid collecting ambulances (people die in them), police cruisers (they're racing to the scene of a horrific crime) and fire trucks (a family dies in a house fire). Yet these niches have rabid collector bases.

Without getting too philosophical, I look at all of these as capturing moments in our existence on this planet. These machines simply reflect a part of that.

At the end of the day, to each his (or her) own. The diversity of collecting opportunities today has never been greater - and that's a big plus in my mind.

Some of my collection includes "deathmobiles" of a different type.

This is an Ebbro model of a Porsche 917, entered at Le Mans in 1969 by John Woolfe Racing:
photo no longer available

In those days there was still the "Le Mans start" in which drivers sprinted across the track to their parked race cars and drove off. Woolfe never completed the first lap, crashing at Maison Blanche. The crash was attributed to the handling of the then-new 917, and inexperience of Woolfe. It was found that he wasn't buckled in, presumably to get a few seconds at the start.

This led to the abolishment of the Le Mans start. So in a sense this is a historic vehicle. I have a few more "last rides" in my collection, both racing cars and others, such as the Minichamps JFK Lincoln and James Dean's 550 Spyder.

It ain't morbid if it's history. Still waiting on a good replica of Archduke Ferdinand's Austro-Daimler.

I didn't intend it to sound critical...

..sorry if it came across that way. When I see death cars, I associate it with things I'd rather not recall, which is antithetical to the reason I collect, that's all.

No offense taken. I welcome the discussion about why we collect what we collect.

I have a collection of AFV’s and these can be included in the tragedy section.