My Favorite Ride: A pea-green 1951 Studebaker offered friends a taste of freedom

By the time Mary Miller was in high school in the 1960s, the century-old Studebaker car company in her hometown had gone out of business.

But there were still a lot of Studebakers on the road in South Bend, where she grew up and the company ruled local commerce for a century.

One of those cars belonged to her best friend, Dina Preston. The pea-green 1951 Studebaker sedan may have been old, it may have had a few mechanical issues, but for the two teenage girls it was a 2,700-pound freedom machine.

The car most likely was a Champion model with a three-speed manual transmission, a shifter protruding from the side of the steering column. Miller looked and looked but couldn’t find a photo of Preston's Studebaker.

Gasoline was about 33 cents a gallon back when Mary and Dina went out cruising in the late 1960s. The economy car would have cost $1,500 when purchased new in 1951 — that’s about $18,000 in 2024 dollars.

Magazine advertisements from 73 years ago used this rhyming line as a sales promotion: “Studebaker … the thrifty one for ’51.” Ads called the Champion model “one of the four lowest price largest selling cars in America!”

None of that mattered to Mary and Dina, who appreciated having any kind of vehicle that would transport them where they wanted to go.

“Her father bought the car for her when we were juniors in high school,” Miller recalled. “She drove most of the time because the single car in our family was shared by four siblings. I did not have access to it very often.”

Dina’s car, on the other hand, was hers alone. Always there waiting in the driveway. But there was a downside: the car was old and weathered, its best years in the rearview mirror.

“Dina and her dad kept the cruiser up, but it never ran very fast. Her father was wise enough to know this was a good thing,” Miller said. “The other issue was that Dina was required to carry a big jug of water in the back because every so many miles we had to stop and fill the radiator.”

They were happy to oblige. “That Studebaker was our freedom. It took us everywhere around town, to drive-in eateries, movie theaters, dances.”

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They also had many “serious teen conversations” while driving down the road. “We laughed and cried together in that automobile. We talked and planned and dreamed about our futures. We also commiserated in the worst of times.”

Once, when Miller was driving her family’s car, she put it in reverse instead of drive, jumped a curb and damaged the gas tank. Gasoline poured out. She was afraid to call her parents with the news.

“So I called Dina. She came right out to help me and drove me home, where we faced my mother’s wrath together.”

They soon departed for college. Miller doesn’t know what happened to the old Studebaker and she can’t ask Preston, who died two years ago after a heart attack. They kept in touch through the decades, often taking trips together. Miller ended up in Bloomington and Preston, in North Carolina.

Miller and her husband were visiting Washington, D.C., when Preston’s daughter called to break the news that her longtime friend was gone. They re-routed their trip to Charlotte, North Carolina, to attend the funeral.

“Riding in the car, I thought I’d better write down a few thoughts in case I had an opportunity to say something at the funeral,” Miller said. “Memories and feelings came flooding back, especially the sense of joy, happiness and the invincibility of our youth.”

She looked up to see a pea-green truck go by them on the highway. “At first, I thought I seeing things. But my eyes and mind were not playing tricks. When it came up close, I could clearly see it was a Studebaker.”

She couldn’t help but smile. “There we were again, in the best and worst of times. Dina, me, and a pea-green Studebaker.”

Have a story to tell about a car or truck? Contact My Favorite Ride reporter Laura Lane at llane@heraldt.com or 812-318-5967.