Mooneyes and Grease in Mellingen
Parts, clothes and Americans from original to heavily customized: the Swapmeet in Mellingen AG is a thing for insiders. At its heart is a small store that is more of a hobby than a lucrative business: Custom Parts & Wear. Here you can find parts for hot rods and small gadgets for American cars, clothes and shoes as well as the necessary equipment for glittering paintwork and lively pinstripes. Or Grease, the grease for the hair, the necessary material for the great quiff.
On Whit Sunday, fans, friends of the scene, vintage lifestylers, hot rodders and a few Billies and Bellas gathered in front of the store for a cozy get-together and brought their cars with them, some very original, many with plenty of patina and also some hot rods built according to all the rules of the art, preferably in pre-war style. Back then, this was not yet the hobby of spoiled suburban boys, but a lifestyle of a conspiratorial bunch of young, socially disadvantaged mechanics who raced against each other and against all others who got involved in acceleration races with their cars, which had been taken from the scrap heap and trimmed to "faster" with minimal means.
A marshal at the entrance to the site ensured that only the right style could be found: a friend's iconic AMC Pacer, for example, was not allowed to drive onto the site, whereas the Jeep Wagoneer from the same era was. The Pacer owner took it in his stride and marched onto the site on foot.
When hot rods aren't shiny, the running boards almost drag on the ground and the Ford flathead V8 engines pimped up with aluminum cylinder covers peek out cheekily from under the hoods - or one is even left off - then the whole thing seems a little more wicked, wild and unbridled than at a shiny chrome custom show. Some of the guys were also wearing large patches, the patches on the biker group members' outfits. But it was all easy: the atmosphere was peaceful, the cars were a feast for the eyes and some were for sale. And it seems that there are also resourceful minds in Switzerland who manage to make such cars - some of them true works of art - fit for registration.
This was not necessarily the classic car world as it is commonly known, but it was highly enjoyable all the same. Sales also seem to have gone quite well for some dealers, according to a well-known tailor of vintage dresses based on old patterns. She later packed her display into her Opel Kapitän A in good spirits.
