Cars That People Insisted Made Good Caskets

As far as we know, you don’t get to pick where you are born. You don’t get much choice in where you die either, but you can decide where you’d like them to bury your body. You can even pick your own casket.

(Source: cremationresource.org)

(Source: cremationresource.org)

Some would argue who cares, but this is a golden opportunity to make an impression from the grave. If you do it right, nobody can stand in your way.

You can make them bury you in space rocket as long as you pay for it up front and sign a contract with willing parties.

If a rocket is too rich for your blood, make them bury you in your favorite car like these nice folks.

1973 Pontiac Catalina

 

Pontiac sold the Catalina line from 1950 to 1981. It was the hardtop body style of several different models. The design elements changed depending on the base model but always retained the fake convertible top.

A 90-year-old Lonnie Holloway’s dying wish was that they bury him in his Catalina. In 2009 his funeral rite came to pass in South Carolina, car and all.

A man at the funeral said of Lonnie, “This was Mr. Holloway. He didn’t do anything half the way.”

Right next to him on the seat was his gun collection. It may have been his wife, had she not passed two years prior. They buried Lonnie right next to her, just one car seat and a door over.

1964 330 America GT Ferrari

(Source: conceptcarz.com)

(Source: conceptcarz.com)

The 330 was a series of V12 cars produced by Ferrari from 1963 to 1968. The America GT had a 3.3-liter engine and cranked 300 horsepower.

There were only 50 of them produced. Sandra Ilene West owned a blue one, the same one they buried her in.

She passed on March 10th, 1977. Her life had been that of a Texas Oil heiress. She’d asked that, when she passed, they bury her in her favorite Ferrari. The only problem? She crashed that one the prior year, so they used the 330 America.

It was her addiction to pain pills from the car accident that spiraled her life out of control. West passed in Beverly Hills, where she’d come to live by that time in her life.

Executors of her estate boxed both she and her car up a massive “casket.” Then they lowered that box into a nine-foot deep hole in San Antonio, Texas. To make sure there were no ecological problems, they filled the box with concrete once in the hole.

Good luck figuring that one out, future humans.

1962 Corvair

corvair-monza-110hp-1962-2

(Source: stevemckelvie.wordpress.com)

Ralph Nader famously quipped, back when he was just an attorney, that the Corvair was “unsafe at any speed.”

Corvairs had a reputation for being unsafe, even when not in a collision with another car. Rose Martin didn’t care. She drove her Corvair for 36-years. It was the love of her life or so it seemed.

Whenever there was a problem with the car, she paid whatever it took to make it run again.

Before she passed in 1998, she made arrangements for burial in the car. Martin was so loved by the people of her town, Tiverton, Rhode Island, her pallbearers were six police officers. I’m guessing they had some help lifting the “casket.”

Everyone at the funeral for the 84-year-old smiled through their tears, knowing that is exactly how she would’ve had it.

(Source: history.com)

(Source: history.com)

This is nothing too strange. People have asked family to bury them in stranger things over the years. Things like, oh nothing, the pyramids of Egypt.

We could spend a whole ‘nother blog talking about the strangest headstones or the things we’ve buried with people, like possessions or cash. Proof positive, some of us believe you can take it with you, wherever it is we go.

I, for one, am hoping it isn’t just a hole in the ground. Then I would hope they’d bury me in my car.

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