More Kaisers and Frazers in East Peoria

More photos from the KFOCI Midwest Division Meet at the Stony Creek Inn in East Peoria. Here's what greeted me when I stopped by yesterday afternoon. Clicking on any of the photos will take you to a larger image.


This is a '47 Frazer, the first year for the Kaiser and Frazer automobiles. It was named after Joe Frazer, the long-time automobile man who partnered with industrialist Henry Kaiser to take on the Big Three (GM, Ford, and Chrysler) after the Second World War. The first Frazers were officially manufactured by the Graham-Paige Motors, a pre-war independent headed by Frazer that just barely survived the Depression. The first generation Kaisers were basically stripped Frazers.


Soon after production of the Kaiser and Frazer began, GP quickly sold out the car part of its business, went into real estate, and a decade later changed its name to the Madison Square Garden Corporation. This is a '49 Frazer, a very nice face-lift of the '47-'48 models. But by then the Big Three had post-war designs, meaning KF lost its uniqueness in the market. Soon Mr. Frazer was being eased out of the company by Kaiser people.



The '51 Frazers were the end of the line. Actually, they never would have been made -- Joe Frazer was out of the company by then -- except KF had manufactured way too many 1950 cars that didn't sell. This face-lift was to use up those extra cars, and it really looks nice.My grandfather owned a Frazer for a while, though that was before I was around. I'm not sure which of these three it would have been.




If I ever buy a Kaiser, it is more likely to be more like this '53 Manhattan. A very handsome car, not as rare as the '54-'55, and there seem to be decent ones close to my price range.


After domestic production ceased, Kaiser-Willys manufactured the Kaiser in Argentina from 1958-62 as the Kaiser Carabella. This 1960 model was used for engineering purposes as the Kaiser plant in Toledo, Ohio, which explains how it is one of only a dozen or so Carabellas in the US.


Henry J. Kaiser went into the auto business after World War Two with the goal of building a "peoples' car." The closest he came to that was the compact Henry J. This one actually looks pretty nice, but it was the wrong car at the wrong time for the wrong price. There are many reasons Kaiser-Frazer ultimately failed as a make, and the Henry J's draining of resources is near the top of the list.





The first part of selling a car is getting a buyer in the showroom. Nothing does that better that a sexy "sports car." Even today, folks head to the Chevy dealer to look at a Corvette. Very few will even consider actually buying one, but some will come home in a new Impala or a Cruze. The 2-seater Kaiser Darrin (designed by and named after Dutch Darrin, the chief designer of the full-sized Kaisers and Frazers) is a beautiful fibreglass body on a Henry J frame. The doors actually slide into the front fenders! 435 were built, and the KFOCI registry shows just over 400 of them still exist. Too bad it's not top-down weather.










Most folk my age or younger hear the make "Willys" and think "Jeep." But before WW2, Willys-Overland had been one of the major independent auto makes and they re-entered the market with a series of compact cars, hoping to capitalize on another niche along with Jeep. The "Aero Willys" was well-praised, but niche simply wasn't big enough -- perhaps if Willys could have sold it for $500 less. Kaiser purchased Willys in '53, but the car was probably already on its last legs. Jeeps were selling well; who needed this? This is a '55 Custom, the last year for the domestic Willys automobile. Her owner, Lew Retzer (one of The Sources if you want to know something about the post-war Willys) and I had a really nice conversation about this and other cars he's owned -- exactly the kind of thing old car club meets are for.

As I was walking to my car in the lot of the Stony Creek Inn, this '53 Manhattan was driving in. She sounded as smooth as she looks.

The '55 Kaiser: One Stunning Automobile

A grayish old car on a grayish central Illinois day? Yet even so, this '55 Kaiser Manhattan is simply stunning to view.

One look at these photos ought to be enough to explain my membership in the Kaiser Frazer Owners Club, whose Midwest Division Spring Meet is happening this weekend just across the river in East Peoria. (Go ahead, click on any of these photos for a bigger view.)

Wouldn't she look just fab in front of Zion's Parsonage? Okay, in my mind I see it on the driveway of the Canoga Park home I grew up in. Either way, though, one like this is likely well beyond Pastor Zip's reach. After all, only 226 of these four-door sedans were made for sale in the US, the Kaiser's last model year as a domestic auto make. Another 1000 or so were exported to Argentina.

But look at those wire wheels. (I was told the owner takes them off for the winter and stores them inside.) Or the "Safety-Glo" taillights -- which look even bolder in the view below. To my eye, at least, the only "dated" items on the Kaiser are the separate bumpers and the wide-white walls. Why under the hood is a supercharged six cylinder engine. Not bad for a 55-year-old car, eh?

There are many reasons why this was the end of the line for Kaiser, many examined in Richard M. Langworth's excellent (but out-of-print) book, The Last Onslaught on Detroit. But what an end result.

ELCA Churchwide Assembly Actions Implemented

I am not surprised. I expected nothing else. Nonetheless, I am numbed by this news release. And I am bound by my ordination vows to dissent.

ELCA NEWS SERVICE
April 11, 2010

ELCA Council Adopts Significant Revisions to Ministry Policies

10-113-JB

CHICAGO (ELCA) -- The Church Council of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) adopted a series of historic and sweeping revisions to ministry policy documents April 10, the result of months of extensive writing, comment and review by hundreds of leaders and members following the 2009 Churchwide Assembly.

The Church Council is the ELCA's board of directors and serves as the interim legislative authority of the church between churchwide assemblies. The council is meeting here April 9-12. The next churchwide assembly is in Orlando, Fla., in August 2011.

The changes were called for by the 2009 ELCA Churchwide Assembly, which directed that policy documents be revised to make it possible for eligible Lutherans in committed, publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous same-gender relationships to serve as ELCA clergy and professional lay leaders. The assembly directed that revised policies recognize the convictions of those who believe the ELCA should not allow such service. The assembly also adopted a social statement on human sexuality.

The council adopted revisions to two documents that spell out the church's behavioral expectations of ELCA professional leaders -- "Vision and Expectations: Ordained Ministers in the ELCA" and "Vision and Expectations: Associates in Ministry, Deaconesses and Diaconal Ministers in the ELCA." The council also adopted revisions to a document that specifies grounds for discipline of professional leaders, "Definitions and Guidelines for Discipline," and it adopted revisions to the "ELCA Candidacy Manual," used by regional committees to help guide candidates seeking to become professional leaders in the ELCA.

Council members asked few questions and commented briefly on each proposed document before approving them. Only minor editorial changes were proposed and adopted by the council. Each revised document was adopted overwhelmingly.

The Rev. Keith A. Hunsinger, council member, Oak Harbor, Ohio, who said he does not agree with the sexuality decisions made in August 2009, announced April 11 that he had abstained on each vote on the documents. He explained that he didn't believe that the first drafts of the documents released last fall embodied the full range of decisions made at the 2009 assembly. "My conscience won't allow me to vote for any of these documents, but as a member of the board of directors, I can't vote against the will of the churchwide assembly," he told the ELCA News Service.

However, Hunsinger told the council that the final forms of each document reflected "the breadth and depth" of the decisions, including the fact that "we agreed to live under a big tent," and that multiple voices would be heard. "Because those documents now said that, I feel my ideas and I are still welcome in the ELCA," he said.

The revised policies are effective immediately, said David D. Swartling, ELCA secretary. Final revised text of each document will be posted online at http://www.ELCA.org/ministrypolicies by the end of April, he said.

Following council approval of the policies, the Rev. Mark S. Hanson, ELCA presiding bishop, expressed his appreciation to many, including the council and the Conference of Bishops for leading the revision process over the past few months. He also thanked the Rev. Stanley N. Olson, executive director, ELCA Vocation and Education, the lead staff person working with church leaders and various constituencies through the revision process.

Olson thanked many others who have worked for changes in ministry policies through more than two decades of effort. "This is the work of many -- hundreds, thousands of people who have reflected, thought and prayed. We are still a church that is tense over this, but we are Easter people, and I think we have done an Easter thing today," he told the council.

Prior to voting, the Rev. A. Donald Main, Lancaster, Pa., chair of the ELCA Committee on Appeals, which led the effort to revise Definitions and Guidelines for Discipline, told the council that the document had not been revised since 1993. New sections address matters such as integrity, and substance abuse and addiction, he said.

The Committee on Appeals also "considered each and every word, constantly testing different language so as to be clear and concise as possible, and remain faithful to our charge and to the social statement and ministry policies recommended and adopted by our assembly," Main added.

The two Vision and Expectations documents and the Candidacy Manual are "tools in the service of God's mission through the ELCA, primarily to assist us in that work of calling forth and supporting faithful, wise and courageous leaders," Olson said. The Vision and Expectations documents were most recently revised in the early 1990s, and the Candidacy Manual was revised in the past few years, he said.

"We have not attempted to spell out every possible situation and to give definitive direction for every possible situation," he told the council. "There are broad principles in these documents, and there are guidelines with some details." Olson added the documents call for the ELCA to trust established processes and its leaders who have responsibility for oversight and decision-making.

"Our next step is to orient our staff and the candidacy committees," Olson said. A memo summarizing key policy revisions will be sent this week to help guide synod bishops, staff working with candidates for professional leadership, candidacy committee chairs, seminary presidents and selected staff, and applicants and candidates.

Olson added that the ELCA Vocation and Education program unit, the ELCA Office of the Secretary and others are responsible for monitoring the new policies, and suggesting further revisions and guidelines if necessary.

For information contact:
John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or news@elca.org
http://www.elca.org/news
Twitter: http://twitter.com/elcanews

Doubting Confessing Thomas

The Gospel reading for today, the Second Sunday of Easter, is always St. John 20:19-31, from whence comes the term "Doubting Thomas." Pope St. Gregory the Great offers a different perspective.

When the apostle Paul says that "faith is the ground of things to be hoped for, the proof of things that are not evident" (Hebrews 11:1), it is clear that faith is the proof of those things that cannot be made evident. Things that are evident no longer involve faith but recognition. Why then, when Thomas saw and when he touched, was it said to him, "Because you have seen me, you have believed"? Because he saw one thing, and he believed another; divinity could not be seen by a mortal person. He saw a human being, and he confessed him as God. . . . But we also rejoice at what follows, "Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed." Certainly this saying refers to us who keep in our minds one whom we do not see in his body. It refers to us, but only if we follow up our faith with our works. That person truly believes who expresses his faith in his works.

From Gregory the Great, "Forty Gospel Homilies 26", as found in The Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, NT IVb: John 11-21 (p. 373).

Or, as this ACCS volume's editor, Joel C. Elowsky, subtitles the comments on John 20:29, "Seeing is not believing" or "Thomas sees one thing, believes another."

I just love reading the Fathers: "[H]e saw one thing, and he believed another; divinity could not be seen by a mortal person. He saw a human being, and he confessed him as God."

Opening Day!!

The President of the United States tosses the first pitch for Opening Day for the Washington Nationals.



Alas, the comments to this YouTube video are pretty crude, and miss the point. Mr. Obama is our President, it's the beginning of the baseball season, and it's a grand tradition. Show some respect for the Office, the Game, and the Tradition -- and just enjoy it.

And tonight, I'll be listening to my beloved Los Angeles Angels on XM Radio...

Alleluia! Christ Is Risen!

He is risen indeed, Alleluia!

O God, on this day you unlocked the way to eternity by conquering death for us through your only Son.

Promise that you will therefore help us to pursue this new hope which you have inspired in us.

Through the same Jesus Christ, your Son our Lord. He lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Amen.

Deus, qui hodierna die per Unigenitum tuum aeternitatis nobis aditum devicta morte reserasti: vota nostra, quae praeveniendo aspiras, etiam adjuvando prosequere. Per eumdem Dominum.

Photo: Easter 2009, Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church of Peoria

---

The Gelasian Collect (Prayer of the Day) for Easter Day, as found and translated in Prayers for the Eucharistic Gathering, by Eugene Andrew Lehrke. as prayed at Zion at both the 6:30 am and 10 am services.

Good Friday

Look down on your family, O Lord.

For us our Lord Jesus Christ did not hesitate to be betrayed into evil hands and tormented by a cross.

Through the same Jesus Christ, your Son our Lord. He lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Amen.

Respice quaesumus, Domine super hanc familiam tuam, pro qua Dominus noster Jusus Christus non dubitavit manibus tradi nocentium, et crucis subire tormentum, qui tecum.

Photo: Good Friday 2010, Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church of Peoria, Illinois

---

Today's Prayer of the Day and the first words I speak in the noon Good Friday Liturgy, as found and translated in Prayers for the Eucharistic Gathering, by Eugene Andrew Lehrke. It's Pastor Lehrke's translation of the Latin prayer (above) first found in the 5th Century (?) Gelasian Sacramentary, and which was used in the pre-Vatican II Roman Missal for Holy Wednesday.