1958 Pontiac Chieftain station wagon

Interstate Chieftain

Much more than just the recreation of a first car, this 1958 Pontiac station wagon is a cross-country traveler

If you were a teenage boy in the early ’60s, chances are good that you would not have wanted to be seen in your mom’s pink-and-white 1958 station wagon. Color and parental ownership aside, a station wagon in 1962 was what a minivan is today — anathema to childless young adults trying to look cool. The 1958 model year was not known for the quality or style of its offerings.

Yet here is this car, a near-perfect recreation of that 1958 mom-mobile by the man who learned to drive in its twin as a teen. It speaks to the essential quality of the Pontiac design that owner Ted Miskell remembered his mother’s ’58 so fondly, that after a half century he chose to track down a replacement to recondition. He now motors the restored result fearlessly, regularly, and proudly.

“I always had a love for that car, ” he says. “Who falls in love with a wagon?”

Wagons, of course, have become sought-after collector cars these days, but that wasn’t always the case. Frequently the most expensive offering in any lineup, their utilitarian image (full of kids or full of cargo) was the opposite of what Pontiac was

selling by 1959 or ’60, when Ted’s mom purchased her car from the used-car lot of a Pontiac dealer recommended to her by her mechanic.

At the time, she was driving a 1949 Buick six-passenger sedan, which her family of seven had just outgrown. “Dad hated driving, so Mom’s car was the travel car, ” Ted recalls. “For a time the baby could sit on laps during the regular two-hour trips to see family. After a while, though, it got on everybody’s nerves!”

The wagon was just the ticket. It, like our feature car, was only a six-passenger model, but in those pre-seatbelt days it was natural to let kids ride in the cargo area. A horsehair mattress and hand-sewn slipcover, both courtesy of Ted’s grandmother, made the rear area an acceptably comfortable space.

“We had a lot of fun, ” Ted notes of road trips with that setup. Remarkably, the mattress outlived the original wagon and now resides in the back of this one.

In retrospect, the 1958 styling has aged better than its in-period reputation would have you believe. It could be that we’ve just seen so much worse in the interim. The General Motors line that year wore the longer/lower/wider styling of the outgoing Harley Earl to the greatest extent it ever would. Incoming styling-chief Bill Mitchell would direct a much pointier lineup of cars for 1959, in the vein of Chrysler Corporation’s earthshaking “Forward Look” restyling for 1957.

The ’58s, then, are one of a kind in terms of styling. For Pontiac, the year was also the last of the old Native Americanthemed model names. The entry-level Chieftain line, of which our subject wagon was a part, would be replaced by the Catalina (formerly the name of the hardtop body) for 1959.

All Pontiacs for 1958 came with a 370-cu.in. overheadvalve V-8 of the type introduced in 1955. Horsepower ratings ranged from 240-hp for the low-compression engine found by default in stick-shift Chieftains and Super Chiefs through the 300-hp Tri-Power and 315-hp Rochester fuel-injected versions optional throughout the line. The original buyer of this car chose the 270-hp, two-barrel-topped version that came standard when ordering the Super Hydra-Matic. The horsepower difference was due to the increased compression of the automatic-transmission engine, 10.0:1 vs 8.6:1.

Any quality issues that may have existed when the ’58s were new have certainly been erased in this car, which Ted acquired as a project upon his full-time retirement in 2010. He found it in an online auction. The car was in Arizona and Ted was in western New York, not far from where the aforementioned Rochester fuel injection units were assembled. In lieu of an in-person inspection, he and a knowledgeable buddy pored over photos provided by the seller. The buddy pointed out that what initially appeared to be caked-on mud or even rust actually had the appearance of original undercoating.

Ted characterizes the purchase as a bit of a gamble, though it seems the risk was fairly calculated in light of the evidence. At any rate, it paid off. The car, as received, not only ran sufficiently well to be loaded and unloaded under its own power but was entirely rust free, save for three spots “about the size of a nickel. ” One was on the right front fender behind the wheel and the other two were behind each rear wheel. Ted kept one of the cutout pieces as a memento.

The restoration was a great introduction to the old-car hobby, as this was Ted’s first. He plugged into the Pontiac community from the start, courtesy of parts vendor “Bonneville Joe” Evans, a resident of Texas. Bonneville Joe proved to be a fount of useful knowledge and contacts when it came to tracking

Although the entry level station wagon in the Pontiac lineup, the $3,019 Chieftain was visually dazzling compared to something truly no-frills like a Chevrolet Yeoman V-8 four-door wagon at $2,574. That’s particularly evident when examining the ornate dashboard.

Thanks to 10:1 compression, the 270-hp, 370-cu.in. V-8 demands premium fuel but consider that it was effortlessly delivering that power from a two-barrel carburetor at 4,600 rpm. It also put out 388 lb-ft at 2,600 rpm—perfect for getting a fully laden wagon moving.

down the right way to do things. Since then, the situation has come a full circle, and now Ted himself is a go-to guy when people have ’58 wagon questions that Joe can’t answer.

For the physical aspect of restoration, Ted initially sought out help of a neighbor, Joe Ferrero. Joe has a 31-car collection, uses a ’51 Buick as his summertime daily driver, and enjoys his hobby with a 48 x 72 shop outfitted with a couple of lifts.

Joe dove right in and restored the entire chassis — front suspension, brakes, etcetera — before health issues intervened and he needed to hand off the project to someone else. He helped Ted find another local, Mike Salter, to handle the body and paint. Ted recalls going with Joe to meet Mike the for the first time. As Mike and Ted talked, Joe seemed distracted by scrutinizing a black ’55 Pontiac nearby.

Black is a notoriously unforgiving color, but the work met Joe’s high standards. When it came out that Mike had handled the paint and body on that car himself, he advised Ted, “You want that guy. ” The advice was solid, and any teething issues GM may have had with its new paint system in 1958 are moot today — the Reefshell Pink and Greystone White finish in modern materials surely outperforms the original acrylic lacquer or its nitrocellulose predecessor.

Another Mike (“the Stitch, ” as Ted says he began calling him), Mike Marino, took on the interior for Ted. Mike the Stitch, resident of the Finger Lakes region of New York, is usually busy with boat work, but a car interior was the perfect project to occupy those slow winter months. Materials came via SMS Auto Fabrics of Oregon. The company handles such a massive inventory of materials for such a broad range of vehicles that it must produce many of its offerings to order. As a result, it can sometimes take a while for complete orders to come out. Ted got ahead of the delay by ordering well in advance, so when the final pieces came in after about 15 months, the car was ready for the interior work.

Ted was particularly complimentary of SMS’s service when it came to some trim pieces that went missing during shipping. The company not only uncovered their fate (destroyed in an accident) but went on to hunt down correct replacements in Europe, of all places. Each series of ’58 Pontiac (Chieftain, Super Chief, Star Chief, and Bonneville) used different door-panel trim, so the right bits aren’t exactly plentiful.

A third Mike (“the Wrench”), Mike Mastim, built the engine for Ted. Mike the Wrench is a hobbyist, Ted says, but a pretty serious one. He not only builds engines for fun but also has a dynamometer to test them on when done. He gave the original block a cleanup overbore, but otherwise built it back to its original specifications. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to find the correct adapter to put a 1955’59 Pontiac engine on the dyno, but Ted reports it runs just fine.

When the engine was pulled, Ted took the original Super Hydra-Matic to L&L Transmission in Batavia, New York. L&L has been in business since 1978, when there were still lots of used cars running around with Hydra-Matics in them. Founder Leon Selapack took on the task of rebuilding the oldie himself. Once the restoration was complete, the shop adjusted the bands via road testing, meaning that the car’s inaugural drive was from Batavia back home.

Since then, the car has racked up trip after trip. The first was a return to Auburn, New York, in tribute to all those long-ago family road trips. Asked how the modern version compares to

“I last saw Mom’s car in 1965, when I was home on leave from the military. ”

The handling, he says, isn’t up to the standard set by his ’13 Chevrolet Silverado, but thanks to radial tires and a four-core radiator (the original had three), the wagon will happily eat up the miles at 55 to 75 miles per hour. He even says he was toying with making the 1,200-mile trip to Tulsa this year for the annual convention of the Pontiac-Oakland Club International — though it’s a matter of whether or not his speedometer and gas gauge are back from being rebuilt by then.

Perhaps the biggest test for the car came on the return trip from the Tri-Power Nationals in August 2019. Ted had gotten his brother to accompany him on the long drive to Norwalk, Ohio, made longer by Ted’s skirting Cleveland via 55-mph roads, so as not to deal with the “combat zone” that I-90 along Lake Erie can become in the summer months.

Ted’s brother, however, wasn’t up for taking the long way around on the way back and insisted they attempt the Cleveland route. Leaving Sunday morning at 9 a.m., temperatures were already in the 70s along with the swampy humidity you find along the lakeshore.

With every window save the tailgate open (plus vents), Ted and his brother rolled along in the thick of traffic at 70 to 75 mph for four solid hours while departing from Northern Ohio. The Chieftain never missed a beat and the temperature gauge never moved from the normal range — a true testament to the wagon’s interstate prowess if there ever was.

Perhaps there will be one better: Ted wants to take his wagon down Route 66 sometime soon. It’s a trip he’s made before, in a 2005 Buick LeSabre. The wagon is much older tech, of course, despite upgrades like the ones we’ve mentioned plus a few others (electric wipers, for one), but Ted’s delay is mostly due to his search for the right driving partner. Otherwise, his trust in the wagon is complete: “I won’t hesitate. ”