The inspiration behind the Great American series of web sites
Our dream was that I would be able to take enough time away from my business that we could plan a road trip across the country. My wife Cathy really wanted to see Route 66. We bought several books about Route 66, and I would sit by her side on the bed as we looked through them and planned the trip. But her condition grew steadily worse, and the dream grew more elusive. Cathy passed away in 2007. I still don't know how I could ever drive Route 66 now without her. However, there are thousands of great roads in this vast country, and I still want to see them.
In 2009, I drove through West Virginia, Kentucky and Virginia, and visited the small Appelachian town of Clintwood, VA, where Cathy's family came from. The photo above was taken in Kentucky. My business still keeps me from traveling as much as I would like to, but I still dream of seeing of seeing more of this country.
I have an unabashedly sentimental feeling about America, and I am embarking on a project to build a series of websites that will celebrate the great American culture of the Twentieth Century. Great American Roads will visit the Heartland, wherever we can find it and document those things about America that we all love. Great American Cars will celebrate this country's romance with the automobile. American craftsmanship, style, and hubris are wrapped up in the sleek lines and just plain muscle of the great cars of the Twentieth Century.
Phil Dickinson
Note: At this point, this is the only Great American site on line.. Others will follow (I hope).
Mission Statement
Our goal is to build a web site that celebrates American automobile manufacturing of the 20th Century. The site will feature classic cars with photographs that are both appealing and informative. Each car will be described in some detail with wide and close-up photos that really show the car’s features. We will give credit to the car’s owner and if we can, to the craftsmen who worked on restoring it to prime condition.
Great American Cars will not be a commercial site with banner ads and lists of cars for sale. It will instead be designed as a non-commercial photo journal that will provide visitors with a visually rich and interesting experience. Great American Cars will not accept advertising revenue and will not charge a fee to any of the owners whose cars are featured. If any cars are for sale, the site will provide whatever information the owner would like us to, including price, location, contact information, etc., but the site will not be commercialized as a listing site for cars on the market, and the sellers will not pay for the listing.
The objective is to build a web site that provides a uniquely rewarding experience to anyone interested classic American cars. We see no limit to the number of cars we can feature or to the number of photographs we can show. As the number grows, people who do an internet search for a certain model and year of car will often find photos on our site.
Great American Cars will be wholly supported by Ocean Color Group, Inc., a display printing and graphics company and its web site AmericanBannerStand.com. This sponsorship will be the only advertising connection. Some of the photos appearing on the site will be available as prints to interested visitors. Prints will be available as framed photos, prints on canvas, posters, postcards, etc. The prints will be offered by American BannerStand and that part of the concept will be a profit-oriented business. However, the promotion of these printed items will not interfere with the editorial appearance of the photo journal, and can be easily ignored by the visitor.
Contact Us
We welcome comments, suggestions, corrections and (thoughtful, constructive) criticism. This is a new venture, and we have no idea if anyone will even notice this site and even less awareness of whether it will be appreciated, so please feel free to shoot us an email, if nothing else to say you visited.
Send emails to the publisher to phil@oceancolor.com
Photographer JH Peterson can be contacted by emailing to petersonjh@hotmail.com
Photographer Stephen Sessa can be contacted by emailing to stephen@greatamericancars.net
If you would like to see your car or restoration business featured on this site, we would love to hear from you. You cannot pay to get on the site. What we ask is good information and Great Photos. If you can help us to build the content of this site for interested visitors, then you are welcome. You should look at the photos to see the kind of photography we are looking for. The editorial concept for photography is that people would like to see pictures that show details of the car and how it has been restored. Digital photos should be as high resolution as possible. We can view your photos, and offer (thoughtful and constructive) criticism.
If you would like to write us by snail mail, our physical address is;
Ocean Color Group, Inc.
55 John Clarke Road, B-14
Aquidneck Corporate Park
Middletown, RI 02842