Yahoo Autos Our Modest Car Collection: 1976 Wrekkr "Baja Blast" Edition
Occasionally, the founder of Our Modest Car Collection enjoyed a sporting moment in the American Southwest. And what better vehicle to tackle the wild and rugged landscape of Scottsdale, Arizona, than behind the wheel of this rare, limited piece of Americana: the Wrekkr dune buggy.
In the mid-1970s, the Wrekkr was just a dream in the twinkle in the eye of a one Mr. Tannis Rumpelstiltskin, a self-described "beach bro" and "female body inspector" who spent his time in Needles, California with nothing better to do than to partake in his favorite habits: vision quests, tax evasion, and occasional experiments in fiberglass. Life was simpler back then. Back then, Rumpelstiltskin had precious little to worry about other than the occasional restraining order. His life was of the carefree one, filled with acoustic guitar music and casual sexism, devoid of such modern complications such as health insurance and empathy for his fellow man. We shall all strive to be so content.
But it was one faithful day, while in his fiberglass shop, attempting to create-in his words-"the world's largest goddamn 'glass bong you f*****s ever did see," that he stumbled upon the brilliant idea: why not mount this cylindrical shape atop the chassis of his roommate's car, and use it to deliver edibles across the dunes that surrounded his pool house?
And thus, a classic was born. (The roommate in question eventually settled with Rumplestiltskin to the tune of $3.8 million and a pair of free Wrekkrs.) The Wrekkr was a nearly-indestructible, nearly-cheap, go-nearly-anywhere desert runabout that captured America's inexplicable infatuation with the dune buggy that emerged for a brief period during the Seventies. For just $25 and a six-pack of Hamm's, postmarked to Needles General Delivery, you could build your very own tough, macho sand basher with just a handful of parts, some weekend wrenching, and the entire chassis and running gear of a brand-new Cadillac Eldorado. Give a man a set of tools, a respirator, and a stack of pre-signed waivers, and one could have a Wrekkr up and running poorly in no time.
Such was the ingenuity of the Wrekkr manly, do-it-yourself ethos. The other was in the advertising. "DRIVE SOMETHING WITH BALLS!" read an advertisement in the March 1975 issue of Good Housekeeping. "YOU WON'T NEED A PRESCRIPTION FOR THIS ERECTION," read another in National Geographic. "PUT HAIR ON YOUR EVERYWHERE," said another crudely-pasted advertisement that ran once in the Saturday Evening Post. To hear noted crank Rumpelstiltskin himself tell it, what with the state of masculinity declining ever since the first Earth Day, it was more than fair to drive a home-built vehicle with a mid-mounted big-block V8 packing 707 horsepower, shift-on-the-fly six-wheel drive, and raised exhaust stacks that went up and over the driver's elbows that could spray smoky bits of coal soot directly into the faces of aging hippies and school crossing guards.
Give a man a set of tools, a respirator, and a stack of pre-signed waivers, and one could have a Wrekkr up and running poorly in no time.
This 1976 "Baja Blast" Edition is possibly the rarest and most sought-after model. It is distinguished from lesser Wrekkr limited editions with a cologne dispenser, a unique horn that sounded the opening bars to Thin Lizzy's thoroughly non-seminal "The Boys Are Back In Town," its twelve pairs of dangling brass ball bearings scattered throughout the bodywork, and a pair of big-block V8s, one on either side of the driver's seat, driving all six black-and-chrome wheels. Notable first? It was one of the first vehicles ever created that could be driven while performing a keg stand.
Rumpelstiltskin built the Wrekker from his pool house for just three years before the state of California shut it down for grotesque EPA violations. (The former Wrekkr factory, museum, and bar and grille is now the state's 14th most prominent Superfund site.) But for the company's founder, things ended on a good note. After a mere three nights in jail, Tannis Rumpelstiltskin went on to co-found the influential ska punk band Sublime.
The Wrekkr predates America's obsession with go-anywhere SUVs by at least 30 years. But unlike today's hoity-toity SUVs, what it lacks in creature comforts, side-impact protection, reliability or political consciousness, it more than made up for in macho, go-anywhere, ground-humping abilities. It's no surprise that for the three scant years Wrekkr was a solvent business, it cheekily employed the brazen slogan, "STICK YOUR JUNK IN MOTHER NATURE!"
