It’s me, Mark Stone, and in this episode of the Backseat Driver Podcast, I delve into the remarkable career of Joe Pep, one of America’s most celebrated car illustrators, whose artwork is inseparable from his lifelong passion for vintage automobiles.

Joe Pepitone shares the early influences that sparked his love of classic cars, growing up in New Jersey and drawing inspiration from television shows like The Untouchables. We talk about how those formative moments shaped not just his automotive interests, but his artistic voice.

I explore with Joe the powerful connection between automotive history and illustration, as he explains how each piece of his work tells a story. His instantly recognisable style, rich in colour and retro flair, captures both the elegance of the cars and the eras they represent.

This episode is a deep dive into creativity, nostalgia, and the enduring appeal of classic cars through the eyes of an artist who has helped preserve their legacy on paper.

___

https://pod.link/1656058575

Visit our sponsors

GAZ Shocks 116 Trophy

Hodder Tyres

Tarox Breaks

SAS Autos

Listen Now

Mentioned in this episode:

Visit the Backseat Driver Podcast Sponsors

GAZ Shocks - Home of the 116 Trophy and the 120 Coupe Cup. Find them at www.gazshocks.com | Hodder Tyres - Trusted brands, every season, every condition. Visit www.hoddertyres.co.uk | Tarox Brakes - The Art of Slowing Down, precision-built in Italy. Check out www.tarox.com | SAS Autos - Experts in high-quality servicing and classic car restoration. Discover more at sas-autos.co.uk

I'd like to introduce to the backseat driver one of America's foremost car illustrators, known to the world as Joe Pep.

His full name is Joe Joseph Pepitone.

As I said, everybody knows him as Joe Pep.

Originally from New Jersey, though he doesn't live there anymore.

Joe got into coys as a young lady by watching Elliot Ness and the Untouchables.

And that's the Robert Stack version, the original one.

Certainly not Kevin Costner, but Joe Pep.

Welcome to the backseat driver.

Well, Mark, it is a honor, or as they would say in New Jersey, hey, you know, Mark Stone, what a frigging honor this is.

You know, tell you, hey, listen, if you're not doing anything, run out and give me a cup of coffee, bagel with a schmear, cream cheese.

Okay.

Hey, you'll be a good boy.

Thank you.

I'm getting the distinct feeling I could be talking to Sony Soprano here, couldn't I?

Really?

It could be, it could be.

It's, it's, you know, you have, in an Italian household, you have a photograph of Tony Soprano and the Blessed Virgin Mary.

You know, it's like those two.

You gotta have it.

And don't forget to light the candles.

You know, and pick up the canoe is on the way home.

That's true, that's true.

Now, I mentioned Eliot Ness and the Untouchables.

I mean, how did all this come about?

Because, I mean, you have a passion for old cars.

Your illustrations have, shall we say, they embody a lot of retro, but I mean, talk us from the beginning.

How did this young boy watching television gain his first taste of old cars?

Oh, well, it's.

Okay.

And you know, as five years old, you know, you always get in trouble.

But if I, if I was a good boy and did everything my parents told me to do, then they would let me stay up late and on Friday nights, WAVC New York, we would watch the Untouchables.

So you better figure that, you know, the cars that they portrayed in this series were only like 20 years old.

Yeah.

But to that society that was called like an old time car.

So, you know, I'm seeing cars that have convertible roofs, you know, and they were far different from, you know, it's like my father, he had a 59 Pontiac Catalina.

So, you know, you're seeing cars that are way different.

And I loved it.

I loved it.

Yeah.

And so he was from that society.

So anything that was 20 years old was ancient.

And the.

And I always enjoyed stories that my grandparents would tell.

A grandmother who was Irish, she came over, lived in Hell's Kitchen in New York.

And you know, we have photographs.

I own a Model T Ford.

So, you know, you know, that's.

To me, that's pretty cool.

But I always enjoyed the stories of what it was like when they were kids.

And that's what drew me to history.

Yeah.

And I know you were saying, was it your grandfather took you to see a friend of his collection that were all under.

All under dust cover?

Yes, yes, it would be.

His name was Elmer.

Talk about, you know, an old time name.

And the.

He would.

We would go visit friends of his.

And one guy, Adam, like a bunch of old Buicks and, and they had the big bubble fenders.

And I mean, to me as a kid, this was great.

And I remember the one guy saying, he goes, yeah, like a gangster.

God.

So stuff like this really stuck to my mind, you know, but you know, it's like.

And then their friends would come over that they were like high school friends with back in the 20s.

So, you know, they'd be telling me stories of what it was like and, and then, you know, like prohibition in the United States and how they would.

They had a party one night and everybody says, dump the booze, the cops are here.

Well, the thing was the cops were here, but it was a friend of theirs that was a cop.

So, you know, it's like different times.

But I. Oh, I love that stuff.

But like my old radio show, Mark, every car has a story.

Yeah.

And it just amazes me, you know, the collections that people have out there.

And then, you know, it's like listening to your program, you know, it's.

I'm not really up on my European cars, but I'm always willing to, to learn.

You know, I'm a quick study.

Yeah.

You know, but it's to me, the.

Was this man's coupe.

What was going on in the world?

Well, you know, Hitler was going crazy in Europe.

The war was just about to start.

Who's the president?

You know, the United States and things like this.

It's like every car has a story.

And then the people that bought the cars.

Yeah.

You know, who was the first to buy that car but Mark, your.

Your father.

What was his first car?

The first car I can remember my father owning was a Morris Oxford which that model continued for many years after it ceased production in Eng as the Hindustani over in India.

But the one thing I always know about our European cars or a lot of European cars in that era, they have nowhere near the style.

They have nowhere near the size of American cars.

Occasionally Austin tried with like the Somerset and things like that to introduce American style.

Vauxhall tried it with one of the victors by adding fins and various things.

But the English never quite cracked the American look.

The beauty of the American coils was the size of them.

And the one thing that always stick in my mind about American coys were the famous Dagmoys.

Ah, yes.

A famous singer who sang with Frank Sinatra Agmore.

Yeah.

And.

And then to be named after that particular part of the bumper, you know.

But yeah, I mean style.

I mean you, you look at.

And I always tell people like we have here in the United States, we have a cars and coffee.

Any type of car can come in and from, from an ancient car to the tuner cars.

And you know, it's.

You have these people that have like the, the 54 Coupe de Ville, Cadillac dog about big Dagmars, you know, but then, but then you have like a Ford Thunderbird who had tiny Dagmars, you know.

So I guess automobiles imitates life, I guess.

Maybe.

Who knows?

I mean, the one thing I've always known, especially that era, the American manufacturers used to change their design and style every couple of years because it seemed to have been inbuilt into the Americans that you change a car every two years, you must keep up with the latest style, the latest design.

Sure.

And you know what, Mark, the commercials.

What I can remember as a kid in the mid-60s was five years or 50,000 miles.

Yeah.

You know, and now it's like tripled the amount of miles people go, you know.

Yeah.

But back then that's the way it was.

You didn't work far away from home.

There was no such thing as working at home and collecting a paycheck.

I mean, that was a dream.

Yeah.

You know, the.

When I was art director for Archie comic books for 20 years, I had the report to an office.

Whereas now if I, if I wanted to produce a comic book, I have all the right people to go to.

And they're all over the United States.

Yeah.

And you know, it's like as long as you have the timetables, you know, the.

And everybody has to be on schedule.

It's almost like a train.

Yeah.

But you can have that done anywhere.

There's no need to go to an office.

So you got to look at, you got to look at how things were.

Because of the war.

Yeah.

And if you can get a hold of a car that was made In January of 42, it's worth a lot of money.

But I mean like General Mungs, Ford, they're producing tanks and planes and bombers and everything.

And it's just amazing.

Yeah.

How the style of that car went from say 42 to 52, you know.

Yeah.

I mean that was the one thing cars in England stayed even after the war, stayed pre war for far longer than they stayed pre war in America.

I think the reason being is though America was involved in the war, it never, it was never attacked.

So the manufacturers, the factories remained intact and they were able to carry on as normal would.

Yes, yes.

Oh, absolutely, absolutely.

I mean the, what I've, what I've read is that Germany was trying to produce these like long range bombers.

Yeah.

And they, and at the time they just didn't have the technology for it.

But as we know nowadays, you know, it's every, everything is up for grabs, you know, there's no place to hide.

And that's, that's kind of sad, you know.

Yeah.

But getting back to automobiles, what I don't understand is, and I've never met anybody from like say Ford or General Motors where it's like, okay, the war is going on.

They're producing all the wartime equipment that is need needed.

Right.

But they didn't have a design department that was working on when the war was over.

Yeah.

You know what I mean?

Okay.

So, you know, it's like.

And there wasn't really much difference until you got into say 47 and things like that.

Yeah.

But you know, as a, as a magazine illustrator, you know, you meet all these interesting people at the car shows and especially the concourse events, you know.

Yeah.

It's, it's just a ton of history.

And the great thing is, and you've probably seen this on your side of the pond, is that it's a great place to take the family, you know, and get the kids interested in.

Well, I mean, that is like you were taking to look at the old cars.

I mean, you take your grandchildren or whatever and it gets, it will get a percentage of them into cars.

And this is how you keep it going.

And it's also keeping an interest in the old cars because probably like yourself, I actually have zero, virtual zero interest in modern cars.

I think they're terrible looking things.

There's not too many that are a different look, you know, and then, and then they're saying that cars will be able to be robotic and you really won't own a car.

No.

You know, it'll just show up.

And I'm like, well, that takes the freedom of driving away, you know, but stay tuned, folks.

You know, it's like you don't know what the heck's going to be happening in the future.

Now, when did you discover you could draw?

I mean, the one thing I cannot do, my father was a designer and the best I can do is a box.

That's roughly about it.

When did you discover you could actually put pencil to paper and draw what you wanted?

Well, I always had a fascination with World War I airplanes.

Yeah.

Okay.

So, you know, I'd see something in the magazine and I would try to copy it.

My mother would, if it was like one of those rainy days, you know, rainy weekends or rainy summers, she would get a shopping bag, brown shopping bag.

She would always hold on to the crayons because I would lose them or just throw them and you know, and then you just draw.

And then I was hooked on to Matchbox cars.

Oh, yes.

At that time were made in your country.

And the.

What I would do is my father would get these like T shirts and in a T shirt pack would be a white piece of cardboard.

Yeah.

And I would save them and I would draw like a bird's eye view.

And I would put in streets and I'd put in like music.

Draw buildings.

Yeah.

That you could see the front.

And you know, you just pull these cards together.

And now you have, like, each time you, each time you work at it, it's like you got another part of your town, you know, that just gets bigger and bigger, but always like models, model cars, model, model airplanes.

And then in the mid-60s, we had big Daddy Roth with his crazy car designs.

65.

But it's, I guess because of the culture, you know, it's like you get hooked on one thing and that was like car your airplanes.

Yeah.

The.

Then going to school, I took like in high school and I took marketing classes.

Yeah.

And then from there I was a forklift driver and I was Going to night school for graphic arts.

Yeah.

So I did that for two years and then I went full time, got on the dean's honored list and things like that.

And I was the first in my family to.

To go to school.

You know, it's.

My parents were from the Depression, so.

Yeah, you know, you had to have money to go to college, whereas everything was changed.

Yeah.

I graduated in 77 and I started at the bottom and you know, doing supermarket flyers and all this.

And that's graphic arts.

Yeah.

Which is totally different thing.

But you know, it's to me with like my kids, I go, you got to do what makes you happy in life.

Yeah.

You know, it's like if you can't stand your job, you got to get the heck out of it.

You do, you really do.

Or you can't be going to work with a pit in your stomach that you know something that you really hate.

But I'll tell you the.

This is my 52nd year in advertising and publishing.

I keep active by doing private commission illustrations.

Magazine illustrations.

Yeah.

But I'll tell you what I really enjoyed was when I had an opportunity to have a radio show.

Yes.

You know, and, and that was like, wow, this is really great.

And so it was called Every Car Had a Story and we were on for 81 shows.

In fact, I was on one of them.

Yes, you were.

You were on that.

And we had so many people calling in because you on that, you basically shut down the AT&T computer up.

But regrettably, all good things come to an end.

And yes, you haven't got one.

I mean, is there a chance of you, you doing another radio show or a podcast?

You know, it's like I just turned 71 and I love to be active.

Yeah.

And it makes you.

It's good brain exercise.

But what I found out was that the amount of work I was working seven days a week on the show, producing a website, getting guests.

It was called Every Car is a Story with Joe Peppin dusting out.

Dusty was a guy that fantastic.

He knew is like things with the engine and the car and the workings of it, whereas I got some tricks more on the, the art and the design and the history end.

Yeah.

And the.

We had a, an hour show and I had a fantastic time.

In the beginning I was scared out of my mind.

It was like going down a hill with a wagon with no brakes, you know, and.

But you know, by the, by the first year we were doing, doing good.

And then we went to a podcast which back then was Facebook Live.

Yeah.

And we would do that.

So we would do the Facebook live and then they would do the audio.

Yeah.

Would be on Saturday afternoon radio.

And we were on four different.

Four different radio stations at the time.

Yeah.

And, well, you know, all good things can't last forever, I guess, you know, but can I tell them the joke?

Can I tell them the joke I saw?

Feel free.

Yes.

Okay, thank you.

So here in North Carolina, you're talking very, very Christian.

And the further south you go, it gets even more.

And it's like, okay, here we go.

Welcome to find out.

A Christian radio station bought the radio station, but they didn't renew our contract.

So I said to the president of the network, I said, well, I guess God doesn't like classic cars.

Which is kind of bold for, as they would call me, a damn Yankee.

Do you know the difference between Mark, do you know the difference between a Yankee and a damn Yankee?

No.

Go on.

Okay, thank you.

So a Yankee comes down south for vacation.

Okay.

Yeah.

And then within a week they go home.

A DM Yankee, I'm a DM Yankee comes down south and we live there, so we don't go home any.

Hey, you know, it's like after 60 years of cold winters and snowstorms, you know, it's like, I've had enough of this stuff.

Now.

One thing, looking on your Instagram and Facebook and everything else, your illustrations of Kais are incredibly distinctive.

Really distinctive.

They embody a lot of color, a lot of very striking designs of older cars, a lot of what I will call retro.

How did you latch onto all this?

How did you develop this style?

Well, it's.

I would always go for reference.

I always like the illustrators from General Motors.

Yeah.

And because now here's a quiz for you.

Do you know why they had illustrations of, say, automobiles, products you would buy in a catalog instead of a photograph?

You know why?

I know a lot of the illustrations exaggerated things and it happened in England as well.

But a lot of the cars, you look at them and a lot of the gadgets and such like, were exaggerated in an illustration A little bit.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, the reason why is that technology at that time, and this is coming from a very old school printer, he says the reason why they used illustrations is that the printers knew how to make the colors pop off the page.

Yeah.

Where at that time a photograph was flat and I've seen color photographs of cars where they've sprayed something on the bumpers to make it foggy because they just didn't have the technology.

And then things got better in the late 50s.

And then by the 70s, if you look at a car catalog, it's all photographs.

It's very little, very little in illustration.

And then so I got General Motors of think.

And then, you know, it's like when you're an art director for Archie comic books for 20 years, you know, you learn a lot of tricks of the trade.

And one of them was, was color.

Yeah.

So, you know, that was something that really helped me, helped me out.

And then it's, you know, it's hit and miss.

You know, you do a project and oh, it's great.

And then you do another illustration and something's missing from it.

Yeah.

But like anything, it's the more you do, the better you get.

You know, and like I said, it's like every car has a story.

And then I also put down where it's the art of the automobile.

You know, it's like I try to discover like the designers who are always the unnamed heroes in the automotive world who designed the cars.

Yeah.

You know, and certain things that they put into.

And then I look into also shading and chrome.

Oh, my God.

Chrome.

That, that's, that's an optical illusion right there.

But it's, I was trained as an artist where if someone looks at one of your drawings and they question, what am I looking at you as an illustrator.

And design has failed.

Yeah.

Okay.

Now when I do an illustration of a car, it's, you want it so that if you're looking at a photograph, there's no questions.

It's like, oh, that's an all time car.

You know, and I've, I've hit my mark.

Chrome.

Oh, my God.

I did this illustration.

It was a 56 Wynken Lincoln premiere.

Yeah.

And this car has so much chrome and so much reflections that it's, I'll look at that section of the car while I'm drawing other parts where it's like, okay, how am I going to produce this?

Yeah.

And illustrate it, you know, but the thing is, is that when as an illustrator and designer and you're doing, say a private commission, you know, it's all my, all my work comes in on budget.

So that's the way I was trained.

People hate surprises.

Yes.

If I do a project and it's like, okay, you want a, you want an illustration of your cart?

Do you want your home in the background.

Do you want your family in the back?

And these are all these 10 questions.

Yeah.

You know, and nine times out of 10 it's, people are saying, well, you know, just give me, I want the car, you know, and if you could do a close up of the car.

And that's.

To me, that's where the art of the automobile comes in.

Yeah.

Any, any type of automobile, you know, but it's something where I enjoyed doing it.

There's no proofreading.

Yeah.

Yes.

I have to admit that was my Achilles heel.

Proofread.

It's like you look at a word and it's like, yes, that's it.

And then it's like, no.

And then the proofreader comes around and then you got your, your revision work that you have to do.

Yeah.

But a car illustration, it's.

To me, it's, I was trained where you do the job right the first time.

Yeah.

You don't have to go back and do it a second time.

And that's.

And as, as a illustrator and designer, that, that's how you lose money.

Yeah.

You know, but something I enjoy and the work I've gotten, people that I've met over the years, just fantastic in that.

But you know, like I said before, you gotta love what you do.

Yeah.

Do you have a particular car or make of car that you particularly enjoy illustrating?

That's like the question people would ask me when I was working at Archie Comics.

Well, who do you like more, Betty or Veronica?

So my response was it depends on my movie.

There's days where I love seeing the old time race cars from the turn of the century.

And then there's days cars from the 20s with the long hoods, the Cadillacs, the Duesenbergs, the Hudson's, you know.

Yeah.

I'll go all the way up to.

Geez, late 60s.

Yeah.

And after that it's like designs of the cars, I don't know, they.

They fell flat.

You know, it's like if you here in the United States, it's like if you came home with a Chevrolet in the, in the late 50s or 60s, it was like, wow, that's a nice car.

Yeah.

You know, we had a neighbor that always went to the racetrack and one day he came home with a brand new 59 Chevrolet Impala.

Yeah.

You know, and that was like, wow.

As a kid, that was great.

Yeah.

A Corvette.

Oh my God.

When Corvettes were coming out with the split window on the back, that was, that was like every kid's dream.

Yeah.

And then I was very Fortunate.

Yeah.

You know, so you're thinking as a kid, wow, this.

I may be driving something like this, but to answer your question this week, I like cars from the 20s.

Yeah.

I really do.

The.

The one car that I think is like art deco on steroids was the Delahase.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, my God.

What a.

What a beautiful car.

And first time I ever saw a photograph of one, I thought it was a very large car.

Yeah.

But it was like getting a mark.

Correct me if I'm wrong, these cars were like as big as a Corvette, would you say?

Some were, some weren't.

Some of them did achieve what you might call American proportions.

Especially some of the Delage and Delahay and Alfa Romeo's bodied by Satuchik and people like that.

They were huge cars.

Yeah.

Well, the huge cars.

Now you see them at places like Retromobile in Paris, and it's easy to understand why now nobody ever drives them anywhere.

They just go on show because they are big, they're unique, and I don't know what would happen if they got damaged.

So they're just basically an ornament with four wheels attached.

But some of them were huge cars.

When I was.

When I was commissioned to do cover one of this magazine, I worked for Crankshaft magazine.

Yeah.

And it was a.

It was a Tucker got fully restored by Rob Ida down in New Jersey.

Yeah.

And just a beautiful, beautiful machine.

That would be the.

Took a Torpedo.

Was that the Took a Torpedo?

Yeah, Tucker type, you know.

Yeah.

And the.

It's only.

It's driven to shows.

Yeah.

You know, in a.

In a trailer.

Because they're afraid that it's like being out on the ultra road, that thing gets damaged.

Yeah.

You know, you're gonna.

You know, you're talking.

You're talking a lot of bread, Fred.

You know, Bucktail.

You know, it's like when I was a kid, my father always told me about the Tuckers, and he says this car has three headlights.

Well, you know, you say three headlights to a kid that likes cars, it's like.

To me, it's like, wow, this thing must be great looking, you know, But.

I mean, one car, I'd seen one car I did drive quite a good few years ago that.

Not a Tucker Torpedo.

But I remember the one thing that stuck in my mind, the two things was the automatic gear selectors.

Were in the middle of the steering wheel and the huge horseshoe style grille was the Edsel, which of course was a Ford ultimately.

Sure.

And you know what?

Edsel, that got a bad rap because I look at at Edsel and I'll look at a Plymouth, same year model year Pontiac.

Right.

And my father always told me it was that the car was too ahead of its time.

Yeah.

Well, talking to car people out here, it's United States was in a recession.

Okay.

Yeah.

So people aren't going to be buying cars.

And what was happening was.

And this is what I don't understand.

It's like f Ford at that time, let's say they have like five different types of automobiles out there.

One was the Edsel and one was the Fairlane.

But what they would do is they wouldn't produce like say Edsel's on a Tuesday.

Yeah.

And then the line gets switched over for a Fairlane on a Wednesday.

They did it like all the cars were like what I heard were all jumbled up.

Yeah.

And a lot of dealerships were refusing when they would get a delivery because the bumper and different parts of the car were in the trunk.

So Ford was relying on the dealerships to put the car together.

And the dealerships were saying, listen, no, we're, we're buying this car and we want to complete.

We don't want to be doing anything.

You know, so that's just, that's the story I heard with that.

So, yeah, the.

I've noticed things like with like say a Chevrolet.

Now back then everybody had these wraparound windows.

Yeah.

Okay.

So like in the corner of the wraparound of the windshield, like on a Chevy, it was clear.

But with the Fords, what I noticed was that part where the windshield bends.

Okay.

Yeah.

It was like all distorted.

Yeah.

You know, so it's like to me, everybody in our neighborhood.

Dad.

Had a 59 Pontiac.

We had neighbors that had a 59 Impala.

We had 65 Impalas.

But the.

So it was like, it was always a Chevrolet was the big thing.

Chryslers and Dodges were more of the high end stuff.

I would say the Chryslers.

Yeah.

You know where as owners of those cars would be like, well, I'll meet you at the country club and we'll pop into a nice restaurant in Greenwich, Connecticut.

You know what I mean?

Yeah.

But you know, the thing was is that it's Volkswagens.

I remember the hippies.

Yeah.

Would have all these painted outrageous Volkswagens.

And my first job, I worked at a Shell station.

1969 and the hippies would come in with like a handful of change.

Yeah.

It was like fill up half of the gas tank on a Volkswagen, you know, dimes, nickels and quarters, you know, let's see.

And then the other Volkswagens I remember were the.

It looked like a.

A small station wagon.

Do you remember those?

Oh yeah, the type threes, things like that.

The variants.

Yeah, yeah, that and the.

Oh, Carmen gear.

Yes.

The world's slowest sports car.

Yeah.

And the.

Then there were Sunbeam.

That was that a British car.

The sun bit.

The Sunbeam Alpine you would have got.

Yeah, yeah.

That and Triumphs.

Yep.

Seen a lot of them.

A lot of the college kids had them back in the day.

But you know it's like American kids.

And you got your parents.

Hand me down.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And was a 392 barrel.

Yep.

Aim with red wall tires and it was.

How much did he tell us?

28, 28 hundred dollars and 28 fifty.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And that would be my first car and I bought it for 350 bucks.

Yeah.

Issue of a buy a wreck for 390 bucks.

I have to ask you, what do you drive now?

Oh, well let's see.

This was my railroad car when I lived in Connecticut.

Yeah.

That is silica Corolla.

Yep.

Yeah, I'm going to say Corolla.

And my wife, she has the.

I call it looks like a shoe.

Yeah.

And it's designed by tire.

Oh, what the heck's the name of that car?

See, I don't even know my uncle.

I know other people's cars.

So you're like me, you.

You lose interest in modern cars.

It's the thing sat outside.

Yeah, it's to me I would love to get a.

What was it?

The Chrysler came out with a great looking car.

It was called a Crossfire.

Oh yeah.

Ultimately it was a Mercedes Benz.

Yes.

And I would, I would love to get one of those.

Yeah.

Yeah.

To one of those.

But you know it's like, like Corvettes.

Corvettes are a beautiful car but if your body build is, you know, bigger than a racehorse jockey, then you're gonna have props in that car.

And that goes the same.

I was trained on a model T Ford.

1919.

Yeah.

Car Club here in Wilmington and The.

At that time, you know, I was like, six feet.

Yeah.

And that's murder.

Forget about it.

It's like.

It's just way, way too small, and the seats don't go back.

Yeah.

I had an opportunity where, thanks to watchdogs, the.

It was a 19.

It was a 20, a 28.

Ford pickup truck.

Convertible.

Yeah.

Wow.

Mark, here.

Here you got a convertible.

Yeah.

And a pickup truck.

Right.

And my wife dawn says to me, it's like, joe, can you fit in that thing?

And so a couple car shows later, I spot one, but it was a hard top.

And I told the guy I was thinking about buying one, and I couldn't fit in it.

The seats, you know, the seats were, like, bolted, so you couldn't bring it back.

And so you would have to be as big as, like a horse jockey to drive in the Model A's.

They got a little bit bigger.

Yeah.

But cars from the 40s on up, no problem driving.

But the.

The cars that our grandparents drove, you know, to be a tiny guy.

Yeah.

You know, or maybe an Englishman to drive.

So you were never tempted by the famous Ford Mustangs.

Okay.

I bought a brand new Ford Mustang 2.

Yeah.

Guys.

Yeah.

Hated that car.

Yeah.

It's.

It's.

It was like the black sheep of the Ford family.

Yeah.

But Mark.

Hey, the girls liked it.

So, you know, if the girls liked it, why.

And I was single at the time.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Which meant, like, driving a car that had no power steering.

Yeah.

It was a nice little car.

You couldn't fit a lot of people in there.

But I love the 66 Mustang.

The Cobra.

Oh, my God.

Yeah.

And it was out on display.

You couldn't get.

Mark, you could not get close to the car because everybody wanted to see this.

It was a. Yeah.

People were different back then, you know, Whereas today, I always found out that World.

World's Fairs don't.

Aren't successful because news of something or new technology comes out so quick.

Yeah.

That, you know, you can't.

You can't have these anymore.

But yeah.

When that car was out, they had that car on display.

You could not get close enough to it.

It was.

It was.

It was a nice little car.

And I think now the.

You can probably get one fully restored.

Like a 64.

Yeah.

What $24,000.

Yeah, you know, us.

But now they're come.

You know, now the new ones, it's like, oh my God, they look like rocket ships coming out, you know.

Yeah.

But I think they're a nice car.

I like them and I know I'm going to make enemies with the GM family, but the Camaros.

Yeah, I don't know, I like, I've always liked the Mustangs.

Yeah.

So, you know, but.

And of course, what was the favorite.

Car when you were a kid?

I mean, in my, when I was a kid the most popular car was.

Was certain things were like the Ford cort, the Rover P5s and P6s and of course the Mini, the original Mini, the proper little issigonis design Mini.

And of course you got the Morris Thousand, little Morris Minor Thousand, the Moggy as it's affectionately called.

But we drove a lot of lot smaller cars with smaller engines.

Yeah, a two litre was quite something back then.

Well, I would, I was a, I was in love with.

Oh, what was it?

Mrs. Peel.

Oh, Emma Peel and the Lotus Elan.

Oh.

And that's where I got my fill of.

Of your what?

You know, what European cars look like, you know.

Yeah.

And to me that was, that was just fantastic.

You know, you see the Jaguars and you know, it was a great program.

I thought, I thought it was so weird, but so great and well, they had, they had great stories and.

But that's where I saw a handful of these automobiles.

Yeah.

You know, from, from Europe and that.

And they didn't have, they didn't have the magazines back then like they do now.

Now.

I mean you can get a, you can get a magazine anywhere in part of the world, you know, or see it on the Internet.

Yeah.

But yeah, it's like British television.

Oh my God, it was crazy.

It was, they would, they would show it on channel 13 and it always came in fuzzy and snowy.

See, this is something kids nowadays don't know what we're talking about.

You know, everybody had a television antenna on their chimney.

Yeah.

And Channel 13 always had these like crazy British shows and of course one was Monty Python.

Yeah.

And.

But it was great, great to watch, you know, good stuff.

Joe Pep, it's been an absolute pleasure chatting to you on the backseat driver.

Thanks very much for joining me.

I mean if somebody wants to go and find your work, you're on Facebook, you're on Instagram.

I mean the images you draw and the posters you draw are fantastic.

And long may you keep churning them out, I hope.

Well, I.

Yes.

Oh, wait.

Hey, listen, as long as I have a heartbeat and someone wants to tell a story of a car, I was, I would love to hear stories from your countrymen as to, you know, it's like what was it was their first car.

And then I, I think it'd be very entertaining.

And of course, to the automobiles, you know, that were out there at the turn of the century, you know, ones I've never even heard of before.

Yeah.

You know, I enjoyed looking at these advertisements and that.

But hey, any of your listeners would like to have an illustration done, it can be done.

So.

But thank you so much, Mark, for your time.

I've.

I had a great old time.

But once again, Joe Pep, one of America's greatest car illustrators, thanks very much for joining me on the backseat driver.

Thank you, sir.

Appreciate it.

Everybody stay well.

Take care.