a230  1152  15 Sep 76
AM-Car, Bjt, 330
With Wirephoto
    MIDDLETOWN, Pa. (AP) - When Chunky died, Edith Crow just couldn't
drive herself to say goodby to her old friend. Now she won't have to,
and Chunky will be at home with her forever.
    It sounds like a touching story of friendship between Mrs. Crow and,
perhaps, her dog or cat.
    But no, Chunky is a car.
    Or was a car.
    Now it is an 1,800-pound block of metal squeezed into a memorial by
a York, Pa., junk dealer.
    ''I grew so attached to that car,'' explained Mrs. Crow, a mother of
three. ''It never let me down. It saw me through thick and thin, ice
and snow, the worst weather imaginable. Even today, I carry Chunky's
ignition key on my key ring.''
    Chunky, a 1963 Chevrolet Nova convertible, was driven 230,000 miles
before it finally gave out early this summer.
    Mrs. Crow had to do some searching before she found a junk dealer
willing to compact the car. The block off the old Chunky came back
last month to the Crow home in this Philadelphia suburb. The family
invited 175 guests to a welcome home party, and one gave Mrs. Crow a
gold-plated Chevy hudcap as a momento.
    The block sits in the Crow's driveway but Mrs. Crow said she plans
to mount it on a pedestal and plant flowers around it.
    Chunky was a one-person car, Mrs. Crow said. Her husband, Bob,
agreed.
    ''That car wouldn't do anything for me,'' he said. ''I'd take it out
and it'd break down. I'd call Edith. She'd come along and Chunky
would kick right over.
    ''I remember one Christmas Eve we had a snow that was thigh-deep,''
he recalled. ''Bulldozers couldn't get through, but old Chunky moved
and got Edith home that night with the trunk and back seat loaded
with Christmas presents.''
    ''Bob's jealous,'' suggested Mrs. Crow. ''I think he was always
jealous of Chunky.''
    But Crow, a machine operator, admired the old car and said it had a
personality of its own. For example, he said, Chunky would not accept
a new speedometer cable. Several were installed, but none worked.
     ''I've been working around machinery since I was a teen-ager and
that was the weirdest hunk of machinery I ever saw,'' he said.
    
1451pED 09-15
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