When I lived in San Bernardino (1991 â??? 1992) there was a nearby wrecking yard that disposed of cars purchased as part of corporate pollution tax credit programs.

Background:
In California at that time, corporations could purchase registered, running cars and destroy them, earning pollution tax credits that could be used to postpone required pollution control system upgrades. There were a couple of collection points that would pay up to $900 for any registered vehicle that could be driven through the gates. They were all destroyed at this one lot.

Absolute frigging riot at that place. They would offload the cars from flatbed train cars into long rows waiting crushing. Thousands of cars. For $5 you could go in and pick parts all day, pay by the pound on the way out. These were running, rust free, and usually damage free vehicles. A huge number of classic 60 â??s and 70â??s cars came through that lot. There were buses that would pull in full of Mexicans, each with a big plastic bucket and some basic hand tools. They would remove alternators and water pumps and such all day (for the cores).

One time I saw a beautiful old Mercury Parklane convertible on one of the the flatbed train cars, perfectly straight with all the trim intact.

There was one frantic old guy who literally wanted every single piece of that car! He had 3 of 4 other guys with him (his son and various friends I think) that were going to help guard it while he disassembled it. Otherwise the Mexicans would rip it apart with crowbars and such (really).

I was looking for parts for my 65 Galaxy so I hung around to help him out. Nice guy, explained to me just how incredibly rare these cars were, unique sheetmetal and trim and such. Turned out that he found it through a service that published pictures of every train car that left the largest collection point. It was some kind of service his car club subscribed to. He had traveled all the way from Ohio and was staying at a hotel waiting for this car to finally show up at the wrecking yard.

These cars were offloaded from the train cars by huge forklifts. When the forklift showed up this guy went to ask the operator to â??please, please be careful.â? I knew there was trouble when the guy spit at his feet.

Should have offered him $100 dollars or something because the first thing that SOB did was put the forks straight through the driverâ??s door. And it only got worse from there. By the time that car hit the ground there was not one straight piece left on it. Some miserable people just deserve to die.

The old guy was literally in tears but he and his friends still took what they could. Never forget it.

99 Tropic Green SVT, Tan Leather, 20K miles, "Nice Twin" (factory stock). 99 Tropic Green SVT, Tan Leather, 28K miles, "Evil Twin" (Turbo AER 3L and more in progress) 96 Red LX, Opal Grey Leather 2.5L, ATX, 22K miles