The Sky Cruise opened July 1968 as a ride traveling 140 feet over the Mississippi River to Quinssippi Island
where there was a small amusement park. Nineteen 4 passenger gondolas painted red, yellow,pink and
turquoise made the 6,084 ft. round trip. There was also a miniature steam train on the island named the "Little Q".
The ride closed in the mid 70's. A scrap metal company bought the ride at an auction in the early '90's mainly for
the huge towers and the gondolas ended up in their industrial junkyard down the street from the plating shop where
I worked. They were being sold off as deer stands before I decided that I needed some. I bought six of them for
$35-75.00 each depending on condition. The Sky Cruise car was started in the spring of 1994 by myself and Wes
who also worked at the plating shop. Yellow #16 was used. A wrecked Ford Fiesta donated by Beth and Burke
makes up the major mechanicals with a shortened and narrowed front clip from a 1940 Chevy. The rear fenders are unidentified. Tail fins are from a 1960 Plymouth Belvedere with ten 1959 Cadillac taillights. A Coors keg is the fuel
tank with "Flower Power" caps. I used the four original gondola colors in the vehicle. I was fortunate to have a boss,Jerry,a street rodder himself, let me use the shop to build it. There was also a tool and die shop in the same
building and with the help of Keith and Ron the machine work was free and flawless. Donny helped with the body
work but Wes helped most of all.
I was pushing to get the car done to take it to the Early Tin Dusters Color Run car show in October. It's an 800+ car show and when I pulled in almost everyone left the car they were looking at and headed my way. It's best to park the car and get away from it, then come back a while later and listen to the comments.
