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Aunt Bee AKA Frances Bavier's Studebaker
Well as many of you know, "we" own Aunt Bees car and she hadn't ran right for a few years.
Well, if you drove by R&R Car Care Center last week and thought you saw the Studebaker in the garage then you were correct!! She cranks right up now and was detailed!
The Studebaker is ready to make a few christmas parades coming up and she may make an appearance before then!
Who else is a fan of the Andy Griffith Show?
The 1966 model two-door sedan won't be "restored" in the usual sense of the word, said the late park owner Brown Loflin as he wiped thick black oil from the engine's dipstick after the car was brought to the park in June 1990. "But it's sure got to have an oil change, and we'll replace all the old slick tires. It runs pretty good and it will be driven a little, but very little."
Loflin shares ownership of the car with fellow Denton resident Stan Bingham, who was owner of a lumber company. They paid $20,000 for it at a sale of property of actress Frances Elizabeth Bavier, who portrayed Sheriff Andy Taylor's aunt Beatrice in television's Andy Griffith Show.
The car's six-cylinder engine, made by Chevrolet for Studebaker assembly in Canada, has an impressive label plate: "Studebaker Super Skybolt Six." Chromed letters on the fenders designate it a "Daytona" model. The odometer indicated it had been driven 44,639 miles when it was hauled here on a truck. The state inspection sticker on the windshield was dated 1982. For most of the time since 1982, it had been stored indoors. There were a few "parking lot dents" and the hood was slightly bent, projecting a little above original position. "We'll try to straighten that," said Loflin. "We don't want to replace it or repaint it. We really feel the car should be kept pretty much the way it was when she drove it."
Miss Bavier, a New York native, lived at Siler City, N.C., for 17 years until her death last December at the age of 86. The recluse bequeathed personal property to be sold with proceeds going to the state university system's Center for Public Television. The car's price was the biggest at the June 2 sale at N.C. State University in Raleigh, where household and personal effects of the actress brought more than $100,000 for the television center at near-by Research Triangle Park.
"We thought the car ought to stay in North Carolina," said Bingham. "It's a piece of the state's history. Brown mentioned the sale to me, and I agreed to go half with him and try to buy it. I'm sure a lot of people will say we paid too much, but we believed it was that important." What would it have been worth if it hadn't been owned by the famous actress?
"A thousand dollars at the most," said Loflin with a chuckle, "and that's allowing for the fact it's a collector's item. But we probably would have gone as high as $25,000 if the bidding had gone that far."
Bingham, who was doing the bidding, ended it when he topped an offer of $19,500 from a representative of a Studebaker club in Florida. Other bidders included Studebaker collectors from as far away as Texas. Many of the estimated 2,000 at the sale were residents of the area around Mount Airy, N.C., in Griffith's native Surry County. Many others were faithful followers of the television show, which still is popular in reruns and has nationwide enthusiast clubs.
Griffith, who became a renowned actor after studying drama at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, used recollections of Mount Airy as part of the television series' stories of homespun life in the fictional town of Mayberry. Although Mount Airy became "Mayberry" and neighboring Pilot Mountain became "Mount Pilot," the real names of Raleigh 10 and Siler City were mentioned often in the series. Siler City is in Chatham County, about 35 miles east of Denton. Miss Bavier was 69 years old and in retirement when she moved there in 1972.
When she joined the Griffith show in 1960 at the age of 57, she had acted on stage and in motion pictures for many years without the distinction she attained almost immediately in the role of philosophical housekeeper and mother-by-proxy to Sheriff Taylor's son Opie.
In her Siler City home, after her death, her attorney found her acting contracts. They tracked the career of an actress who earned $75 a week in a 1949 summer theatre to a star who was paid $2,500 for each episode of the Griffith show. Yellowed by age, the contracts were sold - mostly for prices of $300 to $400 each; and one of the millions endeared by Aunt Bea paid $35 for Miss Bavier's garbage can and its cart. She didn't have any tractors or threshing machines, but we're proud to have her Studebaker at the Southeast Old Threshers' Reunion. It's like Aunt Bee or a steam tractor in one way: You just don't see many of them any more.
It was later the Late Brown Loflin obtained the full ownership of the car and after his passing in 2019, the ownership transferred to his Wife Ruby. The car remains on property locked away, only to be viewed by the public a few times per year.
**If you would like the Studebaker to make a special appearance please email us!
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