'67 Bug, World's Cutest Car

The day I turned 6, my parents surprised me with a birthday party revolving around our 1967 Volkswagen Beetle convertible. The year was 1968. When my playmates arrived for the party, all dressed up, my mother ushered us down to our cellar. We had no idea what was up. She led us across the floor. Then, with a flourish, she pulled open the door to our one-car garage and announced: "Look! The Love Bug is here!" Our Beetle had been tarted up to look like Herbie, star of the hit Disney film with Dean Jones. As we kids piled into the car, I heard a scream. My friend Anna Marie cried out, "Wow!" Her eyes filled with tears of delight. The back seat was crammed with candy, from hanging lollipops to bags of SweetTarts. "It really IS the Love Bug," Anna Marie said. We devoured the treats as my dad drove us to the theater in the next town to see the film. It wasn't too hard for us to imagine we were riding in Herbie, the world's cutest car. And at that moment, I also knew I had the world's grooviest parents. --Tamara S., Rye, New York.

'59 Chevrolet Impala, Cocoon of Comfort

The "great finned one" was the first car I remember. I was three years old (at right in the photo). We lived in St. Louis, but my parents bought the car on a lark during a trip to Fremont, Ohio. They insisted on air conditioning, a massive unit that hung below the dash, equipped with four circular vents adjustable to shoot columns of frigid air anywhere you wanted. I remember snoozing while stretched across the front seat, my head resting on my dad's leg, as we made the 600-mile drive from St. Louis to Ft. Worth to visit my grandparents' farm. We were cocooned in comfort, safe from the blazing Texas heat just outside the glass. The car had a cavernous trunk, a V8 engine with plenty of oomph, and a style that would make the '59 Impala an American classic. --Scott S., Bethesda, Maryland.