Blurry pictures from the lot of Johnson Pontiac in Holly, Michigan 1987

The year was 1987, and I was 13 years old. My parents had been shopping for a new car for the past few weeks, and they always seemed to go to the dealerships when I wasn’t available. Missing those trips totally killed me, as there wasn’t anything cooler on the face of the earth than a new car dealership (hey, I was a sheltered child, ok?). Maybe they didn’t include me on purpose – I don’t know. But my mother was sympathetic to my desire to tag along, and made a promise that she would take me to the local Pontiac dealership to look around sometime when it wasn’t open. I was as excited as a 13 year old car geek could possibly be!

The very next Sunday, she made good on her promise and we drove over to Johnson Pontiac in Holly, Michigan. It was a small dealership, but they always seemed to have a good number of every current model in stock. This particular dealership had always been interesting to me, as they made a regular habit of parking the more interesting models on a small concrete pad right in front of the showroom – there was always good stuff to see. Trans Am’s, Fiero’s, Grand Prix GT’s, etc. Pretty nice selection for a small town dealership.

Anyway, I brought my trusty (cheap) 110 camera with me for that Sunday afternoon adventure and I couldn’t have picked a worse choice. Between that piece of crap camera and my non-existent photography skills, nearly every photo came out blurry. Ugh! I remember being pretty upset when I got the pictures back from the developer, but now I’m just happy to have something for the memories. Anyway, here are some of the pics I took (my apologies for the lack of clarity in these pics):

A new 1987 Grand Am coupe on the dealership lot at Johnson Pontiac in Holly Michigan

1987 Fiero rear wing — Close up of the rear wing on a new 1987 Fiero on the dealership lot

A new red 1987 Trans Am on the dealership lot

Pontiac lace wheel pattern — Close up of the lace wheel pattern on a new 1987 Trans Am

1987 Fiero gt — Rear view of a new 1987 Fiero

Black Fiero GT — Another view of the Fiero

Fiero on the dealership lot — Have you seen enough of this car yet?

new black 1987 Fiero GT — Yeah, I was pretty much obsessed with the Fiero back in ’87!

Sadly, Johnson Pontiac closed it’s doors for good in the early 90’s. The bad economy of the time hit the small town of Holly pretty hard, and this dealership was one of the unfortunate casualties. The shocking thing is that the lot sat vacant and unused for such a long time. Nobody was in a rush to buy the building, or to develop the property into something else. Here’s a snapshot from Google Maps showing the state of things in 2008 – pretty sad, isn’t it?