Free Lance Star Article - May 2, 1985

"VW Bugs No Pests to Fans"

By Rob Freis

The meek shall inherit the roadway, wrote the prophet.

Generations of hulking Cougars, Cobras, Firebirds, Impalas, Mustangs and Thunderbirds may lie rusting in their own dinosaur graveyards, but Jack Batt and Harold Wilson believe the lowly Volkswagen beetle will endure.

They see VW's as the masters of the automotive evolutionary scale because, like all hardy species, the VW bug can adapt.

What other car but the common man's Caddy could inspire a fan club, seven years after its production has ended?

What other car would move a man like Harold Wilson, a Spotsylvania resident and a convenience store operator, to confess he constantly drives around, "looking for VW parts in bushes."

"There's one thing about VW's," said Batt. "You either love 'em or you hate 'em."

"Yeah, and the people who hate 'em sell 'em cheap," added Wilson.

Wilson and Batt have incorporated their enthusiasm about VW's into Der Bug Nuts, a local club with about 20 other Fredericksburg-area residents as members.

They meet every other week or so and discuss the entomology of VW bugs: who's got a new one or an old one, where parts are available, who can fix them right.

Occasionally, Der Bug Nuts becomes a motorized salvation army. Batt says they have literally rescued a rare VW chasis from the jaws of a junkyard car crusher.

That's the way it goes in America, land of the limo and home of the chrome.

Both Wilson and Batt became enamored of Volkswagens while in military service in Germany. That's where Batt bought his first VW.

"I paid $200. I got taken," he recalled. "That was in 1966. It was a 1953 model, and it literally broke down a minute after I drove it out of the lot."

Before he went overseas, Batt bought a Chevrolet, which lasted 24 hours after its purchase. He wrecked with the driver of - of course - a VW.

Undaunted, Batt has come to own 65 other VWs, some for parts, some for show, some for transportation. Currently, he owns a 1949 and 1951 beetles, a 1965 bus, and a 1981 Rabbit and a 1984 Jetta.

Wilson first bought a red '63 beetle in 1967. "That was the last year for the smaller license plates," Batt, the club's arhivist of automotive parts, reminded.

Now, Wilson owns two: a bug and a VW bus, both of which he maintains personally.

Both Wilson and Batts acknowledge their love of VWs has its unpractical side, like developing a yen for the wrong woman.

"They're not the best family cars in the world," said Wilson of the VW's diminuitive dimensions.

"I once drove a bug across the country, with nine pieces of luggage, a dog and a pregnant wife. That was as far as I wanted to go," said Batt.

And VW drivers after auto accidnets have much in common with sardines. "If you're in a big American car and I'm in a bug and a truck pulls in front of us, I'm gonna say my car's safer, because I can manuever. I have a better chance of avoiding it."

"But if we hit, you're gonna be dancing on my grave."

Their bugaboo has its practical side, too.

Since bugs went out of production, "the value went way up," said Wilson. "Now there's no price limit. You can ask anything for a bug."

Searching backyards and junkyards for distained VW's seems like a better idea when you can buy cheap, spend a little fix-up time and jack the price way up.

That happens all the time, say Wilson and Batt. Ever since bugs went out of production, a thriving blackmarket has sprung up, with several magazines advertising page after page of clutches, hubcaps, rear-view mirrors and the like. Wilson said his bus's chrome "VW" emblem alone sells for $99.

One of the most valuable services members of Der Bug Nuts render to one another is keeping track of available VWs and parts. "You've got to have contacts," said Wilson.

Flea markets for bug parts are but a facet of the so-called "Bug-Out" gatherings VW enthusiasts stage. One of those is scheduled to be held next month in Manassas, with such giddy pursuits as beetle drag and slalom races.

Batt plans to attend in search of the finishing touches on the museum piece to be, his 1949 bug.

Collectors and exhibitors like Wilson and Batt develop encyclopedic knowledge of the subtle changes beetles underwent over the 30 years they were produced. Unlike most contemporary American cars, which were completely revamped year-by-year, bugs evolved slowly and practically - a new bumper here, a rounder headlight for good measure.

Practicality has always been the bug's excuse for its homely looks, like the blind date your friends justified by saying, "Well, he's got a great personality."

Bugs were always inexpensive to buy and to operate, and were simply designed enough to allow the automotive ignoramus to tinker. "If you kept it well maintained, you could always expect well over 100,000 miles from a bug," said Batt.

Since the last bug rolled off a German assembly line, Volkswagen has moved its operations to America and begun producing a new family line of cars. But to Batt and Wilson, it ain't the same.

"The Rabbit will never have the appeal the bug did," said Wilson.

Funny thing, though. As the lowly bug becomes rarer, it will become more valuable, Wilson said. "Down the road, if you have a VW, it'll be worth a fortune."

The prophet also said someday the last shall be first.