McDonough, 69, still gets choked up as he reminisces about the car that transported him on many road trips.
“I loved that car. You step in that car and you step back in time,” he said.
McDonough now considers it a piece of art. “People keep rusty tractors out front of their homes,” he said with his hands resting carefully on the remains of the windshield frame. “There’s a lot of memories in it. I’ll be dead before it’s moved.”
The car was a showpiece, ironically restored with a custom flame paint job. Back in 2018, it was featured at the World Of Wheels show at Boston’s World Trade Center. Now, this luminous rust-mobile is just another roadside attraction.
It joins other rusted-out relics plopped across front yards and farms south of Boston. A drive through the picturesque small towns of Pembroke, Halifax, and Plympton reveals a “rust belt” of sorts.
Along Route 58, there are clusters of antique horse-drawn hay rakes, decades-old farm tractors, and even a stunningly rusted vintage VW Beetle. Some rusted objects are obscure from the street, like the ornate wrought iron railing that barely stands upright surrounding the century-old gravestones at Plympton’s historic Hillcrest Cemetery 1706.
Miles away, on South Street in Wrentham, sits a graveyard of jumbled Hudsons, Chryslers, and Oldsmobiles. They decay in unglamorous stages in front of Tosy’s Ford Mustang Farm, becoming a popular roadside attraction. The farm sells used and junked Mustangs and their parts.
The rusty decor is made more luminous in bright sunlight. From old saw blades and wagon wheels, to barely usable mailboxes and lawn ornaments, they have become showpieces of rusty art.
In front of the East Bridgewater town offices, a poignant memorial to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks stands out against the backdrop of an American flag. A section of a rusty steel beam salvaged from the World Trade Center in New York is mounted on a granite stone glowing in orange hues.
Spiegel Scrap Metal in Brockton handles tons of junk metal every day. At the entrance to the massive facility sits a rusted Picasso-esque sculpture. It’s a simple tribute to recycling; a jumbled piece constructed of salvaged car parts and accessories, including a rusted wheel, springs, and exhaust pipes.
Ten miles away, in Hanover, a section of the original steel train tracks that once carried passenger and freight trains lies silently rusting at the entrance to the Hanover Branch Rail Trail.
Perhaps the relentless rainy weather has exacerbated the progress of rust. For some, it is the enemy: a sign of decay and neglect, the passage of time.
Then again, we may pause as we walk over a manhole cover and admire its intricate design made more beautiful by rust. Singer Neil Young’s 1979 album, titled “Rust Never Sleeps,” might sum up the ongoing process of rust and corrosion.
But for Steve McDonough, rust has become a transformation, an unintended embellishment that remade his Caddy into a contorted piece of art.
