Roland Ohlsson doesn’t fuzz around. Born during the 50’s under the light of the big factory his future was predetermined. After sneaking in to the Cineplex in Sagmyra to see The language of Love at thirteen a future with cars, girls and body shops awaited. By Lars-Åke Krantz. Translation Ellen Kay Krantz.
Dalarna the spring of -68 NOT! 40 years has passed but for Roland Ohlsson it’s all the same. Values are not seasonal items to him. Sagmyra and cars forever.
Worldkustom travels through Dalarna and calls Roland at his house for directions and cellp hone number.
– Cell phone number, he says. His tone suggests that he’s right about to puke.
– I don’t use that kind of crap. Meet me by the belfly in Sagmyra.
Hanging comfortably on the hood of a full-size Oldsmobile from 1963 he screens my Suburban carefully. He slides of the hood and offers me a callus hand.
– A Sub, he says. Follow me.
He has been renovating cars for his entire life. Privately, in his own shop and has been helping others during night. Was on the verge of a breakdown at last. Eighteen hours a day year after year takes its toll. Today he fixes industries. On his spare time he’s never far away from an open hood. In the Olds there’s a 394 Rocket motor. 10,25:1 in compression ratio and 280 hp.
The Oldsmobile awakens with a loud growl and climbs up the hill that leads to his house. Straight pipes politely announce to the rest of Sagmyra that Roland is on his way home.
When Tidstrand’s wool factory was in full bloom postwar thousands of people immigrated to Sagmyra. Roland’s mother came from Germany to work at the factory where she met Roland’s father who was a local resident.
In 1896 Axel Ludvig Tidstrand started the construction of the wool factory next to the Solarf mill.
– The county was pulsating and the factory was the heart of it all, Roland says with warmth. You see, the factory shone a bright light during night time. We had everything we needed. Shops, post office, cinema, mission, restaurants, hotels and it all were pulsating with vitality.
Pedal to the metal, one hand on the wheel and the cigarette held between fingers in the ventilation window. Roland Ohlsson is for real.
His memories tell a story about closeness to everybody and a desirable happiness and simplicity but when the factory was closed down during the seventies, the small town Sagmyra went down with it.
We had this old man in town that didn’t like it when the Americans started producing cars with V8 motors instead of sixes. You see, the pistons lean in those engines and that faces the edges on the bottom, he said.
The doors on the Oldsmobile open and close with a click. It’s almost like the door searches for the body and falls into place by itself. The fit is airtight and perfect. The door opens and closes the body like a door should when it’s at its best. The Olds 88 hasn’t run that much and is in a well preserved, untouched condition… Well, if you don’t count the exhaust system.
Hold on, he says, make a left turn and heads for an USA-dealership Motor Garaget in Borlange. The Mopar man that drives an Oldsmobile -63 for the moment must get his weekly fix. – These are real cars, he mumbles while smiling and closes in on a Dodge Senecan from 1960.
Roland is really a Mopar kind of guy by the grace of God but for the Oldsmobile he made an exception because “his father had one.”
– He collided with it into a VW in Germany when I was a child and we were on vacation. The VW was not even drivable anymore.
Choke? Whatta f..k a real American car don’t need no choke.
Daddy’s car god a tiny dent in the rear fender. I traced it a couple of years ago and it’s still running in Sweden.
-”Check behind the plate, I said, just to be sure it’s the right one.”
– It’s a tiny dent there, the owner said.
– Then I knew, it was my father’s, Roland says.
Watch and cell phone he curses at but a sundial he’s got.
Roland has had ups and downs.
– During some periods I have had work and then worked overtime and in addition to that, renovating cars during the nights for other people and even then, not even enough money to wipe the grease off my forehead, he says.
On the threshold to the residence: I have given away so much stuff in my days. Especially when I quit the shop. There’s just not room for it all. – Would you like a generator?
He stands in the storehouse in his childhood home that he recently bought and turns on old car parts whilst the sun sets. There aresausages and pork loins on the grill and in the kitchen Vera is preparing the potatoes.
This is a rack we made to lower the heavy boxes on a Blazer. You position the rack inside the car, open the lid in the floor and lower the box and the distribution box at the same time.
– She’s a great girl, Vera, my new girlfriend, he says and continues.
– Everything is great now. I almost cried when the factory lights was turned on again.
There is no ongoing production but the commerce is blooming nowadays. Outlet stores, clothing stores and restaurants.
A homemade motor support with the same aroma as a grindstone in a barn. We’re talking some serious authentic roots. Around 100 V8’s has been here. – One time a motor that was running started spinning right in front my father and I.
Wanna see were I’m building my garage? We go downhill to a plateau where his father one time made preparations for building a garage before everything dissolved. The heat that came with the sun during the day is now gone and has turned into a cool nightly breeze and I’m lend a sweater.
– That’s where he imagined it standing, but I’m going bigger over there, he says.
Clouds of smoke escapes his mouth while he’s talking and the sleeves on the washed-out jeans jacket stands proudly and unbuttoned against his wrists.
– Dinner, Vera shouts from the front porch.
It’s Saturday night in the little house alongside the edge of the forest. In the Buick Riviera from 1973 came Hakan Svart with his son Robin. The buff one was a great host. This is where he ran around as a child and now he’s bought his mother’s house. He’s finally home.
Sunday morning. Running a warm-up of both car and man.
– Everything is great now. I almost cried when the factory lights was turned on again.
Summer hasn’t arrived yet but the light and the aromas has returned. It’s spring time in this family. – Vera is the best thing that ever happened to me, says the warrior in jeans.
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