Barry’s always been a hustler and a collector—I first met him back in the ’80s through his godson, Jesse James (Barry and Jesse’s father were at one time partners in the antiques game). But it wasn’t until the following decade that I really got to know Barry as the avid, often spontaneous, and overly eccentric collector he was. One late night after an evening out in L.A. doing who knows what, he threw out one of his “fruit basket” offers (his family was in the wholesale produce business and supplied all the greater Los Angeles grocery stores with their fruits and veggies) to get us to come hang out at his warehouse in Hollywood; I was more intrigued by the dozen or so ’20s-’30s streamline travel trailers he’d amassed and squeezed inside the old building than I was apples and oranges! Having only been exposed to Airstreams of this era up until this point, seeing his gleaming Silver Streaks, Spartans, and the like all caravanned together was something else—but hearing him go on and on about each one in salesman-like detail proved Barry was as enthusiastic as he was eccentric. When the trailers became too much to deal with, Barry’s peculiar nature led him to begin acquiring customs—but not your ordinary-type custom cars.
The first of Barry’s rather distinguished customs that I can recall was the “King of Mercs” built and owned by Frank DeRosa. Like the Zephyr pictured here, it too was purple in exterior color when initially acquired—but after losing a little right-of-way disagreement with a semi truck, the 1951 Mercury went from two-toned and scalloped purple to tribal-flamed satin black, for which it’s probably best known under Weiss’ custodial care. Barry would eventually sell the King, but only as a means to acquire another DeRosa job, the “Cowboy Cadillac”—an in-progress 1947 Series 61 fastback, which he still owns to this day. The 1939 Zephyr, however, was bought more as an investment—a flip, as it were.
This here is the original “Scrape”—not one of the fiberglass jobs its original owner/designer Terry Cook popped off under the Deco Rides name. Completed over 20 years ago by Ramsey Mosher in Dover, Delaware, the beyond heavily modified coupe was toured around the country for a couple years by Cook before eventually being sold at auction for a pretty penny—by a man with plenty a pretty penny, Robert E. Petersen, who purchased the Zephyr for his namesake museum. On display for nearly a decade and a half, in 2013 Scrape once again hit the auction blocks—but this time, the well-worn custom only fetched a fraction of its previous selling price … and Barry, of course, the highest bidder.
Upon initially acquiring the hammered Zephyr (figuratively and literally), Barry toned down the exterior a tad in his usual satin black fashion, and just as he does with all things motorized in his possession, proceeded to hammer the coupe around town and beyond until he felt it was time to capitalize on his investment. Before doing so, however, the car was repainted in Cook’s originally intended color—black—and freshened up wherever deemed necessary (it retains the hydraulic suspension and even the same interior originally installed back in the ’90s.). In 2017, Barry put Scrape up for auction for its third time, but unfortunately was unable to rally bidders high enough to meet reserve, so back to the Weiss stables she went and remains to this day.
(As of this writing, Barry was in a very serious motorcycle accident. On behalf of myself and the entire STREET RODDER staff, we wish him a full and speedy recovery!)
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