suppose enough time has passed since the “war of words” about what a hot rod is. Or maybe it hasn’t. It was around the turn of the century (I’ve wanted to use that line) when I made a comment about hot rods, street rods, and so on, going well past the once-hard-cutoff of 1948. My upbringing shows hot rods didn’t have a hard cutoff manufacture date. A hot rod can be just about anything if it meets a few basic bullet points: performance, primarily the engine, is enhanced to yield more power; next is the chassis performance is enhanced to yield increased handling (you can throw in the ride too, as that counts); and it looks like a hot rod. Hot rod looks come in many sizes, shapes, and styles but you will know it when you see it.

Well, it was never intended to be a “hard line” but an arbitrary one. Or so say the early rodders who began this “war of words” when they instructed me what to look for. The funny thing is a hot rod can “talk” to you. I know that sounds ridiculous, but many a hot rod has just sat there looking all “hot roddy.” I hear volumes about its performance, what its owner’s intentions were (are), and that cool stance.

I used to work for a street rod magazine back in the day, a pretty good one. The rodding world was in love with its cutoff of 1949 and earlier for street rods (hot rods) and post 1948 for street machines. But it never made sense to me. Back in 1971, a 1940 Ford was 31 years old. Today a 31-year-old car is a 1993. Holy cow, I’m driving modern-day hot rods every day based on that formula. I’ve heard all the conversations, heated arguments, and my favorite “I will cancel my subscription if you put a post-1948 car in my magazine.” (Magazines are always referred to as “my magazine” as car readers take this stuff personally, which is a good thing.)

It was around 2000 in the good old Y2K days … the advent of a new millennium. It was becoming more and more apparent to me that something was afoot. While I still hadn’t grasped the impact classic trucks would have on our hobby, it was evident that the large cars of the 1960s and 1970s were growing in popularity. The cars of the 1950s had already made a dent thanks to the Tri-Five Chevy, and as such, it was only a matter of time, for me at least, before the cars of the 1960s and 1970s would take hold. Look around. There are still plenty of early (pre-1949) hot rods running around and, for that matter, being built. But it shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that this era of the hot rod has slowed down considerably since the mid 1990s through the Y2K years.

Nowadays, it’s a hot rod world populated with classic trucks, granted mostly Chevys, but plenty of Fords and a few others are making inroads. The fun thing with trucks is there doesn’t appear to be a cutoff at any year. Truckers can’t seem to get enough of trucks regardless of the year or vintage. That’s cool.

For today’s hot rodder, look around, whether at an indoor show or something under the stars, and you will see lots, and I do mean lots, of Detroit Iron from the 1960s and 1970s. These modern-day hot rods (often called “cruisers”) will be parked next to you at an early Saturday morning “doughnut cruise” or an organized event. Even the National Hot Rod Associations threw in the towel some time ago. They have accepted the year of hot rods from the 1950s through the 1970s (and I figure even beyond) as legitimate participants that rodders want to build and the public want to see and ogle over.

The fun part about these hot rods is that they can be restorations that often bring back the muscle car era, or they can be highly massaged with cutting-edge chassis, powertrains, well-thought-out interiors, and lively paintjobs. A hot rod is just that: a hot rod and it will tell you it is and there is nothing you can say to prove it isn’t. Maybe, just maybe, we are now living in the golden age of rodding.