Ted Dirksen owns a 1960 Studebaker Lark 8   (V8) SS automobile.

“I found this car in a quonset owned by a gentleman who collected Studebaker vehicles. The car was sitting there for quite a while, so he wanted someone to buy it and restore it. I liked the car because it had a V8 and was an automatic,” said Ted.

“These cars generally came with a flathead six motor and a three-speed, three on the tree, transmission. This car has a 259 Studebaker V8 motor. This was a bare bones car. There is no stainless steel around the windows, it has dual exhaust, factory headers, radio delete, dog dish hub caps, rubber mats, so it was the cheapest model you could buy with Studebaker, except for the V8 automatic, which made it very different from other cars with options. There are not too many the same as this car,” explained Ted.

The motor offered 195 horsepower with a four barrel carburetor.

“My first car when I was 16 was a Studebaker Hawk. Then I got married, sold the car and raised a family. Once the children left, I started to look for another Studebaker. I normally won’t put money into a four-door car, but people didn’t see the value in this vehicle,” shared Ted.

The Studebaker Lark was a compact car produced by Studebaker from 1959-66. “This car was in decent shape with the original paint, except for a little in front. I brought it all back to original. The car had no rust and was very solid. The engine and transmission had to be rebuilt, almost everything under the car did as well,” he added.

“I wanted to save a bit of Studebaker heritage and bring this car back to life. I love driving this car. My wife and I went to Kamloops and back last weekend (earlier this past summer) to a Studebaker meeting and she drove just beautifully,” Ted said.

“Normally at car shows there are a few Studebakers. I didn’t change any of the chrome, although it should be changed. You can put too much money into a car and I have already passed the value of the car,” revealed Ted.

“It is a work of passion, a labour of love for most people. I had a good friend that knew these cars well and he helped me, so we spent a winter getting it ready for the road. The difficulty was  all of the time and effort to do it. You can get all of the Studebaker parts you want, they are not that rare,” said Ted.

“We could get parts and they were only three weeks away. We also made a few parts as well. Anyone that wants to rebuild a Studebaker will find that getting the parts is not a big problem,” said Ted.

Some of these facts are courtesy of Wikipedia. From its introduction in early 1959 until 1962, the Lark was a product of the Studebaker-Packard Corporation. Sales of the Lark were good for the 1959 and 1960 model year, thanks to the fact that Studebaker had obtained dual dealerships with dealers of the Big Three manufacturers that did not as yet have their own compacts to sell.

Initial models included two- and four-door sedans, a two-door hardtop coupe and a two-door station wagon, with two levels of trim (Deluxe and Regal) offered on most. The Lark was the first car of its size to offer a V8 engine—the slightly smaller Rambler American offered only an in-line six, though the slightly larger Rambler Rebel did offer a V8 close to the same size as Studebaker’s and had since 1957.

The lineup grew for 1960, when the company introduced a convertible (Studebaker’s first since 1952) and a four-door station wagon. Two-door wagons were fast falling from favour throughout the industry, despite a minor redesign which made the two-door Lark wagon’s tailgate and rear side windows more user-friendly, and the four-door quickly proved the more popular of the two available wagons from Studebaker.
For 1959 and 1960, Larks were available with either an L-head (flathead) 170 cubic inch six-cylinder engine or the company’s 259 cubic inch V8.