Van people: The great American rainbow boogie

This book tells the story of the people behind the fastest growing and most expensive fad in America today - vanning. In the face of this phenomenon, van sales have shot up dramatically. Van conversion shops have sprung up in cities and towns of all sizes, and thousands of clubs have been organized across America. On any weekend there are numerous van-ins and van-happenings to which vanners will drive hundreds of miles just to be together. In the words of Spiderman, "With a van I've found everything I ever need." He is typical of the hundreds of thousands who have escaped from a humdrum existence that limited and bored them. These are often the once-practical citizens who have traded their 28-mile per gallon, low-priced compact cars for $12,000-$15,000 vans, averaging 13 miles per gallon. No longer content with a continuing way of life, these are people groping to make some individual artistic statement through the vehicles they drive. Meet men and women from all walks of life. The Naked Lady, a legal secretary by day, creates some of the most handsome and outrageous vehicles by night and weekend. Meet Foxy Lady who made her husband sell her sleek Lincoln Continental so she could have her own tricked-out van. Or Cozy Josie, a tine custom painter, who realizes the dream of seeing her airbrush creations driving down the street as in a mobile museum. Here are the boozers, late-blooming women's libbers, the mechanics, and clerks - people from every part of society - drawn together by a single common bond - the van. As one member of the Rocky Mountain Van Club says. "John Q. Public really doesn't know about van people. He should know that there's a whole new life out here. We're out to promote togetherness and good vibes. We want people to be happy, not uptight. That's what this vanning is all about." Indeed, that in large measure is what this book is about.