North American English Decrepit car

a missouri family of 5 7 months drought area on u.s. highway 99 (tracy vicinity) jalopy car during great depression.

in american slang jalopy, clunker, old rust bucket , bucket used. beater , more urban hooptie, gained popularity humorous song hooptie sir mix-a-lot.

the word jalopy once common archaic. jalopy seems have replaced flivver (1910), in decades of 20th century meant failure . other terms wreck of car included heap, tin lizzy (1915) , crate (1927), derived wwi pilots slang old, slow , unreliable aeroplane. in latter half of 20th century more coarse terms became popular, such shitbox .

of unknown origin, jalopy noted in 1924. possible non spanish-speaking new orleans-based longshoremen, referring scrapped autos destined scrapyards in jalapa, mexico, pronounced destination on pallets jalopies rather multiples or possessive of jalapa. possible origin french chaloupe refers motor-boat , reference sound old car make.

a 1929 definition of jalopy reads follows: cheap make of automobile; automobile fit junking . definition has stayed same, took while spelling standardize. among variants have been jallopy, jaloppy, jollopy, jaloopy, jalupie, julappi, jalapa , jaloppie. john steinbeck spelled gillopy in in dubious battle (1936). term used extensively in book on road jack kerouac, first published in 1957, although written 1947.

georgia tech, engineering school in atlanta, georgia, takes pride in former practice of engineering students maintaining antique cars, , school still maintains ramblin wreck, popular symbol of school. college radio station, wrek, named after iconic ramblin wreck georgia tech.

the term used throughout history of archie comics, referring archie andrews red, open-top antique car.

in 2009 term clunker heavily used in reference car allowance rebate system in united states, known cash clunkers program .

decrepit cars used on indian reservations in united states , indian reserves in canada referred reservation cars or rez runners short. culture of rez car explored in documentary film reel injun, , figured briefly in feature film smoke signals. keith secola (ojibwa) recorded song ndn kars describing such vehicle in 1987. appearing cassette release, used in native american-made film dance me outside. on album circle (akina records, 1992). activist russell means s humorous poem indian cars go far (1993) describes indian car decrepit vehicle.