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Country music icon Johnny Cash’s 43rd birthday was no ordinary bash. It had cake, candles, and a Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham on the menu. The One Piece at a Time singer walked into a dealer and drove out with a Fleetwood Brougham, the boldest Caddy one could buy.
On February 26, 1975, Cash rolled out in a black-on-black beauty, an iconic moment that still echoes in history. Cash sang about building a Cadillac in One Piece at a Time almost 50 years ago, but in real life, he took a simple yet iconic route. Poetic justice indeed!
Interestingly, his No. 1 song had come out just a year after he gifted himself the black beauty. Unlike the song, where he builds the car with stolen parts, his real Cadillac was brand-new, shiny, and complete, delivered to him.
Celebrities do buy expensive cars; it’s nothing new. In fact, it’s rarely even the talk of the town. However, for Cash, it was more than just a car purchase; it was symbolic. For his fans, it became a historical moment, like a “monument on wheels.”
Cash’s Cadillac was later owned by Steve Plunkett, who was already familiar with the durability of these cars, having survived a severe crash while driving a Coupe de Ville. A truck forced him off the road into a ditch, and the car was badly damaged. However, Plunkett managed to escape by rolling down the window and jumping out of the car. This experience proved how well Cadillacs were built.
When the car was recovered, the damage included chipped fender corners and a wheel alignment issue. This wasn’t mere luck; it was Cadillac’s power-packed engineering that turned a disaster into a hymn of the wheels.
Johnny’s Fleetwood now rests far from Nashville, in Plunkett’s Cadillac collection in London, Ontario. It’s the same city where Johnny had proposed to his second wife, June Carter, in front of 7,000 fans. Isn’t that a fun coincidence?
Cash wasn’t just a casual car fan; he had a flair for big, iconic American vehicles, and they often reflected his personality and style. One Piece at a Time isn’t the only song in which he mentions cars. Songs like Get Rhythm (1956), Five Feet High and Rising (1959) have references to cars, journeys, and life imagery.
Johnny used cars as a metaphor for mobility, escape, or personal pride, reflecting the American road culture. So while cars aren’t the central focus in most of his catalog, when they do appear, they often carry metaphorical weight, such as humor, status symbol, or sometimes personal storytelling.