FINAL TRIBUTE

MAT-SU — Billy L. Fikes always loved white Cadillacs.

The Big Lake man drove north from Arizona with his family in a 1956 white Cadillac in 1965. On Sept. 20, he took his last ride in a white Cadillac — a 1954 Superior.

But only after about 30 members of his family and few close family friends spent three grueling days making the classic car fit for service.

Grandson John Fee was at the wheel with John’s brother, Chris Hegener, in the passenger seat when they pulled onto the road with their grandfather that Monday morning.

“He would have said, ‘When you hit the Glenn Highway, turn left and punch it,’” Billy’s son, Bill Fikes Jr. of Big Lake, said of his father.

“Dad was a traveler his whole life,” added Bill’s sister, Helen Hegener of Palmer.

Instead of heading north, John turned the Cadillac hearse, on loan from the Museum of Alaska Transportation and Industry (MATI), south toward Fort Richardson, where 81-year-old Billy Fikes was buried with full military honors after more than 20 years of service with the U.S. Army, including serving with the occupation forces in Japan after World War II and in combat in Korea.

Billy Fikes died of heart failure on Sept. 10 after being paralyzed about 10 years ago.

When the mortuary told Bill it would be $650 to transport his father’s remains to Anchorage, Bill looked at the proffered vehicle and a better plan started to form.

“We could find something better than that to take Dad in,” he said.

They wanted a World War II era military vehicle, so he and nephews John and Chris, both of Meadow Lakes, headed to MATI where they found a military transport, but the back would not open. Sitting next to it was a vintage hearse. It had been parked there since 1975.

The tires were flat, the brakes were seized up, none of the wheels turned and it was nothing much to look at, but Billy’s family members knew they found his ride.

“My dad had Cadillacs all his life — white Cadillacs,” Bill said.

The fact it was in no shape to go on the road gave Bill little pause.

“I have extreme confidence in my nephews’ abilities,” Bill said. “If he (John) said he could do it, I knew we had the ride we were looking for.”

With just 70,000 miles on the odometer, Billy’s grandsons, who learned to work on cars from their grandpa, were confident they could get the hearse on the road.

“Other than it sitting around, it was in good shape,” John said.

With the museum’s permission, John and Chris brought in a flatbed truck. Chris recalled dragging the uncooperative hearse onto the trailer.

“We were digging trenches in the lawn trying to get it out,” Chris said.

Back at Alaska Custom Classics, owned by Hegener-Fee family, the family got to work. They had just 72 hours before they needed to be on the road to Anchorage for the military burial.

“We had to replace the entire exhaust system, all the brakes, the master and the slave cylinders,” John recalled. “The first thing we did was get it running. Then we started worrying about making it pretty.”

The engine was in good shape. John rebuilt the distributor, cleaned up the carburetor and flushed the cooling system. Chris rebuilt the starter. James fixed the exhaust system. The transmission was in good shape, too, and was soon up and running with some maintenance, John said. With Chris hard at work on the uncooperative master cylinder, some of the other family members took on the cosmetic work.

They took off the chrome and sanded down the paint. They cut out rust spots and replaced them. They primed and they painted.

“All the chrome and everything that would come out of the car was on my kitchen table,” Helen said.

Bill meticulously hand-colored the Cadillac logos to their original hues. Helen and her sister Sue Patch made new tan brocade curtains. John’s wife, Annette, reupholstered portions of the interior. Helen’s son James put in new stops at either end of the casket space.

“Until this project, I never really did body work,” James said, “but I learned in a hurry.”

The list of Billy’s family members who helped is long, but includes his son Lewis Fikes and daughter Sandy Fikes, both of Big Lake, and Sue’s sons Zeb and Alex Kraft, along with Helen’s son Michael Hegener, whose efforts included fabrication and bodywork. Close family friend Tom Weber pitched in, too. Even Billy’s great-grandchildren were busy. Cammy Fee, 8, polished chrome and took photos of the work, while her 13-year-old sister, Ally, made pot after pot of coffee to help keep everyone going.

Perhaps no one appreciated that more than her Uncle Chris, who was awake for 54 straight hours fighting with the master cylinder.

When the day of the interment arrived, the hearse was done. Not, Annette said, as well as her perfectionist husband would have liked, but it was ready to take “the neatest man I will ever know” to his final resting place. The family scrubbed the grease and paint from their hands, retrieved Billy’s body from the mortuary and started toward Anchorage.

It was a cortege like few had seen, they said. Joggers stopped to gawk. Others stood respectfully. When they pulled onto the joint base, soldiers stood at attention, but not without wandering eyes at the most unusual sight of a 1954 landulet Cadillac hearse, Helen said.

“It was what Dad deserved,” Helen said.

It was a lasting tribute to the military and family man, Bill said. “There are still 30 people living around him who love him that much.”

It was tough, they admitted, but it gave them a chance to channel their grief into a tribute to Billy.

“The best part about it was it brought the family together,” Bill said.

“Everybody had a great time,” Helen added. “We laughed and we cussed.”

Mostly, they cussed the master cylinder, which controls the brake system.

But they didn’t give up.

“He taught us when you start a job, you finish it,” Bill said.

“If you don’t know how, you figure it out,” added Helen.

“And if you don’t have the tools, you make them,” Bill continued.

“He could fix about anything with a roll of baling wire and duct tape,” James said.

After the service, the Fikes family took the hearse back the museum, where it sits just outside the front door. The countless manhours of work and about $1,000 in parts were the family’s donation to the museum in honor of Billy Fikes.

“Dad’s legacy was the family he left,” Bill explained. “A nice old Cadillac is part of it.

“It turned something terribly negative into something lastlngly positive,” he added.

For John and Chris, who have restored many classic cars, this was a special project not only because it honored the man who helped John restore a 1969 Chevy truck when John was 17, but because it means their work will last for decades and be enjoyed by thousands.

“This one, we know is going to be around for everyone to appreciate for a long time,” John said.

As for his grandfather, John is certain how he’d feel. “He’d think it was great. Grandpa would have loved it.”

The Fikes family said they’d like to see the hearse available to other families, with a user fee going to help support restoration work on other vehicles.

Sherry Jackson, executive director of MATI, said she will put the notion of renting out the vehicle as a creative revenue source on the agenda for the Oct. 17 meeting of the MATI board. Jackson said she was amazed by what the Fikes family accomplished

“I can’t express the appreciation and gratitude I have,” Jackson said. “They will always be able to see it and be reminded of him.”

The museum closed for the winter yesterday, but the hearse will be featured at the Night at the Museum Halloween event for children on Saturday, Oct. 30.

To see the Fikes’ family photo slide show of the hearse’s transformation, visit area907.com/caddy.