A trib­ute to Ken Eberts writ­ten for The Packard Cor­morant 199, Sec­ond Quar­ter 2025.

Ken Eberts gave us not only pre­cise images of great cars, but pic­tures of their con­tem­po­rary sur­round­ings that tugged at our col­lec­tive heart­strings. He came to The Packard Cor­morant at a sad time, but it was the begin­ning of a long and fond association.

Ken had sent us a Packard Twelve cov­er paint­ing our Sum­mer 1991 issue when our mutu­al friend, Packard design­er Dick Teague, passed away. Every­thing shift­ed to doc­u­men­tary mode as we hasti­ly tore that issue apart to hon­or Dick’s mem­o­ry. We kept the cov­er, know­ing Dick, whose first great restora­tion was a 1904 Packard Mod­el L, would appre­ci­ate it.

One item didn’t make that issue was Dick’s con­cept car, the “1992 Caribbean.” It applied all the tra­di­tion­al Packard hall­mark designs to a mod­ern gran tur­is­mo. Dick had been work­ing on it for months, strick­en by can­cer, “func­tion­al,” his fam­i­ly said at the end, “only min­utes a day.”

I’d giv­en it up for lost when Ken Eberts sur­prised me by send­ing along the fin­ished prod­uct: “Dick want­ed you to have this. He asked me if I would do it for him and enclosed the draw­ing which I believe you two had agree to pub­lish. Dick designed and drew it in its entire­ty. My part was just ren­der­ing it in col­or. I think it is his last design.” We ran it the fol­low­ing year.

“I remember that Christmas Eve”

St. Johns­bury, Ver­mont, 24 Decem­ber 1918— I remem­ber that Christ­mas Eve. The Great War had end­ed on Armistice Day six weeks ago. John­ny Came March­ing Home, and with him my Dad, who had com­mand­ed a pla­toon in the mud of Flanders.

The first thing Dad had done when he got back was to buy a car he’d dreamed about for fif­teen years, since the first one seen chugged down Macon Street—a Packard. He couldn’t afford a new Twin Six. But the fam­i­ly doc­tor had ordered one, and Dad acquired his 3-38 Six—a hand­some run­about paint­ed emer­ald green and black. He cashed in every spare secu­ri­ty he owned, added an old life insur­ance pol­i­cy and a back­logged salary from Gen­er­al Pershing’s Army.

Doc’s old Six was still a beau­ty. With its gleam­ing paint set off by brass and nick­el, buff-col­ored artillery wheels and pin­stripes, it was sym­pho­ny in motion. You’d see it com­ing a mile away: the big, black, ox-yoke radi­a­tor flanked by enor­mous head­lights, with aux­il­iary lights built in under­neath, and an ele­gant brass “6” rid­ing the radi­a­tor cap…. —From my piece accom­pa­ny­ing Ken’s paint­ing, Autumn 1993.

How Eberts art jogged our memories

In the world of auto­mo­tive artists, Eberts ranked with the best. His amaz­ing eye for detail focused on art­ful­ly researched, nos­tal­gic scenes, plac­ing vin­tage motor­cars in their orig­i­nal set­tings. It was easy to con­jure up words to go with his work.

A co-founder of the Auto­mo­tive Fine Arts Soci­ety in 1983, Ken’s work adorned the pres­ti­gious Peb­ble Beach and Mead­ow Brook con­cours posters. His painstak­ing style can be found in scores of works shown by estab­lished gal­leries from coast to coast.

Over the years we had the fun of pub­lish­ing Ken’s Packard visions, for the mar­que that had spe­cial appeal to him. Back in 1991, we quot­ed a thought­ful sum­ma­ry of his artistry by William Jeanes, for­mer edi­tor-in-chief and pub­lish­er of Car and Dri­ver. In Ken’s mem­o­ry it is appro­pri­ate to quote those words again:

“His work has a deja vu qual­i­ty that may make you say to your­self, ‘I’ve been there before.’ The places are real, the cars are real, and the details of his set­tings are painstak­ing­ly accu­rate. Yet the moments nev­er actu­al­ly hap­pened. Or did they?”

They hap­pened, all right. Ken was a dear man whose work was inim­itable. No one dies as long as they are remem­bered. Ken’s noble art assures that he lives on in our hearts.

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“The Packard: The Ne Plus Ultra aof Auto­mo­tive House Organs,” Part 1 of a two-part arti­cle, 2021.

“One Brief Shin­ing Moment: Packard’s 1929-30 Speed­ster,” 2023.

“Packard Tales and Mem­o­ries of Bud Juneau,”  2021.

“Why Packard Failed: The Patri­cian and Its Rel­a­tives,” Part 1 of a two-part arti­cle, 2022.