These Are The Cars You Took To Your Prom

We may receive a commission on purchases made from links.

I spotted a group of teenagers this weekend at the local gas station clad in tuxes and sequined formal wear spilling out of some mom's Toyota Sequoia in what appeared to be a mission to find snacks and drinks. This scene will be playing out in gas stations and connivence stores across the country this month. Their chariot of choice, or forced upon them by parents, likely varied from daily drivers to riding high in a sweet limousine.

Whether it was prom, Grad (in Canada as I learned) or another formal coming-of-age celebration before entering an adulthood that's mostly parent-free, when I asked you about the car you took to prom, many of you arrived in style or some form of nostalgic cool that holds up well in our circles today. 

Some of you have some chill people in your life — parents, siblings, or friends were all too kind to throw you the keys to something that would impress your date(s) or friends. Take a look at the last rides our fellow commenters took to the final "party" of their adolescence, and the car that might have been a formidable experience on their own. 

... and I'm only slightly disappointed that not one of you included photos.

My first prom as a sophomore my mother's 88 Olds Cutless Ciera. My girlfriend was a junior.

Junior prom I drove over to Gainesville Fl. that Thursday night to borrow my cousins Mustang LX 5.0 who was attending University of Florida at the time with a very nice sound system. I gave up my 86 S10 with vinyl seats and rubber floor, not a fair swap for the weekend for him at least.

As for my senior prom I had just sold the S-10 a few weeks before prom and bought a new 91 Red Chevrolet Beretta GTZ w/3.1 v-6 tinted windows and had the red rims to match, later to be swapped out with a set of Ultra 5 Star alloy wheels, courtesy of my grandparents $1,000.00 gift for graduating high school.

My high school English teacher who also taught journalism captured my future wife and me and the car in the back ground and was on the front page of our school newspaper as we were entering prom.

From Here for the comments

My first car, a 1978 Mercedes 300CD (gift from grandfather) which I still drive today, though after it passed 786,000 miles 2 years ago, it spent almost a year being fully restored cosmetically and converted to electric.

and

1977 Mercedes 300D, and of course I ran it out of fuel on the way to pick up my date, and of course I didn't know that when you filled it from a gas can you had to work the little plastic manual pump thingee.

and

The nicest car I took was during my senior year where I took my mom's 2004 Mercedes E320. However the funniest one I took was a year or two before where I took my sister and brother-in-law's Pontiac G6 convertible!

From OuttaHere, Gabe Ets-Hokin, and HiVuhltage

1968 Plymouth Roadrunner (383/4 speed) in 1979. 8 MPG; gas was 37c per gallon.

From Don Cline

My parents let me take the Astrovan
My date had never seen such exquisite luxury

and

My mom's Chevy Tracker.

From JaredOfLondon and DiRF

First prom as a senior was a older Lincoln limo I shared with a few of my buddies. My 2nd prom on my girlfriends Senior year (following year) was my new 1994 Acura Integra GR-S Coupe.

and 

Mom's brand-new 1989 Acura Integra: 4-door hatch (5-door?), auto, white with a BLUE cloth interior. Awesome.

and

Class of 82. My dad's 82 Caddy Eldorado (stainless steel roof)

From SD 197, WeryPert1, and Robbie T

1973 – yes, I'm ancient – I drove my mother's '66 Ford Custom 500, a stripped-down sedan with no power steering or brakes and not a trace of style. At an after-party, I got it stuck in a ditch and a tractor had to pull us out. My date did not get home in time. Pretty much a fiasco.

From JimmieG

My 1976 Kawasaki KH500. The Legion Hall that was rented for our prom was less then a mile from home. Surprisingly I wasn't the only one who rode their bike there.

From IB007

Western Canada here. We go to "Grad" not Prom. Prom is very American. Anyway, I graduated in 1988 and went to Grad in a 1988 Lincoln Town Car. My dad rented it and had one of his friends dress up in a tux to act as our chauffeur for the night. It was tons of fun.

JohnnyWasASchoolBoy

If there is anything that movies from the 80's and 90's taught me, it was that when you are rich, you are driven around in a stretch limo. The limo scene from the movie "Big" stands out in my mind as the quintessential limo experience for fancy execs. I was in charge of transportation for my group of friends so, for one night, we were rich and, along with our dates, were driven around in a proper stretched Lincoln Towncar.

and

In the early 1980s, I had a rented Lincoln Town Car. I thought it was pretty sweet!

From ODDseth and Joe Stricker

I took my mom's bright red Mitsubishi Eclipse.. No, wait. It was a '92 Plymouth Laser. Not the RS or RS Turbo, but the base model and the first [maybe ever] car my mom ever bought new and was solely responsible for the payments. Considering my HS car was an '83 Nissan by Datsun Sentra 2-door, the Laser was a big step up. My girlfriend [of a year and a half] and I broke up just a week or two before Prom, so I almost didn't go, but every relationship got tangled right before that dance and at the last second I went with my friends ex after he cheated on her. It was purely platonic on our parts and it was actually a decent time, but man was it fraught with reality TV level drama! Class of '93, baby!

From m a t h e w

Sophomore, taking my Junior GF: 68 Mustang Fastback that I helped a neighbor work on. It was crap, but it was cool.

Junior: My GF's Dad's Miata, a 99 in the green.

Senior: My Best Friend's Dad's 750iL that I drove because he didn't trust his son to.

and 

E46 BMW- borrowed from dad. Peak early 00s with a built-in car phone option. It was a really nice car until by brother totaled it!

and

1967 Galaxie 500 2 door. Initially was my parent's, I bought it after mom got a 1974 Torino. Wasn't fast, didn't handle well, but it was a good cruiser. Got my first kiss in it.

and

My date's 1972 Super Beetle convertible. She let me drive it, so nice of her.

and

1994 — My gf's dad's Dodge Stealth

and

Older brother's '96 black Supra RZ (in '98).

From potbellyjoe, Neal Richards, Scourge of Richland, DieselOx, bootska and Keith Wojciech

My dad let me take his 1986 Corvette. Black with the 4+3. He'd been a race driver in the middle 60's campaigning Alfa Romeos and had taught my brother and I well. We both knew how to drive a stick since we were 11, and he also taught us that, before you could be fast, you had to be smooth. We paid attention.

So every single one of the girls I'd asked had turned me down, and no one had asked Charlene, so we decided to combine forces. We had the cummberbund-and-bow tie color coordinated with her dress (pink because 1991) and I picked her up at her house in the rain. Off we went to Villa Olivia in Bartlett.

All was well until I took the off-ramp. I spoke the language of drifting pretty well (thanks Dad) and the slick pavement beckoned. I left it in second and drifted the entire 270 degrees, oblivious to the fact that she was screaming her head off the whole time since I couldn't hear it over 5.7 liters of bellowing small block. She was furious and told me to let her out at the next stop. I begged her to reconsider, since we were less than a mile from the venue. She threatened to start kicking the dashboard with her spike-heeled shoes and I gave in.

No one had a cell phone in 1991, even rich parochial-school kids, so I pulled into a gas station and waited while she called her dad from a pay phone. She stayed in there while she waited, and soon Daddy came and got her in his new Lexus and I went to the prom stag.

Worth it.

From ChironRocket3