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Officially, I’ve been an automotive journalist since 2002. But it goes back much further. In order for you to know what kind of knucklehead your information is coming from, here’s the short version of who I am, what made me this way, and which cars I've chosen over the years. This may seem long, but trust me, it’s the condensed edition. I’m as much a product of of dumb luck as I am hard work. Grab a beer or cup 'o Joe. Let's go. 

Like many in this business, I was born loving cars. I'll admit, my obsession with automobiles and design has always been bit unhealthy. Growing up in Duluth, Minnesota, I distinctly remember judging the grille of a ’60s Ford Fairlane at age four. Negatively, I’ll add. I still stand by that assessment today.

Mattel Hot Wheels were my gateway drug. They were brand new when I was six. All my allowance money — and any spare change my parents carelessly left around the house — went to cars and orange plastic track. I enthusiastically sent drawings to Mattel suggesting new car designs and received a signed rejection letter from Ruth Handler herself. Wish I still had that.

My first truly educated car recommendation came in elementary school. I advised my teacher, Mr. Peterson, to buy a 1970 Plymouth Fury Sport wagon. Nerdy little me had already been reading Consumer Reports and Car and Driver in the library, so I was extremely confident in my endorsement. I’m sure he laughed off my chatter, but it ended up in his driveway. I believe it served his family well, though I moved on to junior high before anything catastrophic happened mechanically. So there’s that…

There’s no dull in Duluth. It was, and probably still is, a fabulous place for a kid to get into good trouble. When I wasn’t building model cars and writing my own music, I was playing with cameras. I believe life turns on a few hard points — some planned, others completely random. I’ve had eight in my life. The first came at East High School (go Cake Eaters!) when a teacher I didn’t know approached me and said, “I hear you’re into photography, Tom Voelk. Here’s a Nikon and three rolls of film. Take the weekend and show me what you’ve got.”

Apparently my artistic shots of water spraying from a garden hose and my S’cool Bus model kit impressed Mike Miernicki enough that he made me a photographer for the Birchlog yearbook. My career started there. So did the sharp decline in my GPA, since I spent way too much time hiding in the darkroom.

Thanks, Mern. You’re the best.

Money was tight growing up, so I worked at The Bellows restaurant on London Road to buy things like a Fender Rhodes electric piano and my coveted Schwinn LeTour 10-speed. One Saturday, CBS correspondent Charles Kuralt stopped in for lunch with his crew. He and the photographer graciously showed me the legendary RV from his “On the Road” segments. I can still hear Kuralt’s booming voice: “Guys, this kid’s initials are TV. You need to go into the biz, kiddo.”

Instead, my next job was at a carpet store where I made enough money to buy my first car, a used 1974 Mazda RX-4 sedan. I loved the car, but the job nearly killed me. Literally. An unloading mechanism in the freight zone hung up, causing enough tension in the cable to send a three-foot-long metal hook flying into me, catapulting my body 30 feet into rolls of linoleum. Barely conscious, the only thing I remember is assessing the ride quality of the ambulance as extremely rough.

After recovering, I remembered Mr. Kuralt’s sage advice and drove my Mazda down to KDLH and naturally applied for… a radio job. Hey, I was in a band and loved music. Fortunately, the interviewer noticed I had photography skills, and pointed me to the television side, wielding a studio camera for Scene 3 News. Perfect for college, since there was nothing to do between the 5 p.m. and 10 p.m. broadcasts except study while waiting for breaking news.

That boondoggle lasted maybe two weeks.

A news photographer called in sick, and the show producer was desperate for footage of city buses for some reason. After roughly ten minutes of training on a 16mm Cinema Products CP16 from chief photographer Ron Lund, I somehow managed to bring back usable footage. Oh, the irony — my first TV assignment involved moving vehicles.

My competence meant I was “promoted” to full-time news photographer, and my cushy paid study hall disappeared forever. This was Hard Point Two.

News was far more exciting than college. I met presidential hopefuls like John Anderson, Jerry Brown and Walter Mondale. Much of the “Miracle on Ice” 1980 Olympic hockey team came from northern Minnesota, and I covered their homecoming. Stuff like that leaves an impression on a 19-year-old kid. I was learning how the world worked and was getting paid for it.

That compensation, however, was lousy. I had to sell my beloved Mazda. I still miss it. I do not miss the unreliable 1972 Mercury Capri that replaced it. Next up was a ’73 Ford Country Squire wagon — yes, with the fake wood siding. Square to be sure, but it hauled my Rhodes piano and Kustom amp perfectly when gigging with my band, The Face Dogs. Yes, that was really the name.

Meanwhile, my formal education at the University of Minnesota Duluth was being shredded. Between the band, the job and a cute girlfriend, I had zero time to study. A guy has to prioritize.

Hard Point Three? While shooting a story at Sandstone Prison, a photographer from Minneapolis realized he’d left his camera battery in the car. I lent him one of my extras, saving him from another half hour through security. Good deeds pay off. Because of that favor, Ben McCoy helped me land a job at WCCO-TV a few months later. At age 20, I left UMD to become the youngest news photographer the station had ever hired.

Ben, my roommate and good friend, is the best director of photography I’ve ever known. His advice was a Harvard-grade education in visuals, if such a program existed. I watched with envy as he traded his Camaro Z28 for a brand-new 1982 Pontiac Trans Am while my budget could only support a Renault R5. And no, I refuse to call it a Le Car. Besides, I modified the suspension and did what I could to boost performance. “Boost” might be overselling it.

Eighteen months later, Ben headed to PBS Frontline and 60 Minutes. Serious stuff. For me, Hard Point Number Four was about to happen. Four weeks after a co-worker casually mentioned applying for a job in Seattle, Washington, it was me — not him — packing up a U-Haul and towing my newly purchased Mercury LN7 behind it.

Yes, I’m ashamed of that car too. In my defense, insurance rates on a VW Scirocco were astronomical for a 21-year-old male, and I genuinely believed the Ford EXP’s sibling would someday become collectible. I was young, okay? I’ve become more discerning.

Moving to Seattle was an impulsive career move bordering on reckless. In less than a month, I mailed out three audition tapes, drove to Seattle for interviews, gave my two-week notice from a 7-Eleven pay phone beneath the Space Needle, drove back to Minneapolis to pack, then returned to Seattle and started my new job 30 minutes after dropping off the U-Haul.

Whew.

I landed at KIRO-TV because the legendary KING-TV had no openings. I was 22, single, and Seattle’s grunge scene was just beginning. Since my kids may someday read this, I’ll simply say I had a blast. Wink. Wink. Also, I’m the perfect partner to play Six Degrees of Separation of Kevin Bacon since my career means I have met everyone from Prince to Bill Gates. And Kevin Bacon.

And then came Hard Point Five.

On my day off, I was called in to cover a man shooting at police from a burning house. I raced into KIRO on my new Honda Aero 125 scooter only to be told I was being reassigned. Instead of gunfire and flames, I was sent to the American Heart Association for an interview with a nutritionist about the fat labeling of hot dogs and cold cuts. Hard to make stuff like this up.

While tearing down my gear afterward and chatting with the very smart PR representative, I finally stopped being annoyed with the bait and switch, looked up through both bedhead and helmet hair at the rep and saw… my future wife. Mariko Kakiuchi.

I wish this kind of meet-cute for everyone. If there’s such a thing as love at first sight, it hit us both. Looking across the table on our first date, I thought, I’m going to marry this woman. Later, she admitted feeling the same. How smitten was I? When I dropped her off and my headlights illuminated her brown four-door Chevy Chevette, it didn’t faze this car guy in the slightest. She later admitted my Mercury LN7 was the dumbest car she’d ever seen. Can’t blame her.

While I’m mostly about automobiles, let me offer my best life advice: find a mate who’s practical, smart and full of humor. Mine is all of that and more. We’re polar opposites. She literally can’t discern a Jaguar from a Buick. And I’m lost identifying any kind of flower other than a tulip. Our union is like a bacon-and-peanut-butter sandwich: surprisingly awesome. Try it. You’ll see.

Back to cars. I was about to ditch the Mercury for a Honda Accord. KIRO’s wedding present to us was the ability to pick any Pontiac for 40% off MSRP (a weird fleet arrangement). We ended up with a V6-equipped 1987 Grand Am SE sedan, fully intending to sell it a year later for more than we paid. Turns out it was among the best cars I ever owned.

We reluctantly sold it after our second kid came into the world, moving to the first of four Volvo wagons, starting with an 850. Each of them was totaled through no fault of ours.

The 850 was hit by a semi. Mariko and the kids walked away. The second, a V70 with a terrible transmission, was mercifully euthanized by a hit-and-run driver while parked. A Subaru ran a red light and totaled the first of two Cross Countrys my son drove. The second one was rear-ended at speed by a Ford F-250 in stop-and-go traffic on Interstate 5. We finally decided Volvo wagons were bad luck and downsized to a 2012 Kia Soul that we still own. Gas and oil are all it’s needed over 14 years.

Backing up a bit, nearly every year of my TV career, I convinced whatever station I worked for to let me produce an automotive special, and they always scored high ratings. When I eventually made it to my dream station, KING-TV, in 1987, I expanded those specials into bigger productions, traveling to Detroit and Los Angeles to interview engineers and designers. I was primarily a photographer/editor, but I’d worked alongside brilliant reporters for years, so I knew what questions to ask and how to cobble together a solid script.

But spelling eluded me. I had the audacity to pitch Car and Driver the concept of producing a video version and I spelled "both" as "bolth" probably a dozen times. At least I was consistent. 

Finally making decent money, I bought a brand-new 1990 Mazda Miata, one of the first in the Pacific Northwest. My desire for a convertible sports car in drizzly Seattle did not align with pragmatic Mariko’s philosophy, and she made me promise to keep the “foolish toy” until, and I quote, “your unborn children graduate from college.”

Fast-forward a decade and those now-born children (Hard Point Six) were heading to school together in a two-seat convertible. I may not have been the most responsible father, but apparently, I was a fun one. I walked in home from work to find my daughter Maya explaining to the lovely and charming Mariko how she and Sean would play a game where they ducked whenever Maya randomly yelled “Police!” Mariko became significantly less charmed and ordered the Mazda sold.

But wait — I realized we had entered into an agreement. The kids wouldn’t graduate from college for another 17 years or so, and I’m a man of my word. Even though transporting my children in a tiny convertible was, admittedly, a questionable parenting decision.

I promised to buy a cheap, practical car for school runs if I could keep the MX-5. That became a low-mileage two-door Ford Focus with a five-speed manual. Turns out the seller, Des Toups, did some work with Microsoft’s MSN Autos. As we talked cars, he suddenly asked, “Do you get press cars for reviews?”

I had no clue that was a thing. At that moment, I’m pretty sure I heard angels singing.

My show producer, Mark Erskine, loved the idea of car review segments. But our host refused to front them, being an automotive luddite. Mark shrugged and said, “Get a haircut, Voelk, and put on a clean shirt. A trained monkey can be on camera.”

Thus Driving Northwest was born. Hard Point Seven. That Ford Focus spent years sitting unused because I always had a press car to drive.

The TP Trunk Test happened completely by accident. My first test vehicle was an Audi A4 Cabriolet. While shopping at Costco, two packs of bath tissue somehow ended up on the honey-do list, and I shot the giant bundles wedged into the trunk as a joke. Mark immediately realized it was a standardized cargo measurement system. When I called Costco corporate to ask permission to keep doing it, a guy named Jim answered and casually approved the idea. Turns out that “Jim” was the Jim — Jim Sinegal, one of Costco’s founders.

Hard Point Eight: The New York Times.

After years of fun with Driving Northwest, KING’s programming director — who hated “my little car videos” — killed the franchise. By then, the digital era was beginning, so I invested in myself, buying $10,000 worth of gear, renaming the segment Driven and producing it independently. Pretty stupid, since digital didn’t pay in those days. 

Fortunately, a producer named Ann Deary called completely out of the blue asking to license the segments from KING. Turns out one of her editors stumbled across my Mazda5 review on Blip.tv (there’s a name from the digital tar pits). I didn’t even know she was with The New York Times until the end of the phone call. Two weeks later, I was sitting in the NYT cafeteria drinking espresso with Ann, Norman Meyerson and Jim Cobb.

Never in a million years did I imagine working for a newspaper, let alone The New York Times. And yes, I’ll admit it: hearing “Welcome to The New York Times, Tom” ranks right up there with my wedding day and the birth of my children. Allow me that shallowness.

During my first run with The Times, I wanted to write firsthand about the electrification of the automobile. EVs were way out of my budget and, while researching the price of Chevrolet’s plug-in hybrid Volt, I checked into its sister, the Cadillac ELR for grins. This car was a spectacularly beautiful failure, Ferrari rare, selling only 2,860 copies in three years. GM was practically giving them away. Because car guys like weird vehicles, I ended up with a new $82,000 car for 35 grand after the federal tax credit. And my non-car-loving spouse liked the powertrain concept so much she bought a second-generation Volt.

More recently, you might know I picked up a 2021 CPO Porsche Taycan 4S. It’s a dream car for me since I was lucky enough to be somewhat embedded in its journey from Mission E concept to production car. For me, it’s kind of the ultimate souvenir. Plus, I’m using it to show people that EVs might be the best vehicles they can buy. But dang, I really need to sell a car or two.

Still with me? Let me close with this: in my car/career/family/life journey, I’ve found that good karma happens when compromising as little as possible. There’s real joy in doing things properly. Doing the right thing might not pay off immediately, but it lays a strong foundation. I’ve been fortunate enough to create meaningful work with talented people. It always takes a team. Surround yourself with folks smarter than you. Learn from them. Martin Campbell and Rob Callero have sacrificed many early Saturday mornings helping me shoot running footage so viewers can actually see cars in motion.

Awards and plaques are nice. The dozens I’ve somehow accumulated are more than my fair share. Those are not why I keep chipping away at my craft. I believe people need purpose — something to keep us curious and sharp. I get to combine my love of cars, design, engineering, photography, writing and editing to help people choose the right car, truck or SUV. It’s what makes me happy to get out of bed every morning.

So get out there and find your bliss, whether it’s automobiles, travel, food, art or whatever. It’s good for the soul. It’s why I’ll keep on keeping on. Hope you find my work useful. Because I genuinely love doing it. TV