Cover Feature: By Daniel J. Linss that was located in Moss Landing, one town over from their current location in Castroville, where they moved to in 1989. Starting out as a 3-acre site, the operation now covers 26 acres and has several divisions, including a recycling center, a scrap yard, an aggregate plant, a fabrication shop, and a truck yard, just to name a few. George Silva died in 2000 at the age of 86 years old, but Stan Sr., who had run much of the business since the beginning, had no problem taking the reins, because he had been the leader all along. Stan Sr. always worked hard, and Stan Jr., who was born in 1965, did not see his father much while growing up. In the 1970s and 80s the company got heavily into demolition work, and that created a lot of growth. Stan Sr. would work in the yard all day and then drive truck all night, hauling scrap or demolition debris, and moving equipment between sites. Before A&S started, Stan Sr. hauled logs and wood chips, and Stan Jr. can remember going out with his dad in the 1958 Peterbilt he drove when he was only three or four years old. In 1974, the company bought a brand-new day cab Peterbilt 359 with a short hood, and that became Stan Sr.’s everyday driver (the company still has this truck, and Stan Jr. plans to rebuild it soon). At 15 years old, Stan Jr. began driving a roll-off truck locally before he even got his license. Once he turned sixteen he got his Class 1 license and started hauling scrap, pulling a 40’ trailer with metal sides with his dad’s 1974 Peterbilt 359. The trailer did not dump, so it had to be unloaded with a giant magnet hooked to a crane. During his senior year of high school, he was able to get out early each day, and from there he went straight to work – in fact, most days, he drove his work truck to school. Driving a 1979 Peterbilt 352 cabover roll-off truck with a 430 Detroit, he hauled scrap and concrete debris from a nearby demo job until it got dark. Then, in 1984, after graduating from high school, he started driving his dad’s Peterbilt full-time. It’s been said that one man’s trash is another man’s treasure, and if that statement is true, Stan Silva Jr. (60) of Castroville, CA and his family have been dealing with “treasure” for over five decades. In this case, the treasure would be scrap metal, demolition debris, and all other sorts of recyclable products, including aggregates, which can also be used over and over again. The Silva family was recycling long before it was cool, necessary, and perhaps even legally mandated! And although this home built hot rod featured here wasn’t made from scrap or trash, it was creatively put together using a variety of different years and models of Peterbilt trucks, in the early 1990s, making it a “rad ride” that was way ahead of its time. Stan “Buddy” Silva Jr. is one of four “Stans” in the Silva family, which includes his late father (Stan Silva Sr.), his son, Stan “Lil’ Buddy” Silva III, and his young grandson, Stanley Silva IV, sometimes affectionately referred to as “Cuatro” (which is Spanish for 4) by Stan’s mother. In this story, to avoid some confusion, “Stan” will always refer to Stan Silva Jr., unless otherwise noted. With a large scrap metal, demolition, heavy haul and aggregate operation with multiple locations, the Silva family has worked hard to make their mark and take care of each other. Growing up in the heyday of trucking and truck shows – the 1980s and early 1990s – Stan fell in love with hot rods and cool trucks, and the truck he built seen here is a testimony to that love. But the Silva family goes back much further than that – about 100 years back, in fact. The Silva family, which included Stan’s great grandfather and his brothers, immigrated to the United States in the late 1800s from the Azores, a group of islands that were part of Portugal, located in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, about 800 miles west of Portugal’s mainland. Settling in the Watsonville and Salinas area of northern California, near the coast and Monterey Bay, the family became dairy farmers, like so many other immigrants from that area. Fast forward a few decades and to the next generation, and Stan’s grandfather George, while working at a landfill in nearby Prunedale, CA, saw a lot of metal just being thrown away and got the bright idea to start a recycling and scrap business. With help from his son, Stan Silva Sr., George and his wife’s family formed A&S Metals in 1969 – the “A” was for the Ash family, and the “S” was for the Silva family. In 1974, they bought out the Ash side of the business but kept the name the same. In those days, the business was a wrecking yard and scrap metal operation 10 10-4 Magazine / March 2026 HOME BUILT HOT ROD
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