Point distributors, wow, I haddn thought about those in a while, carburetors either for that matter. Can't say I miss either of 'em much, but ... with a pair of flat blade screwdrivers, a 1/2 X 9/16" distributor wrench and a matchbook cover you could set everything to do with the fuel and ignition systems, unless you had a Chevy, which required an allen wrench too

Adjusting the timing advance on the fly from inside the car was a neat trick for old school hot rodders. When playin with carbs even the humidity and ambient temperature could be slightly compensated for that way without havin to pop the hood. 'Course tweakin the mixture slightly was also kinda important for those who always wanted all the HP they could wring out.

Back before crank triggered ignitions were common I designed one for an old 2.3 Ford I had by guttin a reluctor wheel style distributor, choppin the wheel into into segments and had a machinist cut slots for 2 segments in the crank pulley, then used the pickup coil mounted on a bracket to trigger an MSD ignition, then also had the MSD timing advance module inside for adjustment. Worked like a champ.

Good Times