Little update. Replaced the carb, and the distributor (bad vac advance) Engine runs great aside from a few minutes of smoke at startup probably valve stem seals. While we had it up on the lift I changed the transmission filter just for the heck of it. The old pan gasket was leaking bad so I didn't really have a choice. Anyway, the old filter was pretty bad and had caked up junk on it, but also was very fibrous so it probably wasn't really filtering anything to be honest. The new filter, which didn't let any kind of gunk or clutch material slip by would clog solid after driving up and down the road a few times causing it to not go into gear at all once parked. Wound up having to drop the pan where it was twice to clean the filter. Finally got fed up and against my better judgement, decided to just completely flush the transmission. Removed the return and just kept dumping fluid into it until it was clear. Welp, knock on wood I drove it 10 miles already and its been fine. Shifts thru all the gears real nice.
Now that its actually got some decent road time, the steering has a little too much slop for my liking. Back up on the lift and it looks like the slop is at the pitman arm so that's next on the list.