Classic American April 2015

1960 Riva Tritone Speciale

1959 Eldorado Biarritz The UK’s Number 1 for 27 years

www.classic-american.com

1973 Ford Galaxie 500

1974 Ford Gran Torino

MOD RO DED NO

LE !

T T LI ED

DDE T D!

AND

R

THE HISTORY OF APRIL 2015 288 1972 Dodge Challenger

1961 Chevrolet Corvette

58

45 39

33 63 22

Contents April 2015

Regulars

Features

06 12 14 16 18 20 30 56 84 87 90 92 94 100 103 107 111 122

22 ’74 Ford Torino & ’73 Ford Galaxie 33 1964 Pontiac Grand Prix 39 1930 Cadillac 45 1959 Cadillac Eldorado & Riva Tritone Speciale 53 1961 Chevrolet Corvette 58 1972 Dodge Challenger 63 The Hurst Story 69 Discoveries Road Trip 76 Arizona Concours 81 Project Pony 121 Tex Trubshaw

News Letters Muscle Car Files Across the Pond From Here to Obscurity Subscription Offer Classic American Shop Back Issues Scale Autos Discoveries Reviews Club & Events News Events & Cruises Ad Gallery Drive Buy Service Directory Private Classifieds Next Month &Credits

69

53

classic-american.com 5

22 classic-american.com

’74 G

Words ran To Photo : Mike Ren rino & ’7 graph 3 Ga y: Gar aut laxie ry Stu 500 art

Content with owning one of the best Dave Starsky Gran Torino replicas ever built, Sam Greer then realised there was space in his garage for Ken Hutchinson’s 1973 Galaxie 500 too…

A

ny kid growing up in Seventies Britain was probably influenced by the steady diet of American car-chase-filled TV shows. Sam Greer certainly was and it’s pretty obvious which one was his favourite programme. “The excitement of those American cop shows never left me,” admits Sam. “Aged 10, I’d play at being Starsky and Hutch with my friends and later when I joined the Air Force I went into special investigation.” Even today Sam is still involved in the detection business as the MD of a private surveillance and investigation company, but the idea of getting his own Starsky and Hutch car didn’t occur until his wife Grainia gave him a DVD of the more recent Starsky and Hutch film in 2004.

“I was on the internet the next day looking for a 1974-1976 Ford Gran Torino,” remembers Sam. “Getting it was my first experience of owning or driving a classic and it scared me – the car was so much bigger than I realised. But it was also exactly as I remembered it from the television show.”

Sam befriended other Starsky and Hutch fans and one of them – a fellow enthusiast called Calum Anderson – owned a 1974 Gran Torino that was done to a high standard by another expert, Brent Williams of Indiana.

This Torino had been built to look exactly like one of the cars used in the 1975/76 TV series – various Torinos were used throughout the show and some had subtle differences. Supposedly, this one was the first completely accurate Starsky and Hutch replica built. ❯❯

classic-american.com 23

Nothing is ever as simple as it seems. We spotted this stunning 1964 Pontiac Grand Prix in the line-up at the Portlaoise car show in Ireland, but it took nearly a year before we found ourselves in Youghal, County Cork to finally meet up with Hugh McEvoy to talk about his car‌

1964 Pontiac Grand Prix Words & Photography: Ian Shipley

W

“THE FACT THAT THIS CAR SPENT THE FIRST 42 YEARS OF ITS LIFE IN ARIZONA AND CALIFORNIA IS REFLECTED IN THE CONDITION OF THE METALWORK. BOTH THE CHASSIS AND BODY ARE COMPLETELY ROT FREE AND HAVE NEVER BEEN WELDED.”

Owner: Hugh McEvoy.

Room for a couple of golf bags... or bodies!

Desirable: Pontiac’s Aluminium 8-lug wheels.

hen people hear the term Grand Prix these days, they tend to think of very sleek arrow-like cars doing excessive speeds around an F1 circuit.

However, back in 1964, the term Grand Prix was more than likely to be found on cars such as this, with dimensions more akin to a full-size grand tourer than an F1 car.

There’s loads of information available on cars when you come to buy a used modern car nowadays: mileage, insurance write-offs, whether HPI is outstanding and so on.

What’s not listed are the personal details of the owners of the car, although thankfully this is not the case usually with classic and vintage cars; most have a lot of records of their previous owners – who, when, where and how long – along with other details. This Pontiac is no exception.

This two-door sport coupe is as good an example of a Pontiac Grand Prix that you are likely to find this side of the Atlantic and is part of the wave of personal luxury cars that flooded the American market from Detroit in the midSixties. It’s a ‘full size’ car using the B Body Platform. It was built for the 1964 model year and rolled off the line on November 21, 1963, at the General Motors South Gate plant, Los Angeles, California.

This model only ran in production from 1962-1968.

Upon leaving the factory it went to a dealership in Glendale, Arizona, called Mecham Pontiac. It was from here that the car’s first owner purchased the car. Amazingly, he kept the car for about 37 years (what are the chances of that with a new car today?) and by all accounts rarely used it. Apparently he drove it twice a week to the nearest town to see his sister; a fact that was later to be confirmed by a later owner during a discussion with the original dealership.

In about 2001, the first owner, who was then an elderly gentleman, sold it to Dennis Christensen from California.

Dennis restored the car over a two year period and spent over $14,000 during this time of which $4000 went on a new interior. The money spent on the tri-tone blue and parchment interior really shows, the restorer having the original cream parchment panels inserted into new twotone blue seat covers and the matching door panels with their vertically ribbed parchment vinyl either side of the blue centre panels.

PERFORMANCE

SHIFTING

WITH THE TIMES The history of Hurst is a chequered one, although its indisputable success has been down to one man’s hard work and efforts to produce the best shifters known to man. Jim Maxwell salutes George Hurst and his legendary products…

B

1967. Bill Campbell on the left and George Hurst.

Hurst

Words: J Persormanc ames Ma e xwell

y the mid-Sixties the name ‘Hurst’ was an important one, highly revered by drag racers and hot rodders from around the world.

George Hurst made his mark in the industry with his shifters and before that he had a real hands-on background in the engine conversion and speed parts business while operating out of his home in the late Fifties. He served in the Navy as a radioman, signing up at age 16; a very patriotic individual, he later went on record as crediting much of his business success to having served his country.

His automotive career started out with a two-bay garage where he installed Cadillac engines into Lincoln Continentals. “Years ago I built my garage business to the point where people were driving from New York to Philadelphia to have work done,” said George of his early years before the shifters and fame that came with them. “They sat in my living room while I tuned their cars. The work was right, it was guaranteed.”❯❯

classic-american.com 63

This four-wheel-drive Oldsmobile 4-4-2 exhibition car promoted the drivetrain of the FWD Olds Toronado and also provided a lot of publicity for Hurst.

The original Hemi Under Glass was created as a concept on a bar napkin between George Hurst and Hot Rod Magazine’s Ray Brock.

George Hurst knew ‘sex sells’, but did it with a classy presentation.

Sales success Besides just the nuts-and-bolts aspect of the engine swap business, he really understood marketing and research and in the same interview explained how he learned about his customer base and what their desires were for parts and equipment: “While waiting, I had them fill out a questionnaire. What did they use their cars for? What kind of gas did they burn? What was their average turnpike speed?... I asked them everything. Know what they said? ‘This guy is really interested in me’. And because they were made to feel important, they came back.”

After a few years of producing VW Bus bumper extensions, it was ‘sink or swim’ for the company when Volkswagen started adding them at the factory. There were plenty of hard times along the way. Brock Yates caught up with George Hurst in 1965 and interviewed him and learned a bit about the struggles early on: “I came from nowhere and I’m not afraid to admit it. It wasn’t easy, and it still isn’t.” He told of a cold, grey winter day when he was out making sales calls in his battered ’56 Chevy that had no heater (and a lot of holes in the flooring) and he was about to begin a cross-country trip to sell his wares.

“I damn near froze to death, I stuffed dirty clothes in the holes to keep out the cold. That’s how bad it was. Once in the Midwest, I was entering a turnpike and the signs said ‘Chicago and West’ and ‘Cleveland and East’. I sat there for a few minutes fighting the temptation to turn east and give the whole thing up. No one will ever know how close I came…”

64 classic-american.com

Early Hurst ‘Beware’ decal.

Hurst was able to generate some $100,000 worth of orders on that trip from speed shop; the products at that time were engine swap motor mounts. It was at this time that the colour gold became a trademark for the Hurst brand.

“We used to paint the mounts red, but it wouldn’t dry quickly enough before shipment,” George recalled. “So we changed to gold.”

Next the idea of converting the sloppy and difficult ‘speed shift’ column shifters on cars of the day to floor shifters caught on quickly. The factory-stock ‘spaghetti’ linkage wasn’t all that great for racing applications either, so George and his assistant Bill Campbell (who later became an equal partner) came up with a much superior design for floor shifting that allowed for precise, fast shifts, and that was very durable.

The very first design in the beginning stages had the signature curved, flat-shaped chromed shifter lever with, at first, a ‘yo-yo’ type handle, then later the white-hued ‘cue-ball’ round handle was added and changed the automotive world forever.

Installing a high-quality shifter to a drag car or highperformance street car was not only for quicker straight-line performance, but also to save on missed shifts. Here’s how writer Alex Walordy summarised the Hurst shifter in a 1967 story: “Not all stick shifts are created equal and with some of them, changing gears is like trying to spear fish in muddy water. The man with the zappy, highrpm engine who knows that a missed shift spells a new set of valves thinks in terms of something more reliable. Would you believe a Hurst?”

Hurst Performance entered the wheel business from 1965 to 1969, and its wheels were beautiful and strong. The only size was 14 x 6in and at first was called ‘Dazzler’; however,

On sale: April 16

Next

Month 1970 Plymouth Superbird 1963 Oldsmobile Dynamic 88

1958 Cadillac

Selling the ’67 Buicks Discoveries Road Trip

Elvis’ Caddy

Ken Block’s AWD Mustang

2001 Corvette

EDITOR

PUBLISHER

MARKETING MANAGER

ARCHIVE ENQUIRIES

Ben Klemenzson bklemenzson@mortons.co.uk

Julie Brown

Charlotte Park cpark@mortons.co.uk

DESIGN

DIVISIONAL ADVERTISING MANAGER

PUBLISHING DIRECTOR

Jane Skayman jskayman@mortons.co.uk Tel: 01507 529423

Michael Baumber CONTRIBUTORS

Sue Keily skeily@mortons.co.uk

Huw Evans, Richard Coney, Steve Havelock, Will Shiers, Matt Richardson, Paul Bussey, Nigel Boothman, Mike Renaut, Richard Heseltine, Rob Woodall, Paul Trunfull, Tony Oksien, Steve Havelock, BK Nakadashi, Garry Stuart, Ian Shipley, Keith Harman, Gerald Guetat, Henri Thibault, Jim Maxwell

ADVERTISING

SENIOR SUB-EDITOR

Steve O’Hara

Dan Sharp

122 classic-american.com

Sophie Brown slbrown@mortons.co.uk Tel: 01507 529416 Nicole Appleyard nappleyard@mortons.co.uk 01507 529576 SUBSCRIPTION MANAGER

Paul Deacon CIRCULATION MANAGER

Dan Savage

SUBSCRIPTION

Independent publisher since 1885

WEBSITE

Full subscription rates (but see page 20 for offers): (12 months 12 issues, inc post and packing) – UK £52.80. Export rates are also available – see page 20 for more details. UK subscriptions are zero-rated for the purposes of Value Added Tax.

Having trouble finding a copy of this magazine?

www.classic-american.com

DISTRIBUTION

Why not just ask your local newsagent to reserve you a copy each month

COMMERCIAL DIRECTOR

Nigel Hole EDITORIAL ADDRESS

CLASSIC AMERICAN MAGAZINE, PO Box 99, Horncastle, Lincs LN9 6LZ

BACK ISSUES & PRIVATE ADS

01507 529529 24hr answerphone, help@classicmagazines.co.uk www.classicmagazines.co.uk

COMAG, Tavistock Road, West Drayton, Middlesex UB7 7QE. Telephone 01895 433600 PRINTING

William Gibbons & Sons Wolverhampton

Member of the Professional Publishers Association

ON SALE DATE NEXT ISSUE April 16

© Mortons Media Group Ltd. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage retrieval system without prior permission in writing from the publisher.