Okay heres two for the record books. I am 48 years old. I was 15 in 1974 when one of my older brothers told me about his girlfriends - brothers 1968 big block Camaro for sale for $1,500.00. The car had spun a bearing and was sitting in a huge car port in the back of the house where it could not be seen from the road near Annapolis MD. I did not have the money or the income to purchase the car at that time and bought insted a 1966 big block Super Sport Chevelle for $500.00 that had tilt wheel, power brakes and steering and 4 speed trans with 4.88 12 bolt posi rear. That car was fun, but back to the Camaro. My brother married that girl and the Camaro just sat for a while. Every now and again I would see Tommy, ( the guy that owned the car ) and I would ask him if I could buy it now. Him and his dad had a terrible fight sometime after Tommy graduated from school and had not spoken for many years. The car was a high school graduation present for Tommy. It is a stripper Super Sport with no power steering or brakes and only had the gauge package with console and the chrome trim option. It is a light shade of blue with blue interior and of course the 325 horse 396 in the engine bay. Over the years I have worked on cars for Tommy and always ask him if he would sell me the Camaro. His standard reply was the car belongs to his dad and its up to him to decide what to do with it. So the cars sat and sat with the motor out and taken apart for many many years (33 years). At least it was in a car port, but it was not covered up and the elements took some toll on the machine. Fast forward to last year about this time. My brother calls and said Tommy's dad died and the Camaro is for sale. He ask me what it worth and I said I would be willing to pay $10,000.00 sight unseen for it. I currently own, ( for 27 years ) an original paint 68 RS Z/28 and a 69 Z11 Big Block Indy Pace Car, ( 25 years ) along with a Super Pro 63 Chevy II drag race car and just picked up a "barn find" 69 GTO convertible ( 100% original and numbers matching Madator red with black top and black interior ) that needs a complete restoration. My brother told me he thinks he could get the car for $2000.00 so I told him I would give him $10,000.00 for it. A couple of days later he calls and said he has the car. I ask what it took to buy the car and he said "he just gave it to me". I said some cuss words and ask what his plans for the car were, ( he has had some nice cars in the past but always sold them off ). He paid a guy to do a "restomod" on the car, Not much from stock, but I wold have restored it to original. The car is pretty and has won some awards for the paint. It has about 40,000 miles on the car. I told my brother that he is so lucky. I worked many long and tough hours and sacrificed so much to be able to buy and keep the cars that I own. He has a college degree and is an electrical engineer. Me, I am just a auto mechanic and make about 1/4 of the wages he makes but he gets a car like that for free. And heres another one for the record books. I know a guy, one of the customers at the shop that Married a local girl. She had a brother that had a Corvette. Not just any Corvette though. This car is a Maroboro Maroon 1967 427 cubic inch coupe car. He died of cancer in 1971. The car sat in a barn near here for many years and no one even gave it a thought. It was stolen a few years ago and recovered. The family did not even know it was gone!! The police officer is a friend of mine and a different brother, I have 5 brothers. Well anyway the officer ask if we could find the confidential serial numbers on this car to identify the car. We went and looked at the car and my brother says " I know this car " and sure enough its the car that belonged to the fellow that died in 1971 and we know the family. We go to the house with the officer to talk to them and tell them we have their car at the shop and they say " we don't own a Corvette ". The mother is a little old lady now and says yes you do its Jimmy's old car. When the fellow had died the parents put the title in their daughters name and stored it at the farm. So heres this guy that knows nothing about cars and he gets a free 1967 427 Corvette with a great color and the holy grail of motors. He says he don't know what to do with the thing. He did not want to offend the family by selling it so now it sits in his garage at their house. Every now and again he calls me to drive it and service the thing. I have talked him into driving it some now and he is amazed at the attention people pay to the thing. I would never wish harm to anyone but I sure wish someone would give me a rare machine like these two that I personally know of. Oh, and my brother also won a Corvette in a raffel once a few years ago. And they say hard work pays. I say bull, luck pays a lot better, just ask my 14 year old son who will get the GTO when I get it done.
