Welcome

First off the bat let me give you a little background info on myself. Currently I'm employed as an Assistant Executive Chef at Rock Lane Resort In Branson Missouri. But my true calling in life and what I had done for over 28 years is building and restoring cars.

To be more specific, my true passion is the First Generation or 1967-1969 Camaro. My first car that I ever owned (I was 13 at the time) was a 1957 Bel Aire Custom Coupe that I paid a whopping $150.00 for in 1969. The car was a complete and total basket case. The interior was only half complete, it had a 283 that had seen better days and the non origional 4 speed tranny was held up by a broom stick.

For a kid my age at the time I was very lucky, my father owned a customizing shop and I had worked there since I was 5 years old. So not only did I have the talent to rebuild the 57 but I had a steady income that wasn't to shabby even for guys twice my age. So 3 years and $13,000 later (and 13 grand was a heck of alot of money then) I owned a custom 57 complete with full 12 point cage, custom pearl white and pearl turquoise tuck and roll interior, tilt nose front end, tubbed rear end so the m/t n-50-15's would fit in the body attached to a narrowed camaro rear end fronted by a 64 chevy 409 punched 60 over and fitted with 12.5 to 1 venolia flat tops, full roller cam setup, topped off with a jimmy 671 with a hilborn injection system (engine courtesy of Dyers Speed Shop located just outside of Chicago).

I painted the car to match the interior it was pearl white lacquer over pearl turquoise lacquer with flip flop added to the pearl and topcoated with a clear urethane, you could read the headlines from a newspaper 10 feet away. After getting my Illinois drivers liscense my dad and I flat bedded the 57 to Union Grove in Wisconsin or US 30 Drag Strip in Indiana every weekend. After the first couple of shake down passes I finally had a name for the car:

SHAKE RATTLE and RUN

Track officials thought that the car was to pretty to run so they convinced me to enter it in a car show. The first show that I entered happened to be the World Of Wheels show in december of 1973 in Chicago, a four star show. My 57 took 1st for Best Street Custom, 1st for Best Street Engine and 2nd for Viewers choice award. Talk about shocked. That's all it took, I was hooked. After I graduated I decided to enter the Navy and after much hard work and training I became a S.E.A.L.. I purchased my first Camaro in 1975 while I was home on leave, it was a 1968 SS/RS complete w/hideaway headlights, purchase price = $500.00. I won't get into how I got the car so cheap (it was a little underhanded) but the car was complete down to the origional SS hubcaps. I left the service in 1978 and I went into my dad's auto body business as a partner. During the Summer and fall I worked in the shop full time but during the winter and spring every week I was off to a show some where in the US.

My second Camaro was also a 1968 Camaro but it was a straight SS, but this one not only was a California car (no rust) but it was a convertible as well and also complete, purchase price = $1500.00. Oh by the way did I mention that it had only 1189 ORIGIONAL MILES!!! I ended up trading that 68 to Nickey Chevrolet in Chicago for a 1964 impala SS w/409 and a 1968 Impala Convertible w/454 6 months later. I sold both of those cars for a tidy sum and bought 8 more Camaros, 3 came from private owners and the other 5 were from the back lines at car dealerships and the highest paid for any of the 5 was $500.00.

My last Camaro (until recent history) I bought was in 1980, it was a 1967 convertible SS w/tilt wheel and a 350/350hp, backed up by a muncie rock crusher, a/c, ps, pb and deluxe interior. After getting out of the body shop business I moved from Chicago to Branson MO, talk about culture shock, it was like going back in time 50 years. I went around to Body shops in the area and found out that the current pay rate was about 6 times less that what I was making in Chicago as an owner of a shop. I went to work at a boat repair shop where my skills in steel repair and fiberglass repair not only came in handy but earned me $6.00 per hour (WOW).

So here it is 18 year later, I'm 42 in a different career field (started 8 years ago) and in the beginning throws of a mid-life crisis, so what do I do ? Why, go out and get another Camaro of course!!!!!!!! Why not start out life anew with something you like to do!!!!

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