rare4k
02-23-2014, 09:50 PM
My father had a 1967 Plymouth Satilite conv. that caught fire and the insurance gave him a check for the car. He went to all the dealerships in the greater Hannibal MO area and couldnt find anything he wanted. Looked all over the lots and nothing caught his eye. Salesman told him there was a car in the service bay they just got on a trade in he might like. Dad went in and saw this one up on the lift and knew that he had found his car. I dont know what they were doing to it, or really too much after that (this was in late '69, early '70). I do know that my Dad had a small block, small journal that he loved twisting to high RPM's in it and he talked about it often. My father worked on the railroad and was gone for days, sometimes weeks at a time. Fall of '75 he did a head swap and put water in it as a short term coolant. He went to work and something messed his days on/days off schedule and he couldnt make it home before the temp outside dropped and that resulted in a cracked block. It sat in our gargage the entire time I was growing up collecting dust. Dad died in '01 and my uncle wasted no time snatching the car out of the garage and taking it to his storage after we chose to make him Executor of Dads Estate. He proceeded to do many things that upset us children and long story short the kids and the uncle got into a knock down drag out over this car. We poured through endless pages of probate law until we found out that this car was legally (and rightfully) ours. We then re-snatched the car from our uncles storage after we got the letter from the probate lawyer stating we now owned it. And its been sitting still, not running for another decade+. We had lotsa plans for installing an LS motor, until last week when we realized just what we have. Now the challenge has escalated and will be much more difficult, and we have absolutly no plans of building a trailer queen. Dad wanted this car driven and as far as his children are concerned thats what will happen. may not be numbers matching, or strictly L78, but it will be a 396/375 and it will be period correct. Some people may not agree with that, but it is what it is.