Thank you for a great show (for Rick&Lenora Stein)

[njsteve]

<span style="font-style: italic">To Bob and Vicky and everyone else who had a hand in the show,

Thanks for a great event and a wonderful way for the original owners of my SD455 to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary by reuniting with their long lost favorite car. This was their first vacation in eleven years and it has been thirty years since they last saw their old car. I posted the following over in the Pontiac section but in case you missed it, here it is again:
</span>



Well, we brought the car to the 2016 MCACN for Vintage Certification and a family reunion with the original owners Enrico &quot;Rick&quot; Stein and his wonderful wife Lenora Stein. They took their first vacation in eleven years to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary by reuniting with their old SD455 that they bought new and sold in 1986. To say they were excited would be the understatement of the year. The both got extremely verklempt when they first laid eyes on the car from across the room at MCACN. They stopped in their tracks with tears in their eyes. I had made up a little anniversary card for them with their &quot;then and now&quot; photos and placed it on the radiator support for them to see it when they got close to the car for the first time in 30 years since they sold it.

Here's the framed anniversary card:



And the happy couple:



And yes, both of them are still well over six feet tall. Here are the Steins replicating their first photos when the car was delivered back in 1973:

Note the height of the guys just behind them, for scale!





I have to say that the two of them are the nicest couple of folks you'd ever want to meet. Rick and Lenora hung out with the car for all of Saturday and then Rick took over the solo guard duty on Sunday. At 80 plus years of age, Rick has more energy than four twenty year olds. He was holding court the entire weekend discussing everything he knew about all sorts of musclecar topics, not just his old SD455. (he has a photographic memory). It was fun hearing the stories like how he lived just a mile or so from Joel Rosen's shop back in the heyday of Motion Performance. He also knew Donna May Mims from his road racing days in the 1960's.

When I say he has a photographic memory I am not exaggerating. Steve Shauger (the director of the Vintage Certification program) was awesome when he presented the Steins with their own duplicate plaque with the SD455's award on it. Rick thanked Steve and then examined the plaque for only a second and blurts out: &quot;Hey, you got a typo in the VIN!&quot; We were all flabbergasted - Does anyone else out there think that when they are 80+ years old, that they will be able to remember the VIN of a car they owned 43 years earlier? Steve promptly printed him out a corrected copy and gave him a Vintage Certification Team offical shirt.

Rick and Lenora were also rather amazed at all the spectators who would come up and wish them a Happy Anniversary as they walked by. They were deeply touched. An as an added bonus, Rick was also photographed and interviewed by a number of media people including Kevin Oeste of V8-TV.





As for the car, the SD455 was awarded its Legend status with total of 2893.4 out of a possible 3007.7 points. If my math is correct, that is a 96.2% score. I have not been able to see the score sheets yet so I don't know what needs to be addressed for the future but I think that is pretty respectable for a first attempt.


Hopefully the presence of Rick and Lenora counted for an extra credit point or two in the tabulations.

[scuncio]

That is just as cool as anything I've read on this site.

[John]

.... That's the kind of stories that make this show so special [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/biggthumpup.gif[/img]

[Tenney]

Be tough to beat that score (too cool!). [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/burnout.gif[/img]

[ORIGLS6]

I walked past when Kevin was doing the interview. I ducked down and tried to scoot through without drawing attention but couldn't help noticing how tall he was compared to Kevin.
Great story. I hope they enjoyed their trip and their visit to MCACN.

[njsteve]

it was funny seeing them side by side since Kevin is around 6'2&quot;. He said that Rick reminded him of his late father who was a State Trooper and a grizzly bear sized man. You could see him getting a little misty eyed when he was talking about family with Rick.

The overwhelming reason I brought the car to the show this year was to get Rick and Lenora reunited with their car again. The Vintage Certification was just icing on the cake. I didn't ever get a real chance to walk around and see much of the other cars since I hung out with Rick the majority of the weekend, which was fine with me.

[RPOLS3]

That is awesome.

[KenMaisano]

What a amazing story. Its great to see that they are still healthy and could enjoy this very special day.
I also saw the car this weekend. I have always had a love for Super Dutys, and this one is very special.

Ken Maisano

[napa68]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: RPOLS3</div><div class="ubbcode-body">That is awesome. </div></div>

This^^^^^^^^^^

It was great to finally meet you Steve!

Tim

[njsteve]

Thanks. I think it should be mandatory for everyone to have their little name tags like a highschool reunion from now on. That way we can tell who's who at the show a lot easier since I have the worst memory when it comes to names. But I never forget a car!