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Old 03-05-2020, 11:32 AM
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Default Finding former owners - a good read

This is an email that I just received from an old friend. He and I collected Corvettes together for years before moving on to Camaros (and other makes). He taught me a lot about the tenacity that it takes to find the history of cars. My feeling is that former owners (with contact info) are great documentation for rare cars. It's important to get agreement (or not!) about things like original components. Also, just as important to tell the story of the history of these great cars. JMHO

It's kinda long (as most ownership histories are):

__________________________________________________ ____________________



Sending this to several friends who know about my 69 Camaro conv I bought this past December from a private owner in Pittsburgh, PA and now it lives in Florida.

Picture below….my Camaro in Florida. Options from the factory were: Rally Sport, PS, PB, power top, 4 speed, 3:08 posi, radio, console with gauges, tach in dash, tinted windshield, 327/210 hp. It has the original motor, trans and rear. It received a full body off restoration in 2005 and still looks new…with perfect paint and original interior except for new carpet.



.

After several months and about 50 hours of research (you know I have nothing to do while wintering in Florida), I found the original owner, Arthur Lee Ilsley. I bought the National Corvette Restorers Society's delivery report that showed the car being sold thru the military PX system. But that document did not show, as it usually does, the actual selling dealer. I knew the original owner’s name per the GM warranty book showing the car was sold new near San Bernardino, Calif. I found 3 people in the USA with the Arthur L. Ilsley name. I bought a subscription to Newspapers.Com. I can’t tell you how many fruitless paths I went down trying to find people to talk to. So many were dead or did not respond by phone, Facebook, etc.

I was pretty sure of the three men, the one I was looking for was a 1959 graduate of a high school near Pittsburgh. I also knew it had been in that city since 1972. But how did it get sold in California and get back to Pittsburgh. Then I found an on-line document showing my Art was in the Air Force from 1960 to 1980. I found he died in 2004 in Altoona, PA which is not far from Pittsburgh. But I could not find an obituary write-up. I kept getting referred to the Altoona Library. So I gave in, called and paid $5.00 for the obituary of Arthur Lee Ilsley. Well, I lucked out as the obituary was a nice long write-up with the name of his 3 kids, where they lived, his wife, that he was a 20 year veteran of the Air Force and originally from Pittsburgh.

I started looking for his wife and found a phone that would not work. Then I looked for kids. Two lived in Georgia and one daughter was in Altoona. Facebook helped verify maiden names too! I looked for a phone and got one plus an email for daughter Dawn Ilsley Smith of Altoona. I sent an email to Dawn expecting it not to be good. I explained who I was and that I was looking for Arthur Lee Ilsley who bought a new 1969 Camaro convertible. WOW….the next morning I received an email from Dawn saying she was the daughter of Art Ilsley and her father loved that car and she had a picture of him with the car when it was new and she would send it to me!!!! And she did within hours!! See it below…..Art is in his Air Force uniform too.

Is this a great picture or what!! This picture is one of the most hoped for by any classic car owner. Amazing find on a 50 year old car.




So I did not know the actual dealer the car was sold thorough because it was a military order. But this picture revealed it…I blew up the front license plate bracket and there it was. Jack Coyle Chevrolet, San Bernardino. I had researched the Chevy dealers in that area that were active in 1968 when the car was ordered and Coyle was one of them. I also found a Jack Coyle license plate bracket for sale on Ebay and it matched.







That license plate number is readable too (XJN970) and matches the one on a 1971 registration card I got with the car.



Per Art’s wife last week, they drove the car from California to Pittsburgh in about 1970 or 71 and sold it to a “young man” in Pittsburgh. From there I know the other owners who all were from Pittsburgh. So, I am the 5th owner.

There is lots more to this story, like the wife of the 2nd owner (the young man…he was killed in a car accident just a few years after buying the Camaro) who would not talk to me. Fortunately, the 3rd owner was a cousin and that is solved.

Dawn Ilsley Smith has been so helpful and is looking for some more pictures and info for me. Everyone called her father “Duke” and that is now what I call my Camaro
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Old 03-05-2020, 11:40 AM
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Very cool!
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Old 03-05-2020, 04:22 PM
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Steve Shauger Steve Shauger is offline
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Thanks for sharing Bergy! and as they say... and now you know the rest of the story.....
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Old 03-05-2020, 05:53 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Steve Shauger View Post
Thanks for sharing Bergy! and as they say... and now you know the rest of the story.....
Paul Harvey was awesome!
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Old 03-05-2020, 06:21 PM
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Quote:
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Paul Harvey was awesome!
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Old 03-06-2020, 07:19 AM
SuperNovaSS SuperNovaSS is offline
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Cool story. Where is the picture?

Jason
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Old 03-06-2020, 08:12 AM
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The pictures didn’t make it through when I copied & pasted the article.
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Old 03-06-2020, 09:56 AM
R68GTO R68GTO is offline
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Finding prior owners on my car was one of the most enjoyable parts of the project. Though I still haven’t located the OO, I was able to find each of the other seven through Craigslist, Facebook, and owner to owner contact. It’s been great and I still keep them updated on the resto progress. There will be more “chapters” yet to write once the car is done.
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Old 03-08-2020, 01:58 AM
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That’s a great story. The few times an owner search has panned out for me have made all the searching worthwhile.
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