Chevrolets-hidden-50-years-finally up for sale

Scores of new Chevys stored for decades undriven finally up for sale

http://autos.yahoo.com/blogs/motoramic/scores-chevys-hidden-50-years-finally-sale-160911547.html

 

.....wow!

 

That is nuts! I can't believe how original some of them are. This is the ultimate time capsule. Cars frozen in time as they were when delivered to the dealership. Awesome.

 

There are a few wagons to boot all makes. The guy kept a lot of the trade-ins besides the new ones. 9 pages of cars.:2_thumbs_up_-_anima

 

The ultimate time capsule is in a small town in Indiana. Starting in 1953, a car dealer put a fully optioned Corvette in storage every year. His son took over the dealership in the early 70's and continued the practice. They also included several other classic Chevys too. The son is my age and I assume they are still there since I never heard anything about his death. Haven't been back for years, but you used to be able to drive by the building and see the cars thru several large windows in the front of the building.

 

It's amazing what's hiding out there still. This is what those folks in Tulsa were hoping to find when they dug up that '57 Plymouth a few years back.

Sad to see these were so poorly stored, but they are neat to look at. The Cameo with 1-mile on it has a dented roof, sad to see that something fell on it. Also the '78 Vette is missing it's front spoiler, center caps, and big 25th anniversary emblem on the nose....wonder if those items were to be dealer installed, or if they were removed over the years and just sold off to customers. Who knows right? The 60's Impalas are nice, and I love the brand new red Corvair with the stick. Would really like to see the used cars that were left outside.....says the dealership had 500 vehicles stored or stashed around the area.

Ok let me get a little melancholy now.... As amazing as these are, they kinda make me sad too. As a car guy, whenever I'm salvage yarding or at a car show and see a neat old car, I wonder where it's been, who drove it home from the dealership the first time, what views were witnessed through it's windshield, what memories have been made in it, who waxed it on a Saturday morning or sang along to then-new period music or heard mahor news events on it's radio? Did it sit waiting outside someone's school or work for years, take someone to college, a couple on their first date or their honeymoon with cans tied to the rear bumper and sardines on the intake manifold (he-he), or ever go through the Rocky Mountains, cruise Vegas, or the Miracle Mile in LA or Times Square in New York, or the Florida keys..? Memories, music....stuff like that makes me love old cars.

These cars have none of that..no memories, no history. The decades past...the sun rose and went down on them sitting unused inside a shop....and that's it. Every gasket, hose and seal will need to be replaced to make them usable again...and if you did that, they would no longer be new and original anymore...and will lose their value. So what do you do with them....wash and detail them and stick them in a museum as static exibits? Leave them covered in dust as a found time-capsule (I could never do that...just watching the video all I could hear in my head was WASH THEM WASH THEM!)....

Deeep thoughts with Mike...

 

How many options could you get on a '53 Corvette?
The best thing about all this is that these cars were kept out of the clutches of Hollywood who thought nothing about sacrificing classic cars in the mindless films they made of which they managed to shovel into our heads

 

Looks like it was right downtown in 1953. Now the buildings beside it are gone.

 

My wife and I spent hours on the HAMB site reading and watching this. The owner's house is the white one across the street. The daughter is in their driveway in the Vette. Out at the farm near the golf course are nearly 500 used cars just driven there and parked. Many low mileage.
Supposedly around 50 new old cars with under 10 miles on them in barns just like those in the dealership which has been closed 17 years.
How'd they have time to sell cars everyday but Sunday without a vacation and farm too?
Apparently they were super friendly and good people who sold many cars over 50 years. I still can't believe they didn't sell off those used cars and new cars that remained each year. Even for a few hundred they'd been money ahead.
Also I saw no used car or even new car lot. Apparently everything for sale was either inside that building or along the curb.
The hubcaps and other assessory items were in trunks wrapped or in boxes.
The 58 Cameo seems to have a rubber mat on the roof which appears to make it look dented---I think.
I dreamed about those cars all night. Sad yet amazing. It seems these finds never end, just get larger.

 

This is getting a lot of interest on ClassicOldsmobile.com, and an appliance collector off topic forum. What was sad to read, some slugs came prepared, and removed some parts off of a few cars, gaining access to the buildings with their generators and portable tools. They were caught and not prosecuted. And watching all those hubcaps and parts flopped up on those dirty hoods and trunks, scratch scratch scratch! I just hope the good cars go where they deserve to go, and the "low mileage trade ins" go to good homes too.

 

It was amazing to see auction people treating those dirty cars like they did. Most hubcaps and other things were stored in the trunks until they started putting them on the hoods.
Not prosecuting criminals is criminal!

 

I tried to visit the auction company's site but was unable to view any info on the auction or any inventory of the cars. The article and video were interesting though. I would love to see what else there is.

 

Yes, I was thinking the same thing..........naughty!

And I was not impressed when the auction lady initially called the 56 Chevy a 55 in the video.

I wonder if they'll properly clean up the cars before offering them for sale? :confused:

 

That is incredible all those years, just sitting there.