was a 1967 candy apple red, Pontiac GTO…
likely the most fun I ever had
behind the wheel of a car!
She had 4 on the floor, power and was loud
And made to go fast
So I did…
Her speedometer was broken
But the tachometer worked. Her engine cued me
when it was time to shift gears.
In two months’ time, I managed to earn
2 speeding tickets. “No speedometer was no excuse” in
Charleston, South Carolina in 1969.
I had to go to work to pay the fines.
She burned almost as much oil as she did gas
on her trip home to Texas & her engine blew
the day after we traded her in
on a brand new Malibu Classic.
It made me sad seeing her that way:
pushed off the highway, in a culvert.
But the teenager who bought her
likely had the best fun he ever had behind the wheel of a car,
for the few hours he owned her…
Yesterday, I had the pleasure of seeing and hearing
one in action…same color, same style. The driver, a
man about my age. I smiled, when we stopped at the light
& gave him the peace sign.( We did that a lot back in those days…)
He smiled back and revved the old girl up. As we drove down the road,
I dropped back a few paces, respectfully,
to admire a classic, drive away into the sunset.
© Nancilynn Saylor
Photo taken from my car today in Austin, Texas
Nancilynn is Writing again 
Lovely, Nancilynn, both the car and your homage. Sitting covered in my barn is a 1967 Buick Skylark convertible, not often considered a muscle car but a close cousin to your GTO. It has a few unconventions for a Buick, like a standard transmission instead of an automatic, and a 220 hp engine that isn’t huge but is respectabl when I popped that clutch. And, of course, it’s a convertible. It was my daily driver all its life until it got too hard to lift my leg to push in the clutch. My sisters and I tooled around Dallas one day, top down, radio blaring and we, jiving along and aloud. Lotta memories.
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Sam, I totally understand the part about the clutch being too much. It sounds like she is a beauty. Bet she could fetch a few coins on the classic market if you could part with her! I googled 67 GTO and the pics made me nostalgic and the prices made my tummy hurt! Thanks for reading!
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I don’t know where they got the clutch to put in that car but it’s a really stiff clutch. It actually broke the clutch pedal shaft one time but thank goodness I had a mechanic who was not a parts replacer but a rebuilder and he managed to weld it and it still lasts. I’ve had people want to buy it over the years but I wasn’t ready to let it go yet. A decade or more ago I sorta checked out how much it would cost to restore it and was quoted about $10,000 to get it up to show quality. I wasn’t interested in showing, only in driving. But I didn’t follow up. Very recent research shows that ’67 Skylarks in horrible shape (much worse than mine and basically rust buckets) are offered for around $3,000 (about what I paid, new) and restored for $30,000, give or take. I have an offer from BIL to buy it but haven’t heard back and am not sure what to charge. I mean, being a “relative” and everything. But I am closer to being wiilling to sell it now. Though what happened to my ’63 Austin Healer MkIII when I sold it makes me hesitate. The guy painted it pink and took out the straight six engine and replaced it with a Chevy V8, and then had the nerve to come back and show me and give me a ride. I nearly cried.
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Oh, the memories tied to first cars! Love this post. Takes me back to the sad day my olive green 1968 Plymouth Satellite was towed away to become “scrap” after my husband rear-ended a VERY solid hearse on a rain-slick highway (not his fault!) and the car was ruined. Her name was Samantha. I got her my last year at SWTexStateCollege ( to get to student teaching) and she transported me to “adult life” in South Florida in ’69. Still pristine with her white leather interior when she crumpled into that hearse in ’76. Oh my! How I would love to see one like her again!
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Jazz,
That sounds like the feeling I had seeing” the Gait” in the culvert with her hood up and engine blown. Sad day in Texas it was.
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