My 50th anniversary (no, not that -- my model contest win)

[chepp]

While looking for something else, I discovered that fifty years ago today I won a local model car contest when I was 14.

Although the above letter shows a different address (district office?), my win was at a store in Encino, CA. As instructed I then took it to the next level where it didn't win.
Although I don't have a photo of the model, here's a list I made at the time describing it.

Here's a "word picture":
Imagine an MPC '66 GTO convertible body with the hood glued on. All four wheel openings were hogged out in elongated oval shapes to accomodate an altered wheelbase funny car frame scratchbuilt from brass tube soldered together. A shortened roof from an AMT '65 GTO was painted black and glued on over the trunk area that was opened up for the driver who sat behind the rear axle as in a rail dragster. The headlights/grille/bumper were mostly hogged out then painted silver and black to simulate fiberglass. The engine was a blown Hemi and the body color was metalflake green. Its name was Green Phantom.

[jbwelda]

Wow pretty kool! Nice and incredibly complete description too. Too bad you don't still have the car, what ever happened to it? Did it get damaged being moved around by anonymous personnel? Just wondering because I have heard some first hand horror stories about cars coming back in pieces, and a lot of them (pieces that is).

Great piece of nostalgia there!

jb

[chepp]

Thanks. I can't remember what happened to it. I can vaguely recall some of the glue joints failing months later. I probably used tube glue for everything including glueing to metal which wouldn't have been a good idea. So, it may have become a "parts car." I didn't start shooting photos and saving models until a couple of years later.

[Bernard Kron]

In some cases words are even better than pictures, they capture as much what you saw in your mind's eye as what you actually managed to deliver in the physical model. That's what so cool about the second document, your list of the details of the Green Phantom. The initial letter of instructions for the follow up from your selection is just as revealing. First of all you are to go to something that not's called a 7 Eleven, even though the contest seems to have been put on by 7 Eleven or at least coordinated by the regional office. Somebody in the regional office must have been into car modeling, or at least thought that young car modelers were worth the prmotional bother. This shows what a big deal car modeling was in 1968 and how important you guys were to a relatively big business like 7 Eleven. There's no way that the Next Level would not have been at a 7 Eleven in the Modern Age. And requiring you to fill out a form so that they would know how many people to accommodate at Corky's Restaurant - no way! Today they would simply tell you to come on by, bring your model, and brings your friends, and hope that the turnout met their expectations. What a formal age it was - but then tradesmen wore uniforms, you "dressed for success", and applied for membership at the Lions Club.

Thanks for sharing this. It's so instructive on so many levels!

Oh yeah ... and congrats on the win! Happy 50th!

[Mr.409]

Wow that is very cool! I wasn't even alive back then (Actually my dad was two years old in '68 ), but I can imagine how cool it is to find an old document like that. Congrats. Now there would be a perfect time to build a replica out of that Show Winner.

[fordrodnkustom]

Interesting piece of history there, thanks for sharing!

[chepp]

Like my original post, I found this while looking for something else. The GTO is in the background of this diorama picture. I shot it (probably) in the summer of 1969. The top photo is a cropped image from the bottom one. In the bottom photo at the left is a working Christmas tree that I made for use on an Aurora "HO" slot car set dragstip. You can see that the green light is on. The other lights worked, too, including the red light to indicate which, if any, driver fouled. I made it all work by modifying the motorized timer mechanism from a junked washing machine. I still have that control board and the Nomad model but the GTO is long gone. Parts started falling off of it and I didn't feel like fixing it so I saved the best ones and dumped the rest. Eventually even those saved parts disappeared.