1966 GT350 Mustang Restoration Project

I mentioned in a previous post that our next restoration project that you will see featured here is a 1966 GT350 Shelby Mustang. 

The earliest Mustangs are now almost 46 years old, so there is often a lot of history behind each individual car.  This is particularly true of most Shelby American products.

I'll just briefly go into the hisory of this particular car.  This car is the 33rd (SFM6S033) 1966 GT350 produced.  It was originally an employee lease car at Shelby American.  It was used by various employees, including James McLean's son, Bill.  James McLean was the general manager at Shelby American.  Later the car was leased by another Shelby American employee named Ron Hile.  Ron was a painter at Shelby American.  I have been fortunate to speak and stay in touch with these enthusiastic individuals.  The car was then used by Carl Nasson.  Mr. Nasson was a designer working on the 1967 GT350 program.

In September of 1966, this GT350 was sold as a demonstrator to Dana Chevrolet (yes, Chevrolet) in Southgate, CA.  In the summer of 1967, it was purchased by a 17 year old that would later move to Virginia with the car.  In the late seventies, it was purchased by the owner that I ended up buying the car from in 1999.  There are lots of stories that go in between all of this brief history, and I hope to cover those later.

I absolutely love vintage pictures of any interesting cars, so you can imagine my thrill when the first retail owner who still lives in the area walked into the shop a few weeks ago with these photos.  I've known this guy for a long time and have been in contact with him about the car but had not seen these pictures.

Anyway, enjoy the pictures.  These were taken soon after he purchased the car from Dana Chevrolet in September of 1967.  The tach was already replaced, the original shifter had been swapped for a Hurst unit, and the front bumper guards had been removed.  Those are the original California black and yellow license plates (with a Dana Chevrolet license plate frame on the rear) that were registered by Shelby American to the car in October of 1965.  The paper over the back plate is the new owner's temporary registration.  More later...