After 50 years and zero miles on the odometer, the time capsule’s creators had hoped for a better vehicle than this. Marty Coleman
ON JUNE 15, 1957, a 1957 Plymouth Belvedere was buried in Tulsa, Oklahoma, to commemorate Oklahoma’s 50th birthday. It was intended to be a time capsule for a future generation to unveil 50 years down the road. The Plymouth was brand-spanking new, with only four miles on the clock. Fifty years later, when the car was scheduled to be exhumed from its crypt, it would be given to the Tulsa resident who could guess the current population of the city 50 years in the future.
In 1957 Raymond Humbertson guessed 384,743; the actual Tulsa population in 2007 was 382,457. Humbertson’s guess was the closest, so he won the car. He had died, however, in 1979, so the car was passed on to his two sisters, one of whom still owns it today.
Virgil Exner’s Forward Look design was considered ultra-modern and stylish, so the Belvedere was chosen as a fine representative to send to the world of 2007. A case of Schlitz beer and a large can of gasoline—to be used to start the car if the world of 2007 no longer used gas to power their vehicles—were stored in the trunk.
The car was sealed in an underground concrete vault that was billed as strong enough to withstand a nuclear war. Nuclear war, maybe, but not a good rain shower—the vault was not watertight.
It’s a great story, and it could have had a great ending. But in 1973 work crews doing some excavating around the Tulsa Courthouse (in the vicinity of where the car was buried) ruptured a water main. The area flooded terribly, and water made its way to the concrete encasement, completely submerging the sleeping Mopar.
When it was unearthed in 2007, it was hoped that the car would come out of its dark resting place in an overall preserved, good condition. But that simply wasn’t to be. The car was shrouded in a cover, but a rusty rear fin poking out showed the crowd that the car hadn’t spent the past 50 years high and dry. The car had sat in water for decades, and it was a rusty mess. The seats were mostly rust springs.
A sealed time capsule that was stored with the car didn’t leak, and its contents—newspapers, rolls of movie film, vinyl records, plates, and other documents—were in perfect condition. But the Belvedere, the star of the show, was in sad shape.
With a collective sigh, the crowd went home, and the story quietly, over time, simply dissipated. Humberton’s family didn’t want to give up, so they shipped the car to Dwight Foster in New Jersey.
After 50 years and zero miles on the odometer, the time capsule’s creators had hoped for a better vehicle than this. Marty Coleman
Dwight Foster’s company, Ultra One Corporation of Hackettstown, New Jersey, sells a rust removal chemical called Safest Rust Remover, designed to remove rust safely without compromising metal. Dwight was tasked with trying to save the car from further deterioration and resurrect it, as best he could, with an eye on preservation.
The interior of the buried Belvedere before any restoration work had started. Ultra One
The 1957 Belvedere as it looked right after it emerged from decades of soaking in water in an underground vault.
The buried Belvedere rests easy on a trailer in Tulsa, Oklahoma. In hindsight, this may have been a better place for it than the vault!
When he received the car, it didn’t roll, the leaf springs had all but disintegrated, and the chassis was about as fragile as papier-mâché. The water, which became something like an acid bath, had compromised everything—a toxic soup the car had remained submerged in since 1973.
Dwight still has the car, and he’s still carefully peeling off decades of crusty rust and molten debris. The car now sits on a stabilized chassis. It rolls, and the 1957 tires have been fitted with inner tubes to hold air. His plan is to continue to preserve the car so it can be put on display or eventually sold, if the family decides to take that route.
“I’d like to see it end up in the Smithsonian,” Dwight says. “The family turned down a few offers in the past with hopes that the car would end up in a museum or be part of a tour that can display the car so the public can enjoy the history and the story. I think that’s a fine idea, as the car is too special to just let it sit in a warehouse somewhere.”
The original paint is finally visible on the buried Belvedere after months of painstaking work to remove the rust.
The interior of the buried Belvedere. Though the restoration had begun, the rust and decay were still everywhere.
A pristine original Belvedere with minimal mileage is worth about $40,000 to $50,000. Obviously, that’s not this car, because it’s not even truly an automobile any longer—it’s an artifact.
What about other cars that have been found? Ones that will never work again but instead are appreciated as works of automotive art?
In 2009 a 1925 Bugatti Brescia Type 22 Roadster was pulled from the bottom of Lake Maggiore in Switzerland. It had been sitting on the bottom of the lake for about 70 years. When it was recovered, it was in similar condition as our subject car. It had to sit on a dolly just to be moved because most of the car had succumbed to the lake water in a similar fashion as the Belvedere.
That car sold at the Bonhams Automobiles d’Exception Auction at Rétromobile in Paris on January 23, 2010, for $364,700. At the time, a fully sorted, well-prepared #2 condition Bugatti had a valuation range of $150,000 to $400,000.
The difference for this sale, or at least at the time of this sale in 2010, is that the Bugatti was offered as a newly discovered treasure. In other words the sizzle was sold while the steak was hot off the oak-fired grill. Sell ’em while they’re hot, so to speak.
A 1957 Belvedere hardtop is not hard to come by. A total 67,268 were built. Sure, this one is rare due to its history—no argument there. But you and your spouse aren’t going to drive it down to the ice cream shop now or ever. It will never be functional as an automobile again. So on this scale, the car has virtually no value.
But as an automotive oddity, it has some merit. A unique collector, or let’s say at least two of them, could presumably bid this car to a distinctive level given the proper amount of marketing and a large television audience. On that scale, and with the stars aligning, I would guesstimate that the car would fetch a figure larger than $25,000—but I don’t think it would exceed $100,000.
At first glance, the cleaned-up Belvedere looks almost drivable, but it is too delicate to ever take the road again.
Some have questioned if the work by Dwight’s shop has aided or diminished the value. This is debatable, and I’m sure if we asked several collectors we’d get several answers. The car was certainly more haunting and historical in its as-discovered condition. The clay and rust preserved the car in an eerie state of decay. In that form, it had a unique look. By cleaning it up, perhaps some of the history has been washed away.
But on the other hand, Dwight’s work has preserved the car and stabilized the sheet metal. It is ready, according to Mr. Foster, to be on display, provided that it is properly transported and cared for. One could look at this somewhat like a five-hundred-year-old painting that is no longer visible because of fading and oxidation. Conservators carefully remove the surface oxidation, waxes, and dulling varnishes. These preservations increase the value of the work of art when properly executed. Isn’t that what was done here? Shouldn’t the car be considered an object of art?
Looking at the history, the current state of the car and unique one-of-one provenance coupled with a market that seems to be yearning for the odd and unusual, I’d suggest a value range of $40,000 to $60,000 at a widely publicized auction. I think the car might have pulled a considerably stronger number in 2007, while the sizzle was still following the steak. But auctions can and do surprise us, so the true number is anyone’s guess.
That said, I’m with Dwight—I’d rather it find its way to the Smithsonian. It would be a more fitting end to this story.
