CHAPTER 1:

THE AERO WARRIORS

RACE ON SUNDAY AND SELL on Monday. That was the motto for the major car manufacturers for decades. The cars you could see running around in NASCAR could be bought right off your local dealership sales floor. And it worked. As in the name indicated—National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing—they were “stock” cars equipped with safety equipment and raced around the track.

You could say NASCAR started well before the sanctioning body came into effect, and that it started with bootleggers seeing which of their moonshine runners was faster. It quickly evolved from there into NASCAR, and as the years went on, more and more advancements were made in the development and design of cars for the series. Every season, things got more and more fine-tuned, with cars getting lower, with bigger engines. It was a very slippery slope.

Into the 1960s Dodge/Plymouth and Ford/Mercury had it out for one another. Dodge/Plymouth had given a black eye to the other race teams in 1964 with the debut of the new 426 Hemi in its race cars at the Daytona 500. These cars went on to finish 1-2-3-4 in the race. NASCAR developed strict rule changes to keep the Hemi in check, but they were later loosened. Still, the gauntlet had been dropped, and from there on, it was a race to best NASCAR vehicle.

In 1969, Ford had developed the Talladega, which was based on the Torino/Fairlane at the time in response to the news that Dodge was making a new, more aerodynamic Dodge Charger called the 500. The Ford was named for the Talladega Superspeedway in Alabama that had opened up that same year. Ford used the “SportsRoof” option for better aerodynamics, but up front the cars originally had a recessed grille that looked good but created horrible airflow problems. So a more aerodynamic nose was put on the car, and it had a flush-mounted grille so air flowed over the car with much less turbulence. The rocker panels were rolled in, so the car could sit lower and look fairly stock. Another trick was to cut a rear bumper to make it a bit narrower, and give it a slight “V” shape. That helped create better downforce, much like an air dam is used now.

Famous for sitting in Stephens Performance for decades, this Daytona was resurrected shortly after these pictures were taken.

NASCAR rules required that 500 units of a model had to be produced for the public to purchase; otherwise the model could not be raced. To make these units as cheaply as possible, Ford built all the cars with the same engine, a 428 Cobra Jet V-8 with a C6 automatic transmission and bench seats. It is said that Ford still lost money on every car sold. Roughly 754 Talladegas were produced. Plymouth at the time was not producing an aerodynamic car that could compete with the Talladega, so Richard Petty, one of the all-time best drivers in NASCAR, switched to Ford for one season, and he won his 100th race in his Talladega.

Mercury did nearly the same thing with its NASCAR vehicle, the Cyclone, adding a more aerodynamic front nose with a flush-mounted grille. The bumpers and rockers were designed like those of the Talladega, as the Talladega design was basically copied on the Cyclones. This worked very well and made the Cyclones extremely competitive. The productions units were a bit different, though, as they all had the 351 Windsor V-8, the C6 automatic, and a front bench seat.

Here sits a 1969 Dodge Daytona, an original family car. I see this car once a year, and it has never moved in the many years I’ve gone by.

This was jokingly referred to as the “parts car” Superbird by the owner, but that can’t be further from the truth. It has been sitting while he works on his other three Superbirds.

You won’t believe it unless you see it: an original 1970 Superbird in a large lean-to with a large chain around the wing to help keep it safe.

Dodge led the charge for Mopar. The new-for-1968 Charger looked awesome, but serious aerodynamic flaws, such as the large, recessed grille and sunken rear window area, made it uncompetitive in NASCAR. The 1969 model year’s standard Charger did not help matters, so a plan was hatched. To go faster than everyone else, the Hemi would either need a big boost in power, which was unfeasible, or the car needed to pass through the air easier. The second option was much easier and cheaper, so the 1969 Dodge Charger 500 was developed.

The Charger 500 had a flush-mounted grille that was taken from 1968 Dodge Coronet, and the rear window area was made into a fastback style. It looked the part of a fast car, but unfortunately, it did not perform as well as hoped. The 500 production cars came with either a 440 or 426 Hemi, a four-speed or automatic, and a variety of other options. It just wasn’t slippery enough for the racetrack, so Dodge went back to the drawing board and developed the Daytona.

The Daytona was just about the wildest vehicle an American auto manufacturer had ever produced. It looked like nothing else on the road. After months of testing in wind tunnels, the designers popped out the 1969 Dodge Charger Daytona, named for the Daytona International Superspeedway in Florida. It had a large, peaked nose up front; a large wing at the rear; and it retained the fastback rear window of the 500. And it rocked. It was fast and did very well in NASCAR. It didn’t win the title, but it was right there.

Here you can see what happens when the garage burns the aircraft-grade aluminum wing off a 1970 Superbird; only the ends survived.

Walking up to this car, you would think this 1970 Superbird had been sitting for decades, but it had only been put into storage for a short time. But little room makes the car a shelf in winter!

The car in the next bay was a different story. This is a 1969 Dodge Charger 500 that had been sitting for many years and took a bit of work to unbury the nose enough to snap these pics.

Plymouth didn’t do anything aerodynamic with its cars for the most part, until they lost Richard Petty to Ford. The 1970 Road Runners underwent wind tunnel testing and another wonder was produced: the 1970 Plymouth Superbird. (Get it? Superbird—based on the Road Runner.) It was enough to lure Petty back to Plymouth and he won the 1970 NASCAR title in a Superbird.

It cost Plymouth, though. Because of these crazy cars Ford and Mopar were producing, NASCAR boosted the homologation requirements from 500 to over 1,000 units for public consumption. Plymouth produced roughly 1,935 cars, and lost money on every one. While the Daytonas and 500s sold fairly well, some Superbirds sat on dealers’ lots for years before they were offloaded for a song.

Sadly, time marches on. With new, more-stringent rules coming down from NASCAR, the Hemi and other big engines were out after 1971. Ford was already out in 1970 because of the new rules. So by 1971, there were few aero warriors on NASCAR tracks. But their legacy has never been forgotten, and their rarity has made those Aero Warriors some of the most expensive muscle cars in the world!

(Above, from left to right) The Superbird, which got turned around since I saw it last, is a 440 six-barrel car with a four-speed.

This Mercury Cyclone Spoiler hasn’t moved much in the few years I’ve known it, but it wouldn’t need much to get it up and going.

Another one of the 500 owner’s cars, this Ford Talladega was moved from a tight barn spot to a more easily accessible location.

Unburied from where it once sat, this 1969 Charger 500 moved from one side of the barn to another in the time that I’ve known about it. The owner has one of every Aero Warrior model.

KEYSTONE STATE CARS

FOR MANY YEARS BEFORE I started seriously getting into barn finds and hidden gems, there was a picture circulating in the Mopar web forums of a bunch of cool cars, including two Superbirds, tucked away in a storage building of some kind. It always had my interest, and every time it popped up online, I would ask about it to see if anyone knew who owned the cars. Nobody ever responded. Years passed, and while I remembered the picture, not many other pictures existed with a collection of cars quite like that! Then one day I got a message from a gentleman saying that if I were ever passing through Pennsylvania, to drop him a line. He had a few cool cars stashed that I would probably appreciate seeing. I put the guy’s information on my map for a future adventure, and then forgot about it.

Eventually, I was heading in the gentleman’s direction, so I sent him an email letting him know I would be in his neck of the woods and was still interested in taking a look at his collection. We set up a time to meet up, and a few weeks later I traveled east to Pennsylvania, a place I had only driven through once before. It was quite beautiful and surprisingly very hilly. Being from Chicago, I wasn’t used to driving twisty roads, but I made it to the location without incident.

This 1969 Dodge Daytona sits quietly behind a fake wall in an auto parts store in Pennsylvania. This car has been fully restored, but has been sitting for year, and to get it out from its hiding spot would require either going through a wall or moving several tons of equipment.

This was definitely an old-school area, an agricultural part of the country. The car owner’s store was an auto parts store looking like so many other small town auto parts stores. I walked in and was immediately back in my days at NAPA in DeKalb, Illinois. At the back of the store, at the parts counter with staffers on the phone or helping customers with their parts needs, I waited my turn.

I introduced myself to the car owner. He was about my height, but leaner. He told me the business had been his father’s and was now his. He told me to follow him, that he had a surprise for me, and he was absolutely right—it was a surprise!

Acquired in a deal for three 1970 Plymouth Superbirds, this 1970 Superbird has been sitting in this spot for decades. It’s the same spot from the famous picture that I remember seeing online years ago that inspired me to go find cool cars in barns.

Here is the same 1970 Superbird from a side where you can more clearly see the extra original Superbird nose, and mismatched door. This one is fairly complete with the original 440-cubic-inch V-8 still sitting between the front fenders.

We walked to another part of the building that used to be a small engine shop. We came around the corner of a false store wall and what I saw blew my mind. There was a 1969 Dodge Charger Daytona and more. There were two 1967 Hemi Plymouth GTXs and a 1969 Dodge Superbee Six Pack.

I’ve had many surprises in my travels, but this was right up there near the best of all time. The building’s false wall made it possible to hide the cars, and nobody would be the wiser. It was an ingenious way to keep the cars close, but there was the issue of how to get them out of this space. The cars would have to go down a hallway at the back of the building, a hallway clogged with merchandise and machinery. To get them out would be a serious chore. Hypothetically, he said, if something was to happen and they had to get the cars out quickly, they would just run them through the side wall!

There weren’t just cars in this mystery space, but there were also oh so wonderful parts. Spare 1970 Plymouth Superbird noses? There were three! Need a Shaker Hood for a 1970 Plymouth ’Cuda? That was there as well—and this was just the first level. We made our way into the storage basement where there were some of the most amazingly rare parts, neatly stacked and organized on shelves. There were 426 Hemi heads, spare steering columns for all manner of Mopars, rims, intakes for all major Mopar engines such as the 426 Hemi, 440, 340, etc. He didn’t discriminate. And everything was organized and labeled. I was truly walking through a muscle car wonderland. And there was more.

We made our way to an old storage building of his elsewhere in town. It was truly old school, with the lower of the two stories built into a hill, almost like a basement. We started on the top floor where, in a center storage area were two very nicely restored cars, a 1970 Hemi Plymouth Road Runner and a 1970 Plymouth ’Cuda 440 Six Barrel. Both had only been sitting a short time, and looked to be in perfect condition. But it was what I saw next door that really brought the whole experience home: It was THE spot from the picture that had captivated me for years.

Tucked away in another storage building away from the other orange car, this is the third 1970 Superbird from the deal (another one was sold off recently). This one has been completely blasted apart to fix rust and other issues with the body, but you can still see the holes in the rear quarter panels where the wing would bolt into place..

In the photo, three Superbirds were tucked into a corner of the room, and a variety of rare Mopars filled the rest filled of the space. Unfortunately, the scene had changed slightly in the decade or so since the picture was taken—but not by much. There was still a single Superbird left in the room, and a 1970 ’Cuda. It was incredible to me to be able to touch a piece of my personal history. This place had haunted my dreams.

Below us was the cherry topping the cake. We walked down to the lower level and the place was filled with muscle cars. Most of them were Dodges and Plymouths, and the third Superbird from the epic photo was stored down there. It was in pieces, and was nothing but a shell. But it was the final piece of the puzzle. You could see the holes in the quarters where the wing had been mounted, and large “PLYMOUTH” decals on the quarter panels. There was no mistaking what it was.

Exploring these locations had been quite the experience, to say the least. The cars and their quality and rarity are almost beyond description. I felt fortunate enough to get the opportunity to document them with the owner, and to tell their story.

Can’t miss the wing on an original 1970 Superbird. This is the same car as before. The wing was unique to the Superbird and it was part of the homologation needed to run the cars in NASCAR. The wings are made from aircraft-grade aluminum because of the tremendous air pressures the wings are subjected to at high speeds.

TALLADEGA SIGHTS AND THE DAN GURNEY SPECIAL

THERE ARE STASHES OF RARE, desirable cars out there that you hear of, but simply cannot fathom. You can’t believe cars of this high quality are just sitting there, possibly unappreciated or undiscovered. It’s almost like trying to find a lost civilization: You’ve heard stories it exists, but haven’t laid eyes on it. Thankfully I was able to change all that.

Many years ago, I saw a few pictures online of a warehouse where a decent number were stashed. That’s not out of the ordinary; there are countless barns and warehouses around the country full of cars. They’re most commonly ordinary old cars, nothing particularly rare. But this was not one of those places. This stash contained an impressive quantity of Aero Warriors, not just one or two, but nearly 20 cars in varied conditions. And the photos showed they were properly stored in a warehouse on a concrete floor, not just a metal shed in the middle of nowhere. But that was all that the post contained, just a few photos and little explanation of the cars shown.

I thought of those photos often, and I’d hear stories about them, but nobody knew exactly where the stash was—until I was at the Wellborn Muscle Car Museum. A gentleman there had seen the collection and knew exactly where it was. Luck had it that I could visit the location on my way home, with only a slight detour, so I headed north from the museum to see this legendary place in person.

From this angle, the abuse this Superbird endured is clearly seen. The paint on the wing had been baked away by the sun, and some of the owner’s efforts to restore it can be seen.

Walking into a large warehouse in Tennessee, it is hard to believe that so much incredible history is under the roof. This 1970 Plymouth Superbird is in the process of being restored back to its original luster.

A rougher 1970 Superbird, in the same color as the first one but never in such good shape as long as this owner had it. It needs a lot of work, including a lot of metalwork. Thankfully, it is no longer rusting away outside and is in a nice, dry warehouse in the meantime.

A better view of the metalwork that needs to go on with this poor Superbird. The quarter is still with the car, at least, sitting there in the open trunk. You can clearly see the holes in the fender where the wing bolts into place.

Here is another 1970 Superbird currently under restoration. The nosecone had just been liberated from the front of the car and the 440-cubic-inch V-8 had been rebuilt. This one had been sitting for a prolonged period of time, but even with all sitting, it is still fairly solid.

Here is a good view of the condition of the same Superbird. It is by no means perfect, but it is in pretty good shape for sitting for so long. You can see in the trunk the special brackets Plymouth used to keep the large wings in place. The brackets bolted to the wings from the inside of the car and to the frame rails at the other end.

I reached the collection’s owner by phone and he agreed to meet to show me the cars. Mike, the owner, said his father used to have a car leasing and sales company in town. Mike was in school and entering the car business with his father just as the Aero Warriors were emerging in NASCAR racing. Working with Ford training program, Mike got an internship at Holman-Moody, the legendary shop that set up all of Ford’s NASCAR race cars. And seeds of the collection were sown.

He started saving these cars he loved. Ford Talladegas, Mercury Cyclone Spoilers, Superbirds, even a Charger Daytona and a Charger 500. His father’s company had a large storage building near their main shop where Mike could stash the cars. He didn’t simply put them away—-he restored them and has been recognized for his great work.

Sitting for so long that mold had been growing on the exterior, this 1969 Talladega has seen better days, but it was rescued from a horrible existence by the warehouse owner, and with a little bit of work (and maybe a car wash), it could easily be reborn.

Tucked away in another part of the warehouse, a fairly rough 1969 Mercury Cyclone Spoiler sits neglected. This is another project that the owner rescued. It looks as though someone started a restoration and just gave up. It is now safely secure in the warehouse.

For a Ford, this is one of the rarest cars you can find. This original 1969 Ford Talladega was rescued from a field. The current owner heard it was going to be destroyed and rescued it, putting it in his warehouse.

This is one of my favorite cars in this collection. It is a nearly all-original 1970 Superbird with dog dish center caps, black steel wheels, a 440-cubic-inch V-8 with a four-barrel carburetor, and a four-speed manual transmission. I personally would drive the car as is because it has such a great look to it.

Here’s something you would not expect to see: the rusted, burned-up hull of an original Superbird. This one had been used for circle-track racing, and it was beaten and abused. It had been relegated to a farm field and was about to be crushed when the warehouse owner rescued it.

The engine that came out of the burned-up Superbird was a bit different. An original 426 Hemi, one of the most desirable engines ever produced, this one is still fairly complete for sitting for so long. It has been rescued and is currently being rebuilt!

As Mike and I headed to the warehouse where the cars were stored, its plain exterior gave no hint at the precious cargo inside. We entered in the dark as a thunderstorm raged, but with the lights turned on, the hidden treasures were on full view. Here was a pair of perfectly restored, rare Ford Talladegas and a Dan Gurney Special Mercury Cyclone Spoiler. In front of me was a Dodge Charger Daytona, and next to that was a Charger 500. And this was all visible on first glance!

The Daytona was a work in progress, with all the bodywork done and work on the engine and interior underway, but the Fords and the Mercury were in near-perfect condition. The Charger 500 had been sitting a while, but was clean and looked like it could be running again with only a bit of work.

The warehouse was divided into multiple large, open areas separated by large doors that made it easy to move the cars about. In the next area we entered was another Mercury Cyclone that needed a bit of work, along with a blue 1970 Superbird that was his daughter’s car and in the midst of being restored. They had just finished rebuilding the car’s original 440-cubic-inch V-8, so the project was moving right along, and this car had a great patina to it. The decals on the quarters had just the right look, one that can’t be duplicated.

Elsewhere in the warehouse was a rusted-out husk of a car. Some people would have scrapped the car and moved on. But Mike knew it was an original 1970 Superbird with many of the rare Superbird components still in place. Apparently, the car was used in some circle-track racing, then was involved in a fire and left in a field to rust away. It was later going to be crushed, but Mike stepped in and saved it. It was no candidate for restoration, but Mike expected to find some way to display it.

Through another door were several large benches and engines on stands, including a complete 426-cubic-inch Hemi V-8. Just over 10,000 street Hemi cars were produced between 1966 and 1971, and I was told this was a 1970 Hemi, a true rarity, and a welcome was told this was a 1970 Hemi, a true rarity, and a welcome surprise.

My favorite 1969 Talladega in the group was this blue one, mostly original, except with lots of mold and moss growing on the exterior. Wherever this car once sat was not warm and dry. Thankfully, it was rescued and with a good wash will probably look great again.

Near the Hemi was what I’m more used to, but not in such numbers. There were two rows of rusty, crusty Ford Talladegas, Mercury Cyclones, and a Superbird, all of them cars Mike had rescued from farm fields or junkyards. The rarest of the bunch was the Superbird. Most of the rescue cars were complete and looked like they could be running again with just a bit of work.

Surprisingly, this is the only 1969 Dodge Charger 500 the owner has, originally a green car with a green interior and a 440-cubic-inch V-8. This one is pretty close to being finished. It has just been sitting while other projects with greater needs get put ahead of it.

Another 1969 Cyclone sits in a line of saved cars, this one having been sitting for a long time even before it was rescued and put in the warehouse. For sitting so long, the car is actually in pretty good shape, so it waits its turn to get going again.

A better view of the unique front end of this Cyclone Spoiler. It had been sitting outside for so long, the original stripes have faded away into almost nothing. And the original 351-cubic-inch V-8 is nowhere to be found.

As we continued our explorations, I saw two more Superbirds, one which was Mike’s main project, a blue ’70 Superbird that he used to display at shows. The other Superbird was not as nice since at some point, someone had cut the quarter off the car and it was missing parts. Of all of Mike’s Superbirds, this one was in the worst shape, but all of his Superbirds were 440 cars, which makes restoration and parts salvaging easier.

The tour was over and I was in shock from the collection’s impressive content. And to this day I am in awe of the true generosity Mike showed me, someone he had just met, for sharing his collection with me. It goes to show there are still amazing people in the car hobby.

I see a trend as another 1969 Talladega sits in the warehouse. It was purchased years ago, tucked away, and doesn’t need a lot of restoration. The original 428 and transmission still sit under the hood.

Talladega is one of the cleaner cars that were rescued. It looks as though it was simply driven into the garage and parked.

Another forlorn 1969 Talladega sits in a row of other rescued vehicles. This car was rescued from either being sent to the junkyard or crushed. It is a complete car and not in horrible condition. So it sits in the back of the warehouse until the time is right.

One of the worst in the bunch, this 1969 Talladega was missing a lot of parts. Someone at some point had started trying to restore it, but stopped. Thankfully, it is in the right place to be put back together properly.

This poor 1969 Talladega did not lead a very healthy life. A kid put the car into a pole and then the car sat for decades. Knowing what the car was, and not wanting it to be neglected any more than it already had, Mike rescued it.

THE PENNY SAVER DODGE CHARGER BARN BURNER

I’VE BEEN FORTUNATE TO BUILD a reputation as an honest journalist, and I have become part of a community on social media that allows me to tap into more people and finds than I could have imagined. In the 10 years or so I’ve been actively hunting for cool cars in barns, fields, and beyond, I thought I had found all the big-ticket items around Chicago. I was a member of the local clubs, went to area shows, and people knew what I did and how I do it. But sometimes things just come out of nowhere and surprise you. That’s what happened when a gentleman named Tom messaged me through Facebook.

He had followed my work and asked if I knew of a pair of Aero Warriors—a 1969 Dodge Charger 500 and a 1970 Plymouth Superbird—sitting in a barn in Wisconsin. He said his friend Scott had these two cars in his barn, and that he’d be happy to show them to me. And they were only about two hours from my home. I jumped at the chance!

Pulling into Tom’s, oh, let’s call it a “compound,” he gave me a tour of his shop and his projects. There was a Plymouth Duster, a Dodge Challenger, and a 1970 Plymouth GTX that had serious front-end damage under repair. Coolest of all, to me, was a really neat late-’70s Dodge Ramptruck Tom had purchased off of Craigslist.

With the grille safely inside the nearly empty passenger compartment, this original 1969 Dodge Charger 500 sits directly next to a few dozen hay bales and a 1970 Plymouth Superbird.

We then headed to Scott’s farm. I still couldn’t believe I had never heard of this collection until a few days earlier.

Scott invited us up to the main barn, which, based on the old construction style, was at least 100 years old. And there, in the barn’s center stall was what we were there for: a pair of legends.

There sat two of the rarest muscle cars in the world: a 1969 Dodge Charger 500 and a 1970 Superbird. It was clear the cars had not moved from the barn in a long time. There were marks from bird droppings on both vehicles, and with the barn actually used for hay storage, there was a good amount of hay tucked in the engine compartment of the 500. The Superbird had been spared most of the hay, but not the bird droppings.

Scott purchased the 1969 Dodge Charger after seeing it advertised in the local penny saver magazine. The owner said he thought it had been modified, and Scott knew immediately what he meant. Scott bought it and drove it for a short time, but the car was a bit beat, so he parked it with plans to restore it. Well, life happens and things get put on the back burner, so the car remained parked, mostly complete, for over 30 years.

Shortly after acquiring the 500, Scott saw an ad in an Aero Warrior club flyer for the Superbird in Iowa. Scott bought it, hauled it home, and unfortunately, it has been sidelined with the 500. He believed the engine wasn’t built correctly and blew up, so previous owners had parted the car out. All Scott got was the main bodywork, engine, transmission, and rear end, but none of the original unique Superbird parts, such as the nose or rear wing. But he had since been able to acquire the missing parts.

Random parts were scattered about the barn: a six-barrel intake for the Superbird in a pile of hay, a spare grille for the 500 in an actual barrel, and more. But the big-ticket items were in the basement of the farmhouse, including the NOS (new old stock) nose and the wing for the Superbird.

You can get a better look at the rougher parts of the Charger 500, especially the quarter panels. But the really unique pieces, the aero rear window setup and trunk lid, are still with the car, as is the flush-mounted grille.

The engine in the 1969 Charger 500 is a 440-cubic-inch V-8 that is mated to a four-speed manual transmission. It was driven home from Milwaukee and driven around for a short period of time before the owner put the car away to fix some issues.

A closeup of one quarter panel on the 1970 Superbird. Plymouth wanted people to know who produced such a unique car, and they successfully did it with large “PLYMOUTH” decals on each side of the Superbird on the quarter panels.

Another piece of the puzzle, a new old stock, never used Superbird nose. Scott found this nose shortly after he got the car. It has been in storage ever since. It’s not the storage place I would use—with a spare desk and bikes—but whatever works!

The term barn find is thrown around fairly liberally nowadays, but this was as legit as they come, and I was completely giddy with excitement.

We left the farm but stayed in touch with Scott, whose cars were included in the “Barn Finds and Hidden Gems” presentation I helped organize for the Muscle Car and Corvette Nationals in the fall of that year. Scott was so enthused by my excitement over his cars that he dug the 500 out of the barn and brought it straight to the show, its first show ever. This is what makes what I do absolutely worth it.

This is the view you get when walking into the barn for the first time: snowmobiles, a tower of hay, and a pair of rare Aero Warriors sitting in the middle. This is not something people think exists in the modern era, but there they are! And completely untouched.

Since the 1970 Superbird was missing many of the pieces that make the Superbird unique, like the wing and nose, the owner has been collecting pieces through the years to put the car back together. This is just a spare upright he has for the car. A complete wing is safely tucked away in the rafters.