Mr-Shine's Blue '55 Chevy

In The Beginning
This is what our '55 Chevy looked like, when we purchased it in June of 1981:



The Process Begins
We drove the car for about a year - local shows, cruises, etc. Then in 1982, we began the process
of removing all the exterior and interior trim, glass, wiring, and stripped the body to bare metal.
We thought about doing the body work ourself, but quickly realized we didn't want to tackle
that challenge.


Finally - Ready For Paint
The car went to one body shop for ten months, and then to a fellow Chevy club member's garage
to get the finishing touches, and paint.
Between the two shops, it received new quarter patch panels, inner and outer rocker panels,
floor supports, body mounts, trunk pan, and fender eyebrows.



  Color - Now To Put It Back Together
Finally, eleven and a half months after the car left our garage, it was home again, with a beautiful
new color - Mercedes Lapis Blue (selected by my son Rick,  only 16 years old at the time).
Now the job of putting it back together - the car sat in our garage for over a year,
before I could get the ambition to put it back together.
The task was overwhelming - I couldn't decide where to begin, and it was difficult remembering
where I had put some of the pieces that were taken off the year before.


  Putting It Back Together
A good friend, George Patterson urged me to get it ready in time for "LEAD EAST",
billed as the "World's Biggest 50's Party", held each year over Labor Day weekend,
in Parsippany, New Jersey. George even offered to come to my house several nights
each week after work, to help with the project.
With George's help, and a lot of support from my wife Jackie, the car went back together,
and was ready to make the trip to LEAD EAST - and we had a ball !

 Lots Of Fun, and Then...
We had a lot of fun cruising with our '55 Chevy, from Sept. 1986 until the night of June 28, 1989.
On the way home from a cruise night at Marcus Dairy in Danbury, CT., we were rear-ended while
waiting to make a turn to exit the parkway - just 2/10 of a mile from our home.
The other driver was also very close to his home - he fell asleep less than a mile from his home.
Luckily there weren't any serious injuries. The estimate to repair the car was $ 7,000.00,
and we had the challenge of finding the parts.

Repaired, Sold... and then, 15 years later, home again
We were able to get a good used quarter panel, and all the other parts needed to repair
the car, and were able to convince the insurance company to repaint the entire car.
At the time of the accident, we had been building a '55 Chevy Sedan Delivery (I'll feature
that car another month), because we felt it would be better suited for taking Race Glaze to
car shows to sell. So when the Blue '55 was finished being repaired, we decided to sell it.
That took the better of a year - we sold it the Summer of 1991, to a man from Peekskill, NY
who bought and sold classic cars. A few years later I ran into him at a car show,
and asked if he knew where the car was. He didn't know - I tried finding the car via the
internet by posting inquiries on my web site, and e-mailing some Chevy clubs,
but could not locate the car. About 4 years ago, I asked a state trooper friend of ours
to run the vin number. He located the car in Queens, NY - about an hour away.
I contacted the owner - he was not interested in selling the car.
Then in Sept. of 2005 he e-mailed me and said he was now ready to sell the car,
and wanted to know if I was interested in buying it back. Jackie and I went to see it
over Thanksgiving weekend - it still looked real sharp, and was basically the way I sold
it in 1991. We negotiated a deal, and the owner Nick, was nice enough to hold the car for me
until the following March - almost 4 months !
We brought it home on my birthday March 18, 2006 - what a birthday !