This car was delivered to the original owner Jim Simpson Jr. on December 13 1966. It was purchased at Paget Chevrolet in Greer South Carolina. Below is the page from the original owner protection plan (a.k.a Protect-o-plate). From what I can tell from the documentation, Jim was a medical student who resided in Lexington Kentucky where he still lives today.
The original tank sticker. It was removed from the car in 1992 when it was restored. A video documents this. All options are listed as they should be.
The owners POP shows the car was sold from Paget-Greer Chevrolet in South Carolina. This is where the original owner went to college. This is the original dealer tag and the dealer has been out of business for many years.
Of course the Welcome to the Corvette set is still with the car. It includes a Corvette magazine, a congratulations letter from GM along with a Corvette patch and plastic corvette owners card containing the original owners name, VIN number and key numbers.
The first glimpse into the mileage of the car was in January 23 1968 when the protect-o-plate booklet states that the mileage was 11,195 miles during a scheduled service.
In early 1971, the car was purchased by it's second owner Bill Morgan with signed documents from Bill stating that Jim was in the process of raising a family and needed a bigger more practical car. Bill was a school teacher at the time and fell in love with the car and ended up purchasing it from Jim with ~70K miles on the car. Seems about right using the 12K per year rule of thumb. After Bill purchased the car, which he states was for investment reasons given the options on the car, he decided to put it in his garage until 1992. The car was stored in his garage for more than 20 years.
Here's a picture of the odometer as it was heading into the restoration shop in 1992 showing 70,618 miles.
The car took several months to restore and Bill decided to take it to an NCRS regional meet in April of 1993 where the car scored 91.4 points (more details later).
Bill held the car till 2002 when it was reluctantly sold via a broker to the third owner Steve Mirlocca who lives in New Hampshire. The entire time Bill owned the car (from 1971 to 2002) he drove it less than 1k miles. When Steve purchased the car it had 71,426 miles as documented by a service receipt from Rod's Automotive in New Hampshire as well as Bill himself stating in a signed letter that he "never drove the car". Additionally, there are dozens of receipts from Steve over the 8 or so years he owned the car documenting the mileage as 76,984 from the NH department of safety on 4/06, 78K on 5/7 from the NH department of safety, 79K on 4/8 from the NH department of safety, and finally 80K on 5/9 from the NH department of safety.
Here's the Hemming's advertisement that the person who purchased the car from Bill used to make a quick buck. I have the 2003 Hemming's showing the advertisement. I still have contact with Bill and he's bitter about selling the car to someone who simply wanted to make a quick buck.
Steve decided to sell the car in 2010 when I purchased it - via a broker Greg Wyatt - and the car arrived with the odometer reading of 81,629 miles. It currently has about 82K miles.
Here's a picture of the trim tag. About as pristine as you could imagine. 467 - Convertible, 450-White and Bright Blue interior, 976AA - Bright blue (Marina Blue).
Steve decided to sell the car in 2010 when I purchased it - via a broker Greg Wyatt - and the car arrived with the odometer reading of 81,629 miles. It currently has about 82K miles.
Here's a current picture of the engine stamp. It shows 7104956 (partial VIN) on the left and VIII0HP on the right signifying November 11th and HP (L79, Manual transmission, A/C).
