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[Music] welcome to Corvette Today the show that
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talks about everything Corvette with your host Steve Garrett lifetime member of the National Corvette Museum
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president of the Corvette Club of Kansas City Missouri and radio disc jockey at the number one radio station in Kansas
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City for over 45 years here's Steve Garrett
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thanks for listening and watching Corvette Today the show that talks about everything Corvette and the only current
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podcast dedicated to Corvette i'm your host Steve Garrett i appreciate you tuning in corvette Today is brought to
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you by Wheelcraft want to dress up your Corvette with bright chrome or black chrome wheels visit wheelcraft.com and
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world my very special guest on today's show is a repeat guest he sought out
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found and restored more significant Corvettes than anybody else in the entire Corvette community his book
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called The Corvette Hunter chronicleizes all the famous Corvettes that are in his Corvette universe he's also celebrating
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40 years in business with his world famous shop Corvette Repair in Long Island New York his name is Kevin McCay
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kevin welcome back to Corvette Today my friend well Steve it's always a pleasure always look forward to our conversations
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i do too buddy first of all everybody let me give you a little Corvette Today history about Kevin McKay first of all
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Kevin is a master storyteller he was first on Corvette today number 14 we
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talked about his book The Corvette Hunter he was also on episode number 74 when we were talking about the number
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one Lamont Corvette from 1960 and finally he was on episode number 174
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where he found the number three Lamont Corvette restored it and brought all three Briggs Cunningham Lemon Corvettes
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back together for the very first time in 60 years that happened in 2023 and today
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we're going to talk more about his shop and the 40-year celebration of Corvette Repair first of all buddy let's start
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from the very beginning when did you realize you were a Corvette guy you know it's funny you mentioned that Steve i
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was probably seven eight years old i was holding my dad's hand crossing the street i see this amazing car with these
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chrome strips on the trunk i go "Dad what kind of car is that?" Goes "Oh that's a Corvette." And I knew at the
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time I didn't know what year it was Corvette but I remember vividly in my mind the chrome strips on the trunk area
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i said you know that's the 58 that I really made an impact on my life as a kid and I've always into little race
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cars and tractors and trucks you know anything with wheels on it bicycles and the whole bit so that always stuck to me
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and then later on in life I said "Boy you know the more I look at those cars the more I really appreciate the style
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the aggressiveness of the cars itself." So it made a big impact in my life absolutely so when you started working
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in the car community what was your first job i went to an automotive school i took second class i just ate it up i
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just love the theory on the mechanics of it after I graduated from the automotive school my dad goes "Look if you're going
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to be a grease monkey mechanic you better get the benefits you got to get paid holidays you got to get vacation
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time the whole nine yards here." So I looked around and with the assist of the schooling that I went to I got a job
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working at car dealerships and I worked at five different Chevrolet dealerships
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wow think about this i mean working for Chevrolet you work on Citations and you work on and you work on Impalas and you
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work on Camaros and Chevels and you also work on Corvettes corvettes was a treat
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for me because they were aggressive and they were sporty and I would go on a road test and people would give me a
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thumbs up i remember I doing a cam shift on a 66 white convertible wow and I see the girls winking at me i said you know
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this is my kind of car absolutely if it gets you girls that's my car now in 1984
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it all started with a dream tell me more about that well I just fell in love with the Corvette i bought my first Corvette
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when I was 23 years of age it was a red Corvette a 64 convertible i took my
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whole life savings of $3,800 out of the bank and I went there 2 hours spending the guy was asking
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$4,500 for the car i took all my life savings i said "That's all I have sir." He goes "Well I'm sorry i'm not going to let it go that cheap." And I walked down
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the driveway and I hear his wife yell out "Young man can you hold on one second please honey can you come in the
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house for a second?" Next thing I hear pots and pans throwing at him and she's screaming at him "Will you sell the car
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to the damn kid you taking his whole life savings away just get rid of the damn car you had the car for many many
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years thank God for the wife." And she came out house uh young man the car is yours we'll take what you have that's an
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amazing story brought the car home drove it home i took place off my other car drove it home and I put in the driveway
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my parents came out of the house my father goes "What the hell is this?" I said "Dad it's a Corvette where's the trunk?" I said "It's a 64 doesn't have a
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trunk it only got one seat in it." "Well you're me and a hot chick." The rest was history i took over from that and started getting all the car magazines
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and reading about the history of Corvette and I just fell in love with it and go to the library because back then there was no internet back then
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everything was just by Defuse magazine and some of the other old magazines on the market at the time and I just kept
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reading about it learning the history about them and I just enjoyed it that's awesome now in 1985 you started Corvette
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Repair in a one bay garage with a lift didn't you yes I did every job I've ever
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had I got fired from Steve i wasn't too good at taking orders too well and I did my own thing i saw an old repair place
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been there for many many years the back of the shop you can see it was kind of abandoned they just kept putting parts
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back there and I went there one day i said you know I'd like to rent out that rear bay if it's okay what do you want
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to do i just want to work on Corvettes you know I worked at five different Chevrolet dealerships i have a little experience and it would be kind of cool
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if I could start my little business right out of that one bay garage and he said okay it's going to be 400 bucks a
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month so I kind of calculated in my head well $400 a month not too bad it's $20 a day i think I could swing it and we're
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on a major road called Sunrise Highway right here in Valley Street not too far from my parents house and I put up the
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sign Corvette repair with an S because at the time I wasn't really incorporated i was just starting out i was just
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trying to get a feel of things i own two Corvettes at the time i own a 64 Corvette convertible and a 65 coupe and
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I put them on there and I just put the word repairs on them and they started flocking in and from the day I opened up
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that shop I was always busy fantastic now in 1987 you moved the business into
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a newly constructed facility is that the one you're still in today yes the building was built in ' 86 i moved in
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here in ' 87 i've been here ever since kind of an odd story where one of my
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clients was in the real estate business and the contracting business and he said "You know Kevin we got something here
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every time I come here it's a main house here." And I was able in the one bay I was able three Corvettes one lift with three Corvettes i would put one car up
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in the air and a Corvette on each side of it he goes "You know I got this piece of property it's zone industrial right in Valley Stream it's probably about
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eight blocks away i could build you a shop." I said "What you can?" "Well I think so oh I mean it's own industrial
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but you got to get a loan i said "Okay cuz you got to go to your bank and get a loan and maybe we could work something out." I said "Okay." So I go down to the
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bank i sit down i was in my 20s and they asked "What kind of credit you have?" And I take out my wallet i said "Well I
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get a serious credit card." The woman looks at me he goes "Well you look bad not going to cut it the serious credit cards I we need more than that." I said
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"Well I'm sorry but we just can't give you a loan." And I went back to my customer and I said "Jimmy," I said "Look I really want the property i want
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you to build me something this is something a dream come true." He goes "Look I might be out of my mind Kevin but guess what i'll hold the mortgage
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for you." And that's what happened so you held the mortgage for me at 13% wow
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$4,000 a month was my mortgage i had to come up with $1,000 a week for 15 years and you know something I was never laid
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on a payment and I was able to pull it off i just worked 7 days a week 14-hour days whatever it took to keep that shop
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open and he built me my dream shop at the time but I kind of outgrew it but we're still busy and I'm so fortunate to
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have a great team behind me cuz I've always said this it's not just one individual it's all about your team and
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I've had some very gifted and craftsman work for me for many many years and to this day I've been very blessed you do
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have a fantastic team of people working for you and buddy like everybody says the rest is history isn't it it really
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is and you know something what you put into it is what you get out of it and I like to be treated the way I treat my
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workers and that's why we're like family here i have guys here over 30 years that's fantastic well buddy let's take
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our first break when we come back we're going to talk about some of the famous Corvettes you found and restored that's
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i'm Harlon Charles and you're listening and watching Corvette Today with Steve
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today or just give him a call 833-639-4231 i'm your host Steve Garrett
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with me is my buddy Kevin McCay we are celebrating 40 years of his world famous shop Corvette Repair in Long Island New
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York kevin you're famously known as the Corvette Hunter let's list out a few of the monumental Corvettes that you found
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and restored oh there's a long list Steve top of my head basically of course Bobby one of the most famous cars of car
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number three and car number one Bricks going to hand Lemon's Corvette i've survived believe it or not and I think I
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told you a while back that just rode to Lama and I was able to get the holy grail of gun numbers of Corvettes that
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race at Lama and I just went shopping most of the cars that people had in their collection or in their garage had
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no idea what they were so I had an advantage because I knew the history of the cars people that had these cars
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probably bought them as a street car and that's what happened most of these race cars were converted back to street so I just been fortunate to get those cars
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the Rebel car we found in a junkyard bought for seven grand and car sold in 2014 at Barrett Jackson for $2.68
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million which is the record a factory ZL1 that we did for 3 million $140,000
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believe it or not wow uh years ago so it's been a great ride we did a 56 Cbring car 57 CERN car a couple of
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motion cars a phase three a phase 3 GT we worked on the 62 the only 62 Corvette
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that went to Lama worked on one of only two built hyphen SR2s that went to Sebring in 1958 as car number three the
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the number 48 4950 cars we worked on the BFG cars did restorations on those
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number four Rebel Lemon's car the Serve 2 XP819 which is a permanent display at
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the National Corvette Museum the Owens Corning Corvette that was also one of the winningest Corvettes ever in history
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the Sunray DX cars we worked on the class winner car 1968 car number three
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we also worked on car number two we also worked on the Gulf Oil car that was also a Sebring Daytona class winner also
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worked on a one of one the Pina Rodin Corvette we worked on We Styling cars i
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worked on a three or four maybe five factory 67 LED8s as well we've been fortunate it just keeps going on it does
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keep going on and you have been fortunate my friend also let's talk a little bit more about the see-through Corvettes the famous 53 Corvette cutaway
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car that's on display at the National Corvette Museum well that's a great story i remember looking at that chassis
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back in 1982 at the insurance national regional meet down at Cypress Gardens Florida and I had a big son at believe
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it or not O3 the world's oldest production chassis in existence and I followed that car and then the car the
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chassis vanished i saw it on eBay for sale i said I don't believe that chassis is for sale it was a rolling chassis i
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said boy that would make a great display maybe building either a drivable chassis which we've done or some kind of
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suspended body exhibit we've also put chassed sideways a sideways display so I
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said you know I have a real good friend of mine named Ed Force who was a big collector most of his cars in his collection had about 46 cars Corvettes
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most of his cars were 10,000 original miles but we did quite a bit of work for him over the years and I called him i said "Ed I got this oldest production
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chassis on eBay it's advertised for sale we could build something crazy." He goes "You know something Kevin give me the item number." I give the item number he
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works out deal with the owner of the car who was an attorney actually buys the chassis brings it here and I go ahead
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what do you want to do he goes "You know it's up to you i could do dry drivable chassis." Yeah we done that before we could put a chassis on it side display
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that i call a sideways Corvette he goes "Ah yeah that is pretty cool you've done that for me already." Well we could do a cutaway car cutaway car what side is the
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VIN number i said "Well the side of the VIN number is on the driver's side." He goes "Let's do a cutaway car and let's keep the driver's side open so they can
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see the VIN number." I said "That's great." So we got a donor body a 1954 Corvette donut body and we designed it
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on on a couple of pieces of looseleaf paper it was about 5,000 man hours two years later we put it all together and
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the car was a tremendous hit this is a drivable cutaway car everything was functional on the car and it was just a
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great educational display i just love people taking photographs and taking notes and just learning what the inner
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workings of an early early Corvette was and knowing this was the actual oldest production Corvette chassis in existence
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which I believe it still is it was just really cool we campaign that car everywhere ed did a great job uh
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preserving history and he donated to the National Corvette Museum which is a permanent display there for the rest of
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his time there that's fantastic i'm thrilled every time I go there I just pinch myself i'm just so proud of that
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being there what's nice about that they even have all the restoration photographs that I gave to them step by
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step how it started from the very beginning to the very end how it was built that's cool like a PowerPoint
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presentation they did that was really fun i was really taken back by that but they asked me Kevin we'd like to get some photographs so the restoration so
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I'll give you the whole file and they just took it and ran with it which is wonderful but what we're going to do in the future here at Force we did another
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C2 see-through Corvette for him so our plan is hopefully in the near future if the Force family allows it I've been
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dealing with their son Matt have the C1 C2 and C3 cutaway cars all together ooh
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that'd be cool i know that Chevrolet has a C8 cutaway car and we'll put that in there too it'd be great to have all
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these educational displays and the inner workings of different technology in different years what's this all about here talking about an education just be
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mind-blowing to me that's fantastic and you know what i would be remiss if we didn't tell the story about the 1960
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number three Corvette from Briggs Cunningham and Chip Miller that's a fantastic story well Chip and I were
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best of friends for many many years we had a lot in common and we talked every day sometimes two three times a day and
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we traveled together we went camping together we went to the movies together god knows how many times we went out to
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dinner and breakfast and lunch and we just had just wonderful relationship i got real close with him because Lance
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his son was in college so he took me under his wing i even had Trip's wife Judy do my laundry for me it was great
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we had a lot of fun it was just a wonderful family an amazing event carlile events i haven't missed a
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Corvvis at Carile well I think they first came in in 1982 and I've been there ever since i just love it and I
21:52
love the people and I just love looking at old parts but to get back to your point here we talked about this where I
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wrote to Lama and I was able to get the holy grail of VIN numbers of all the Caressa rac and so we went shopping and
22:04
the car was originally was going to be for me but Chip the way he was he was such a gentleman and such he did have a
22:09
bad bone in his body he says "Kevin if you ever decide that you would give up that car that's my all-time favorite
22:16
car." He goes "Matter of fact I graduated high school in 1960 i remember that car went over to Lamar i really like to have that car if you ever got it
22:22
and I said you know something Chip we're best of friends there's another car I'm going after i can't own them all after
22:27
fun is the hunt in the chase we know where the car was but the guy just didn't want to sell at the time i said you know something i'm going to get you
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the number three Cunningham lemons Corvette and I'm going to go after that Roger Pensy number nine Corvette that's
22:38
what I wanted in my collection and it worked out where we got him the Cunningham number three car i got the Penske car and we showed him together
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and we just had a blast doing it that car is owned now by the Irwin Croy collection who has that car and it could
22:52
go to a better home he's taken great care of it we normally show that car and we show the number one car together
22:58
quite a few times we went out to Monteray when they had the celebration of Chevrolet's 75th anniversary and that
23:03
was a lot of fun we're going to keep plugging away on those cars here you know reniting the original drivers of
23:08
the car because when we're in the middle of a restoration back in 2001 when Chip finally got the car we did our birthday
23:14
celebration his 58th birthday and we had Bob Gman and John Fitch here at the shop looking at the car to make sure it was
23:21
the number three car which it turned out to be that's fantastic and that number three Cunningham Corvette went back to
23:26
Lamad to celebrate the 50th anniversary with Lance Miller too that's a great story in and of itself well Chip his
23:33
dream was supposed was to go there together with both drivers and have Bob and John drive that car around the track
23:39
for the 50th anniversary because they were there from 1960 here it is 2010 and that was our plan of course Bob Gman
23:45
passed away just before we finished the car and of course Chip we know that story he got gravely ill and he passed
23:51
away but before he passed away he told his son "Promise me you'll take that car back to Lamar promise me." And of course
23:58
Lance did exactly what he promised his dad that I will take it back over to Lamar and give you my word and the rest
24:03
is history so knowing that John Fish here he is 92 years old going around that track where he was 50 years prior
24:10
is truly amazing with that car it really was it really was he was treated like a rock star too wasn't he oh they were
24:16
singing that guy signs he could be any more of a humble gentleman he took his naps during the day john was just an
24:23
incredible human being and what a hero he was i mean he was shot down in a plane and hid for a couple days at the
24:29
end it was end of the war in 1945 and he survived he was very lucky and he was also engaged to one of the Kennedys i
24:35
think I told you this he was engaged to Kathleen Kennedy he used to play football with John and Ted and Robert
24:40
and he said you know Kevin the mother loved me i said "What happened?" He goes "Man she was high maintenance so I couldn't afford her anymore you know and
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I was at I go on the sailboat with them i played football with them up there in Boston area." He goes "Oh yeah it was a
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great family to know." So John just had all these amazing stories about his life
24:57
he lived a great life you know he lived until he was you know in his 90s it's just amazing that is amazing well buddy
25:03
let's take our final break when we come back we're going to talk about more career highlights for you with Kevin McCay here on Corvette
25:11
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other Corvette organization does this and they're available for purchase members also receive the bimonthly and
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award-winning Restore Magazine and Driveline magazine throughout the year we also host an extensive technical
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ncs.org when you want to buy a Corvette or any Chevrolet for that matter get yours from Hendrickk Chevrolet Shauny
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from sales to service to collision repair Hendrickk Chevrolet has you covered visit chevusa.com or call
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913-384-1550 hi I'm Mark Falter host of the Retirement Income Hour podcast and Corvette enthusiast i know when I bought
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my Z06 I was thinking two things these cars are fantastically fast and wow are
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they expensive owning a Corvette isn't just about driving fast it's about living life in the fast lane but are
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your finances keeping up on my podcast I'll make wealth management as smooth as
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your Corvette on the open road whether it's planning a retirement building your investments or how in the heck do I get
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my retirement accounts to pay for this Corvette I have got you covered search the Retirement Income Hour podcast
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wherever you find your podcast and let's shift your finances into overdrive i'll see you on the open road financially and
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literally investment advisory services offered through Mid American Wealth Advisory Group an SEC registered
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investment advisory firm hi this is Kirk Benyan and you're
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listening and watching Corvette Today with Steve Garrett hey thanks for
28:32
listening and watching Corvette Today the show that talks about everything Corvette corvette Today is brought to
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call 833-639-4231 i'm your host Steve Garrett
29:02
with me is my buddy Kevin McCay kevin has been in business for 40 years on Long Island New York in Valley Stream
29:09
and he has got Corvette Repair we are celebrating 40 years at Corvette Repair kevin you've been nominated for the
29:15
Corvette Hall of Fame multiple times and in 2012 you were also inducted into the
29:20
Bloomington Great Hall tell me that story about Bloomington i was really very blessed nothing better than your
29:27
peers vote you in i just love what I do Steve that's always been my focus i just
29:32
love the people i love the history i love the challenge i just love hunting down these cars that might have been
29:38
gone forever you know whether I found him in junkyards or barns or behind someone's house i just love that whole
29:43
thing and knowing that I was considered and then I got inducted into the great hall has just been a dream come true for
29:49
me my family was proud of me and all that sacrifice I did and hard work over the years you know working those 14-hour
29:56
days six seven days a week it really really paid off and it's nothing better than to be recognized for what you you
30:03
work so hard for but remember it's more of a passion and a drive and a love of what I love to do it's been my whole
30:09
life i mean Steve I didn't get married till I was 50 years old for a reason wow you I missed out raising a family i just
30:15
couldn't wait to go to another show and see a lot of my friends and hunt down another rare car or finishing a really
30:21
special car with great history and here I'm going to debut it for the first time it was really my life i'm going to
30:27
continue on and when I got married I told my wife I said "Honey I love you for who you are and I hope you love me
30:33
for who I am but I'm not going to change you i'm in my 50s it's going to be pretty tough to change me." And she supports me and she's been terrific i'm
30:40
a little bit stubborn i'm always on a mission it's been great but yes I'm fortunate and I know I've been considered for the Hall of Fame multiple
30:47
times i'm very blessed about that too and I've been there from the very beginning i'm one of the original founding members of the National
30:54
Cor i had cars in the Corvette annex i helped out with the suspended body exhibit at the Corvette Museum back in
31:00
'94 i went down there a week before set it all up i had the Rebel Corvette there was one of the first cars I got into the
31:06
National Court Museum back in 1994 and I think I had six or seven cars there now on display today besides the number
31:13
three cutaway car and my 69 see-through car and I have a couple of race cars there over the years the XP819 car
31:20
there's another permanent display there which is great a client of mine donated it to National Corporate Museum so I've
31:25
been very very involved with it i mean I worked with Dan Gail who was the head man i've also worked with a guy named
31:30
Ray Batalini who's still involved also in the Hall of Fame in that museum i worked with him back then back in the
31:35
early early 90s it's just been a great ride we We had drivable chassis there suspend body exhibits there and
31:41
everything else but it's been great you deserve to be in the Corvette Hall of Fame at the National Corvette Museum that's for sure buddy that's okay i mean
31:48
I'm not going to change my life i'm going to continue what I love to do and just go to events and have fun yeah now
31:53
in segment number two we talked about the number three Cunningham Corvette but you also found the number one Cunningham
31:59
Corvette and restored it now Bruce Meyer from the Peterson Automotive Museum in Los Angeles owns car number two which is
32:05
on display there at the Peterson but in 2023 you brought all three Cunningham Corvettes back together after being
32:12
apart for 60 years tell that story of how you found that number one car restored it and then brought all three
32:18
back together well Steve that was 63 years in the making and Bruce Meers got
32:24
that car through my connection because Bruce heard through the grapevine that when I knew where the number three car
32:29
was he wanted to purchase that car and I said "Look I promised a mutual friend of ours named Chip Miller." Oh Chip's such
32:36
a wonderful guy i said "I know." And I already promised that car to him he goes "Well I want to get a car with Hallebrand wheels on it and I want to
32:41
get a car that went Lamont." I said "Well the only other car at the time has been located was found by Michael
32:47
Pillsbury who is no longer with us anymore." The family sold out to two brothers up in Connecticut and that was
32:53
the number two car and I was able to get Bruce and the two brothers together and they worked out their own deal and they
32:59
got the number two car together which is great so the only car left to find was number one car it took me 19 years to
33:05
get that car that car just kind of fell on our lap when I was getting inducted into the great hall at Bloomington lance
33:11
Miller gets a call from a gentleman up in Connecticut he said "Hey you're not going to believe this i just got a call from a guy down near Tampa area that he
33:18
claims he just found the number one car." He said he left the body off to look at the numbers on the chassis and
33:23
it had VIN number 3535 and he went on Google search came up the Cunningham website that was a missing number one
33:30
car wow i'm about to get inducted lance calls me out and goes "You're not going to believe us they found the number one car." I said "What are you talking
33:35
about?" I said "No Lance I know you like to kid with me and play with me all the time listen to me this is my big moment
33:41
let's talk about this later." He goes "No I'm not joking around." And sure enough he wasn't joking around when I got back from Bloomington I checked my
33:47
email and I knew instantly it was number one car because the photographs I got from the gentleman down in Tamper had
33:53
the wiper hole still in the car which they moved it from the outboard into the
33:58
middle of the body that was Cunningham's trademark so I knew it in probably half a second that was the missing Cunningham
34:04
car eventually I was able to get it went through a legal battle which is behind us the car went for a public auction and
34:10
the Cunningham family bought the car back i approached the Cunningham family at the National Corbin Museum they were
34:16
there because Briggs Cunningham was getting inducted into the Hall of Fame and I went up to the family and I said
34:22
"By the way I know where the number one car is," which actually that Briggs personally drove himself at Lama in 1960
34:28
wow took my card and they called me a couple months later and they said "Miss McKay we did a little background check
34:34
on you and we know you're for real we have a great interest to get that car back with the family." Of course rest is
34:40
history they got the car purchased it at auction sent it directly to us and we did a complete restoration cuz the car
34:46
the car was really a train wreck Steve it was pretty bad we saw the photographs of it online we brought it back to life
34:52
and we came up with idea we debut at the Ritz Call down in Mill Island we got hold of Mr myers and we had all three
34:59
cars together we watched the movie The Quest which is an amazing movie if you haven't seen that movie I highly
35:05
recommend it talks about the history of other Cunningham race effort at Lamar in 1960 and having all three cars together
35:11
but was really neat about it I had to get permission from the family i made up a custommade mask of Briggs Cunningham
35:17
and at the end of the movie I sat in the car with a car cover over me and we unveiled the cover i'm looking right at
35:22
the daughter who's like 78 years old the baby daughter Bricks Cunningham she's looking right at me and for a split
35:28
couple seconds she thought she was actually looking at her father behind the wheel of the car that's fantastic i was down there with you at Amelia Island
35:35
there and it was a fantastic event was that great or what and I was wearing John Fish's original uniform they raced
35:40
at Lama oh my gosh to bar that just for that but people were in all they were clapping it was just a highlight of my
35:47
life believe me doing that but I had to get permission from the family they had that me look whatever you do don't tell
35:52
your mother of course the grandson her son just said "We got to do this Kevin."
35:57
And we did it it was fantastic now buddy you've put out a book called The Corvette Hunter talk a little bit more
36:03
about the book and where you can still purchase it well the book is sold out but I have probably a couple of cases
36:08
left it sold out within a year you can buy it on my website which is corvette repair.com and I'll be glad to sign it
36:15
for you and it's just some of the cars that we hunted down and restored and some great stories you know Steve I only
36:22
have a high school education i was a pretty good athlete but I was a lousy student my fortune was working with my
36:27
hands putting gadgets together that was my thing i'm not the kind of guy to go behind a desk i was kind of guy that
36:32
would be underneath the car you know working on something anything mechanically I always love i love putting models together i never read the
36:38
directions i just looked at something figured it out on my own and I made my mistakes along the way like everybody else has but you learn from your
36:44
mistakes and then you improve as you go along it's just been an amazing ride for me because I know where I started i
36:50
haven't changed a bit i'm very fortunate that we've been so recognized in this hobby just about passion and just loving
36:56
the history and loving the people and as long as I got my health Steve I'm going to keep on plugging away here i still
37:02
work my 14-hour days coming here at 5:30 a.m in the morning and leaving here at 8:30 9:00 at night wow that's amazing
37:08
buddy you've been doing it for a long time too let's talk about some of the accolades that you've got because you've got achievement awards magazine covers
37:16
sports car market awards all those kind of things too we're in over maybe 120 cover cars cars that we worked on along
37:23
the way i didn't realize that we were on that many covers but I started putting them all together here and I put it like a little collage of all the magazine
37:29
covers that we made it's amazing how these cars could have been gone forever like guys like me made an effort to find
37:35
some of these amazing cars with great history and preserve the history and to tell the story bringing people together
37:42
and bringing the old-timers together and a lot of these oldtime racers I became great friends with spend the weekend
37:47
with them i just love the history the history has to be told because we're not going to be here forever Steve so as
37:52
long as I can preserve the history and tell the story that's what it's all about with me i'm going to keep on going
37:58
there's a couple other cars I want to go after i found them but I can't tell them who I am because they'll do a Google search on me and I'll find out I'm going
38:04
to lose that car yeah tell me what you're working on now and if someone wants to reach out to you how can they get a hold of you well we got some
38:11
special cars in our shop we've always have some special cars in our shop here we have the 100th Corvette ever made
38:16
1953 SH number 10 0 we're doing a nutbolt restoration on that car it's
38:22
going to be a pretty boy we also have another car that's one of one it's a tuxedo black silver leather headrest 66
38:28
and a quarter car most people say that doesn't exist well we're showing it this weekend actually we're going to an SSV meet and then we're going to bring
38:34
Bloomington to show it to go for the gold we also have the only 68 factory LED 9 cart black with red interior
38:41
convertible no one's ever seen one well documented we also have here a 24,000 milei black-on-black sidepipe 435 car
38:48
survivor car the guy had for 50 years i just bought that car a couple years ago and we're going to show that these next
38:55
couple of weeks also we have a 06 tanker that came out of Yanko Chevrolet we have another 66 4 and a quarter tanker the
39:01
guy had for 53 years we have also a 69 factory sidepipe LDA car that we're
39:07
working on right now get that car ready for Bloomington so that's some of the projects that we have here so we're staying pretty busy yeah you are if
39:13
someone wants to reach out to you there at Corvette Repair how can they do that Kevin very very simple here just go
39:19
right to my website corvetterepair.com and throw an email at me and I'll respond usually within 24 hours that's
39:25
awesome buddy thank you so much for being back on Corvette today congratulations on 40 years of Corvette
39:31
repair i appreciate you your family buddy steve it's been great and I tell you're knocking out of the park too my
39:37
friend you work your tail off you deserve it what you put into is what you get out of it and I'm really proud of you too i remember when you had one
39:43
segment now you have what 280 i don't even know i lost count here Steve but you just keep doing what you're doing because we're going to rock this hobby
39:49
so that's what I want to do all right be well my friend okay absolutely buddy thanks again for listening and watching
39:54
Corvette Today and be sure to tell your family friends and other Corvette enthusiasts about the Corvette Today
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Falter with the Retirement Income Hour podcast and Hendrick Chevrolet in Kansas City at
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