Locating previous owner
 

Hi folks,

Some of you know that my dad passed in 2022, and I’m now the caretaker of his 1961 Corvette that he bought in 1965. I just located the bill of sale from that transaction, and the seller was Robert R Dawson from Markham, IL (I also have his mailing address). An hour or so of Google searches hasn’t turned anything up. What do you recommend? I have zero expectations given this transaction took place 59 years ago.

Thanks!

Also - I have at least 3" worth of receipts dating back to 1965, including a lot of old Chicago area Chevy dealerships and speed shops. I'll scan some of those and post them. I'm glad he saved so much of this stuff (but I wish there was more from the selling dealer - which I believe was Bill Becker - but I only have the manila folder with the dealer's name on it).

Try a Facebook search with same, similar name from Illinois. Given his likely age, he probably doesn't have a Facebook account, but one of his kids might. I found one of my cars prior owners when a child of the owner responded to a Facebook message.

I hired a guy a few years ago that helped me find 2 owners of cars I had. If your interested I’ll get the info.. I think Tim Napa68 used him too

Thanks, guys. I located his record on Ancestry and he passed in 1989, so I reached out to a family member hoping there are a few pictures (or at least a few memories) out there.

Most states are pretty tight with the DMV records due to privacy laws. I found the original owner of my Z/28 by using the county property records. If your county has upgraded to on-line records you can sign up and search away. I found the ex wife of the original owner had sold the house that was listed on the dealer invoice, with that I searched and found where she had moved to. During a phone call, she had a lot of good memories about the car, not so much with the ex. She gave me a bunch of his old friends names that used to help him work on the car.

I was just finishing a restoration, and asked her if she and her kids would like tickets to the first showing of the car at a local show. Some of the kids had no recollection of it. That summer one of their grand kids was having a graduation party which the original owner would be back in the state for. A time was set for me to pull in the driveway as a surprise.

After a long inspection, I handed him the keys and said lets go for a ride. We went about a mile up the road and he turned in to a school parking lot and said he had to go back. I mentioned I had a full tank of gas and thought the ride would be a little longer than that. He took his hand off the shifter and it was shaking pretty good. We pulled out of the parking lot, he wound up first gear, snagged second, then slid into fourth with a big smile on his face.

Sorry for the long story. I've owned this car 45 years, drove it up Pikes Peak and been through Legends Judging, all with lots of good memories.

Mike