Black Ghost - Hemi Challenger

[William]

Mecum gets much criticism for not vetting old muscle as B-J does. Those days are quickly fading as dockets are increasingly trucks, resto-mods, late model exotics. No need to vet those. With their busy schedule, they are eating B-Js lunch.

Wonder what direction the new B-J ownership will take.

[Pro Stock John]

Tony is a long time performance car journalist.

I think his points are valid, the car was all stock and most likely the owner simply took it out once in a while and ran some other folks from a light when cruising.

[juliosz]

I guess I don’t recall anyone saying it ran against the famous Detroit street cars. This guy, is forgetting one thing, nobody twisted anyone’s arm to pay $975k.

One by one, the guys who were there are leaving us. Now what mostly remains are guys like this who think they know the Detroit street scene from back in the day, which they don’t.

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by juliosz

One by one, the guys who were there are leaving us. Now what mostly remains are guys like this who think they know the Detroit street scene from back in the day, which they don’t.

I've lived near and hung out on Woodward my entire life.

I'm really sorry - but I never heard of the Black Ghost until a couple years ago.

My Pontiac buds that I have asked had not either.

K

[TarheelRyan]

As the high bidder of the Black Ghost, here is my 2 cents worth. It is a fully documented, triple black, "original" numbers matching Hemi Challenger R/T SE 4 speed with a gator grain top. The documentation for the car is in the top 1% of all Mopar's. As for the history of this car, I will listen to (1) Dodge Factory; (2) Hagerty; (3) Bob Ashton; (4) Dave Wise; and (5) the Qualls' family any day of the week over Uncle Tony's Garage.

Over the past 2 days, I have seen the absolute best and worst of the classic/muscle car community in its treatment of this car. As far as I'm concerned, it is a bad ass Hemi Challenger with a trailer hitch that has a pretty cool backstory...embellished or not.

[70 copo]

Originally Posted by TarheelRyan

As the high bidder of the Black Ghost, here is my 2 cents worth. It is a fully documented, triple black, "original" numbers matching Hemi Challenger R/T SE 4 speed with a gator grain top. The documentation for the car is in the top 1% of all Mopar's. As for the history of this car, I will listen to (1) Dodge Factory; (2) Hagerty; (3) Bob Ashton; (4) Dave Wise; and (5) the Qualls' family any day of the week over Uncle Tony's Garage.

Over the past 2 days, I have seen the absolute best and worst of the classic/muscle car community in its treatment of this car. As far as I'm concerned, it is a bad ass Hemi Challenger with a trailer hitch that has a pretty cool backstory...embellished or not.

Outstanding and congrats, are you planning to see how she runs on the track?

[TarheelRyan]

I have no plans of running it down the track as I think a Hyundai Sonata probably has a better 1/4 mile time than a bone stock 70 Hemi Challenger. Next month, I will probably load it in the trailer and take it down to the local cars and coffee meet where there will be a sea of Porsche's, McLaren's, etc. My hope is a young kid or 2 will see it and take interest in it or it will bring back a good memory for some old timer walking around. Too many of these cars are getting bought up and stored away in private collections. There are a few of us trying to buy these cars to share with others and keep the hobby alive, but then we have to deal with bullshit like the Uncle Tony's Garage video. The sad thing is Uncle Tony knows what he is talking about and he should be spending his time sharing his knowledge and celebrating the muscle cars of yesterday instead of trashing them to earn ad revenue. For the record, there was NOTHING Mecum said or did to impact my decision to buy this car. I was not scammed by anyone in my decision to buy the car. I was just one of several hundred people at Mecum that day that overpaid for a car...nothing less and nothing more. My garage is open to anyone at anytime. If anyone that reads this message is ever in the Bradenton, Florida area, shoot me a message as you are welcome to stop by...and yes The Black Ghost will be there.

[Stefano]

Originally Posted by TarheelRyan

I have no plans of running it down the track as I think a Hyundai Sonata probably has a better 1/4 mile time than a bone stock 70 Hemi Challenger. Next month, I will probably load it in the trailer and take it down to the local cars and coffee meet where there will be a sea of Porsche's, McLaren's, etc. My hope is a young kid or 2 will see it and take interest in it or it will bring back a good memory for some old timer walking around. Too many of these cars are getting bought up and stored away in private collections. There are a few of us trying to buy these cars to share with others and keep the hobby alive, but then we have to deal with bullshit like the Uncle Tony's Garage video. The sad thing is Uncle Tony knows what he is talking about and he should be spending his time sharing his knowledge and celebrating the muscle cars of yesterday instead of trashing them to earn ad revenue. For the record, there was NOTHING Mecum said or did to impact my decision to buy this car. I was not scammed by anyone in my decision to buy the car. I was just one of several hundred people at Mecum that day that overpaid for a car...nothing less and nothing more. My garage is open to anyone at anytime. If anyone that reads this message is ever in the Bradenton, Florida area, shoot me a message as you are welcome to stop by...and yes The Black Ghost will be there.

Congrats on your latest acquisition!

[southernfriedcj]

Originally Posted by TarheelRyan

I was just one of several hundred people at Mecum that day that overpaid for a car...nothing less and nothing more. My garage is open to anyone at anytime. If anyone that reads this message is ever in the Bradenton, Florida area, shoot me a message as you are welcome to stop by...and yes The Black Ghost will be there.

You didn't overpay. You paid what the car was worth to you.

Next time I'm down your way I'd love to see the car. I'm one of the folks that prefers Challengers over Cudas. I owned a couple Challenger T/As myself.

[lowmile]

Every town in America had guys and cars that street raced. Did this story seem over done sure it did. A few years I was standing around in a group of seven or eight guys at a cars show about 30 miles from my home town. I didn't know any of them but they were swapping street racing stories, one of them brings up my name and starts in on a story. They don't know its me standing there and I don't say a word. The guy tells the story and I sound like a street racing legend so of course I just sit back and listen because to hear him tell it I was a lot meaner and my car was a hell of lot faster than it ever was. I walked off and chuckled to myself. not about to set the record straight. I said all that to say this, no car from that era ever gets slower or the the story less intense, as time passes. I would the imagine that the person who purchased the car did it for the car itself and took the story for for what it is, one more embellished tale about a time and passion that we'd all like to revisit.