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Hi All,
I am fortunate enough to be posting from beautiful Scottsdale, AZ. Not to rub it in but the weather is mid 70’s and we’ve yet to see a cloud! Quite a contrast from the typhoon of last year and a much needed break from the subzero temps back home!I will be checking in the next couple days with updates from the Barrett Jackson auction. This year’s line-up looks excellent. While there isn’t a “main attraction” this year (as there has not been the last couple years) there is definitely a fine crop of vehicles to hit the auction block. As many of you know Barrett Jackson is a “no reserve” auction which means that all vehicles will sell for the highest bid. While this can be a little nerve racking for the sellers, it makes for an amazing spectacle as a spectator. We have been coming to this auction for 25 years and it has gotten progressively better each and every year. This year is the 40th anniversary of the greatest collector car auction in the US.
For you Pontiac fans like Andrew and John, one car getting a lot of hype so far is the 1963 Pontiac Bonneville Ambulance that transported JFK’s body from Air Force One following his assassination in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963. This ambulance is one of 66 Bonneville ambulances built in 1963 and of those only 15 were contracted for military use. This vehicle was stored for over 40 years and is 100% unrestored and in its original condition. The car looks exactly the way it did back on that fateful day and has been perfectly preserved. It is being dubbed as “the most historically important vehicle in US history”. It is also fully documented by the PHS.
There are also a couple high profile collections going through this year from Sylvester Stallone, Allan Jackson, and Bret Michaels. The highest selling vehicle of the auction so far (as of Thur. eve 9:00 local time) was a 1955 custom Chevy pick-up with a Corvette LS2 power plant that sold for $147,000.
Things are just starting to warm up and I will keep everyone posted over the next couple days. I plan on having some photos to share as well from Friday and Saturday. Don’t forget to tune into Speed Vision to watch live coverage all weekend. Have a great weekend everyone, and I will keep you posted tomorrow.
Kerry
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Very cool …
My wife told me last night I should book a flight and attend the Barrett Jackson auction sometime (and she will enjoy the warm weather and will go shopping).
Thanks for posting. Have been watching and cars have been bringing some strong prices, it looks like.
Thanks for the updates, Kerry.
I’ve been watching also, and it seems that the cars, and especially pick-up trucks, are bringing very strong money this year.
I was watching the red 65 Impala SS convertible, with the 327 V8, Auto trans on Wednesday that brought $36,200 with the buyers commission. This car had to have been one the best on the planet to bring that kind of money.
The OP mentions about the 63 Pontiac Ambulance on auction…it is a fake. The real one was crushed.
http://jalopnik.com/5739333/president-kennedys-ambulance-is-a-fakeYour right that was a steal. That is the gamble as a seller. For the most part you can sell for top dollar here because of the huge draw of bidders. You have 5000 bidders bidding on 1000 or so cars, so the prices are normally driven up. Every once and a while though you see some really good deals.
There is some good money here though and pick-ups are definately hot! Thanks for the reply.
You should do it for sure! There are plenty of things for the wife to do as well. Hard not to have a good time.
Not sure where they got their info, but I’d have to disagree. No one is more careful in the authentisity of these vehicles than the Barrett Jackson crew. They have a complete story in their yearbook and like I said it is listed in the PHS as the exact ambulance that transported JFK. I can assure you if it was a fake it would not be a Barrett. There are always doubters out there though I guess when it comes to high-profile autos. We’ll see what happens tomorrow.
ThanksSpeed had a little press conference with the seller and the seller said he is not 100% sure it is the real deal.
There are some documents from the government that states that all items from JFK’s death were gathered up and destroyed so people could not sell items for profit.
There were something like 50 cars built like that for the Navy …
This could be another Tucker story …. but this one will sell …
Quote from Davis, “Maybe it’s an absolute phony, maybe it’s a real car, maybe it’s a decoy car or maybe it’s a movie car,” he said. “That’s part of it. It’s just the nature of what it is.”
http://automotive.speedtv.com/article/autos-kennedy-ambulance-controversy
From Barrett Jackson’s website:
Hello everyone,
Just checking in with the Friday edition of the update from Barrett Jackson. Not to get too far off track, but I have to let you know that the highlight of the day may have been our trip to the Desert Valley Auto Parts salvage yard. We have ordered several parts from this yard over the years so we decided to check it out first hand. We were blown away to say the least! We never expected to see that many cars in our wildest dreams. All vehicles in the yard were American made from mid 50’s to mid 70’s. There was everything from complete vehicles to completely stripped vehicles and everything in between. Literally thousands of cars in the yard and it was quite a sight to behold! No rust to be seen anywhere and many of the vehicles looked restorable. If any of you guys are in need of hard to find or non reproduced parts definitely check them out @ http://www.dvap.com. They also let us know that they are starting a reality series on Discovery Channel starting Jan. 26th at 9:00 central. I would highly recommend tuning in if you get a chance. The show will be called “Desert Car Kings”.
Well as far as the auction goes, it was another spectacular day weather wise as well as car wise. One of the first cars I spotted in the staging lane was a 1967 Impala SS convertible. The car was triple black and 100% original untouched with just over 20,000 actual miles. For me personally it is cars like this that keep me coming back every year. There is no other place on earth that you will find this many low mile unrestored classics. Being in the restoration business, the knowledge gained from seeing factory original untouched cars first hand is priceless. Oh I guess I forgot to mention this car was a 427 4-speed to top it all off! The car crossed the line at $40,000 which was probably one of the best buys of the day in my opinion.
Along those same lines of factory original, low mile untouched cars was my favorite Vette of the auction which also ran through today. It was a Marlboro Maroon ’67 427/435 roadster with 17,800 actual miles on the odometer. This survivor was still sporting its original rubber (including tires, belts and hoses)! The paint was showing some wear, but that’s what made it so cool. This Vette has won every prestigious award that a vette can win including triple crown and Bloomington survivor/special collection. This is an awesome car to look over and use as a great example for future restorations. The car still had orange over-spray on the exhaust manifolds that hadn’t quite burned off yet! By the way this car sold for $242,000 including commission (top seller of the day). Quite a bit of coin, but hey where ya gonna find another one??
Total sales today were $14,581,000. When you figure in the 10% that both the buyer and seller have to kick in for commission, you’re talking about a pretty good day for Craig Jackson and Co!
Hope you guys got to catch some coverage on SPEED and if not there will be a long day of coverage tomorrow. Saturday is the biggest and best day of the auction so it will only get more exciting tomorrow. I’ll check in with you all then.
Have a good night,
KerryAt the end last night they interviewed Craig Jackson and he said they have had a number of cars that have sold for more then they did in 2007 (the height) and the number of +100,000 is way up as compared to the last 2 years.
Even Barret doesn’t know if it is or isn’t. I’m using the reference of the periods after the letters U & S. Original news photos show no periods. Could be the movie car that they used in Women Of Camelot.
Auction Recap:
Sorry I’m posting a little later than had planned. The auction got a little late on Saturday night and we spent most of yesterday flying back. Not a great day to be stuck in the plane with the Packer game and all!Overall the money was quite strong this year in Scottsdale. We went to check out the Russo Steele auction on Saturday morning and they had several nice cars as well. They had a ’70 Hemi Cuda convertible sell for 1.5 Million. Which as far as I know was the big seller of the entire weekend.
We sat right up front for the running of the now “infamous” JFK ambulance. We also got a chance to talk with the owner of the car for a few minutes in the feature tent before they ran it out. He does have a pretty compelling case as to the authenticity of the car, but in the end there was just too much controversy to bring the big bucks. I thought Steve Davis (the president of Barrett Jackson) and Craig Jackson himself did pretty well in their explanation of the situation. They had to be very careful mainly because if it ended up selling for 7 figures and then was found to be a fake down the road it could seriously damage their reputation. I’m sure the owner was bummed, but the conspiracy theorists really kicked in on Friday night. There were also some stories on the news that evening. I think the most compelling evidence that the doctor had was this. Each ambulance had an ID number on the doors. There were photos and video running in the display which showed Jackie Kennedy getting into an ambulance with JFK’s coffin on the night of his assassination. The door decal numbers on that ambulance matched the numbers on this ambulance. The owner then had documents from the Navy linking the VIN of his ambulance to those door ID numbers.
I think there are still so many emotions lingering from that assassination and the conspiracy theories that followed that this ambulance was probably doomed from the start.
All in all, I am happy to report for all of us that the American collector car market is strong once again. If it’s not completely back to where it was 5 years ago, it’s very close. While the numbers of the Barrett Jackson auction can be inflated at times, I still think it is a very good barometer as to the interest people have for these cars. And let me assure you by the number of vehicles, bidders, and spectators, the collector car market is alive and well!
I will try to upload some photos in the next day or so. I would especially like you guys to see some shots of that salvage yard.
Have a great week everyone and Go Pack!
KerryI would say over all there seemed to be more money there this year. While the ’67 Impala was a good deal that’s kind of the nature of an aucion. There are cars that go for more than they are worth and cars that sell for less than they are worth. Overall though the bidders had money and they were spending it.
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