Page 36 - March 2022

1969 Dodge Charger 500

The deal was struck, and I showed him a recent article I did in 1970 Chevrolet Chevelle
Hot Rod Magazine on a 1969 Dodge Daytona, and he mentions he has
one of the cars that makes a Daytona. And my mind jumps to, oh, he SS Convertible
has a 1969 Dodge Charger since that is the original basis of the rare car.
Nope! Out in his tractor shed, in the mud sat a 1969 Dodge Charger There are stories about cars you just don’t believe, stuff that just
500, the first of the Dodge Aero Warriors as they are called. seems too far-fetched, even with everything I’ve seen. I had heard a
Built to go fast in NASCAR, the regular ‘69 Charger had some story about a rare 1970 Chevrolet Chevelle SS Convertible just sitting
horrible aerodynamics with the recessed front grille and recessed rear in a field, complete, just sitting there. Now that’s not the interesting
window area, and the Charger 500 fixed that with a flush front grille part, the car had been sitting there so long that a tree had fallen down
out of a 1968 Dodge Coronet, and custom flush rear window area. and crushed part of the car. But since this car is only one of a handful
That was good, but not great and the cars were still not competitive. built, it always intrigued me as to why it was sitting. And fortunately,
Dodge took a huge leap and created the Dodge Daytona, famous for the reasons were on my side for once.
the tall wings on the back and pointed nose up front. They were crazy, Traveling through Wisconsin, I was told by friends exactly where
and did the job. the car was, and every time I drove past it in my 2009 Dodge
For 1969, the top option engine you could get was the famous 426 Challenger, I could never see it. I thought I had the wrong location.
Hemi. And, if you wanted to have a bit more fun, you got the 4-speed. One winter day I was with a friend in his truck driving past the area and
This car had both, and with the color combo it worked out to be just with the little bit of additional height I could see over a small hill, and
one of three produced. bam, there it was! Behind some bushes and trees was the Chevelle!
Unfortunately, time had not been kind to the car, at one point it I followed up later that year on the car, and met the brother of the
had hit a guard rail and done damage to the passenger side rear quarter. owner. He was kind enough to let me document the car and go over it
A pole had gone through the nose of the car, wrecking the original very carefully. I almost had a heart attack though. As I was doing some
engine. The owner traveled the country as an over-the-road truck driv- filming a cat jumped out of the car and ran into the woods. Talk about a
er, so when he had some room on his flatbed, he would pick up cars or surprise.
parts and drop them at the farm. That’s how he got the Charger 500. The car was basically complete and mostly original. It is a 1970
While the Charger 500 was the cherry on top of the cake, there were Chevrolet Chevelle SS 454 Convertible with a 4-speed manual
still tons of vintage cars all over the property and stashed away in transmission and air conditioning. It had the top engine available with
barns and sheds. This adventure still is one of my favorites, even after that combination, which was the LS5 engine. It produced 390 horse-
a decade. power. The only step up from there was the LS6 454 cubic inch V8

1970 Chevrolet Chevelle

SS Convertible

34 Journal of Antiques and Collectibles