A General Motors enthusiast in Florida was surprised to find that the 1965 Pontiac GTO he purchased last year was actually the same car he owned as a teenager in the early 1980s.
The GM enthusiast, Randy, took his 1965 Pontiac GTO to the recent Festival of Speed classic car show at the Ritz-Carlton in Orlando, Florida, where he won first place in the Muscle Car Vintage category. Helping to draw some attention to his beautifully restored GTO was a signboard he displayed next to it telling the story of the car, which he purchased last fall from a classic car dealer in Connecticut.
Randy purchased the car sight unseen from the dealership last fall and had it checked over by an appraiser before the dealer loaded it on a flatbed and shipped it to his home in Florida. While the vehicle was en route to his home, he dug up his old paperwork from the 1965 Pontiac GTO that he purchased for $2,000 back in 1980. He noticed the VINs were fairly similar, but then saw that the VIN on the newly purchased GTO did not match that of the paperwork he was given by the dealer. Concerned the car was a clone and not a real GTO, he reached out to the dealer, who confirmed there was a typo in the original VIN report and provided him with the actual number.
Randy was stunned to see that the VIN of his newly purchased GTO was an exact match with that of the car he owned when he was 16. “This is my first car, the VIN matches!” Randy exclaimed over the phone to the dealer, who was just as surprised as he was.
“This dealer just sold me the first car I ever owned!” he explained on his car show posterboard. “I didn’t know until after I had already bought it that this was my first car. I have the Protect-O-Plate to validate also, since I forgot to give it to the buyer in 1985.”
“35 years ago I watched my car drive off into the sunset, and now it is back,” the sign also says. “For good this time!”
Making this story even more surprising is that Randy is originally from Oklahoma City and this car was located more than 1,500 miles away in Connecticut. GM only produced a little more than 8,000 Pontiac GTO coupes like this in 1965, so there was always a small chance he’d come across his old car considering he was shopping for the same style vehicle from the same model year, but this is still one highly unlikely scenario.
Here’s to enjoying many more years behind the wheel of your first-ever car, Randy!
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Comments
Cool
That is Awesome. My brother was fortunate enough to experience the same thing for a 1967 Nova SS he bought @ 18 years old. A few years later he pulled the engine (327) trans ( Saginaw 4 speed) and 12 bolt rear-end and installed a big block (454) tunnel ram with 2 fours, straight axle and a few other things I don’t remember. The unbelievable thing about all of this was not only finding it and being able to buy it back 45 years later, but he had kept everything that he removed from the car all these years. Thats right, engine,trans, rear-end, even the upper and lower control arms. Unreal! The car has been fully restored with every original 1967 parts he could find in the US and even Canada. The car was painted original deep water blue metallic, light blue interior. Beautiful car!!!
A friend of mine had a 66 GTO in black. That car hauled ASS. Like I said before I wish Pontiac and Olds were still around.
What goes around comes around.
I still have a set of keys to the 65 GTO convert I bought in 1974
That was another thing: I had a spare set of keys too, so I stuck it in the ignition and turned the key, and it worked. Like I needed more proof but now those are my special set of keys!
My first car was a 1968 Mustang, I installed a rebuilt 302 out of a Fairlane, but never improved the brakes. 3 accidents later I sold the car to someone I worked with who traded it for a bus. Never gave much thought about it until one day I came home to discover a totalled red mustang sitting in front of my mobile home between me and the Manager next door. I looked over the demolished wreck, looked like it hit a telephone pole at high speed. Pushed the motor back enough to move the dashboard. Later that day a friend came by and looked over the wreck, he remembered my mustang from years before, and asked have you really looked at the mustang, I replied yes, and he again asked. This time when I looked at the smashed frontend, I saw buried within, the Licence plate. I was immediately shocked! EVR-659, My first car!, Still had a key and checked out the interior, seeing the custom gauges I installed in the instrument cluster. A couple days later the car was gone, towed off.
What a great story! I bought my ’64 GTO in 1981 as a 19 year old and still have it today roughly 14k miles later (all when I was younger, of course). Couldn’t be happier for Randy and am sure he will have plenty of ‘catch-up’ years ahead of him…
Thanks Bill, I am so ready to beat my first ownership period by 5X this time!
Awesome !!! Wish I could be that lucky . keep it and never let it go again .
The First car I had… was a 1968 GTO.. his and hers. Ram air …hood tach ..400 ci. 400 TH .. It was a Real tire burning machine..tons of torque!! Dang..sure do miss that car.
Great story. Not only that he has his original car back-but also that the car is still stock and hasn’t been butchered by a customizer.
Smokefoot,
Totally agreed! It had mods on it when I bought it originally, and I swapped in a 4.11 12-bolt Posi from a Chevelle, but they corrected everything along with adding a lot of nice options on top of what the car originally came with (Deluxe steering wheel, power antenna, power brakes, seat belts (!), etc). Loving it!
My husbands Dad passed away and left him a 1970 GTO that he had bought over 40 years ago from a man in Stone Mountain Ga. It’s all original and had been garage kept. It looks like a new car inside and out. I think it has less than 40k miles on it.
Wow, awesome!
I’ll supply my geez in story too: 1965, I bought a 1956 belair conv from a bowling alley parking lot in Irvington nj for 175.00. My dad and I drug it home to Bloomfield with a rope! Needed a fuel pump. Bronze/white with black top. Wish I could find and buy it back.