Kansas City Couple’s 1967 Corvette is a Former Chevy Engineering Test Car

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Kansas City Couple's 1967 Corvette is a Former Chevy Engineering Test Car
Photo Credit: Tom Strongman/KansasCity.com

Corvette enthusiasts know you can’t take it with you, so you might as well enjoy it now.

Take John and Brenda Cianciolo, for example.

Back in 1978, after they had just bought a house and paid as much down as they could, they had just $312 sitting in the bank.

That didn’t stop the couple from buying a 1966 GTO like the one Brenda had driven in high school when the opportunity arose, however.

“A friend called and said he knew about a ’66 GTO convertible that had been tapped in the back and needed some work,” John explains. “He said we could get the car for $300. I thought, ‘How can I tell my wife about it when we only have $312 in the bank?'”

But the next night, over supper, John told Brenda about the GTO. “She perked up and said, ‘Here’s how I look at it. Whether we have $312 or $12, we’re broke anyway, so just buy the car.’ ”

They followed her advice, fixed up the GTO and three years later made enough profit to buy a 1958 Corvette that they’ve been in the process of restoring for years but hope to have completed by 2014 in time for the National Corvette Restorers Society convention in Kansas City.

That’s not only the Corvette the couple has owned, though. They’ve had a ’61, ’65, ’67, and ’72 and currently have a ’67 with an interesting history behind it.

They bought the very nice black convertible four years ago that had already been through a frame-off restoration and had earned a prestigious Top Flight Award from NCRS in 2002.

The Cianciolos found out after it was built, the car was sent to Chevrolet Engineering Division in Warren, Mich., for research and development. John believes engineers added the tilt/tele wheel there to work out any problems for future 1967 models.

One of only 815 black Corvettes that year, and one of only a few with the saddle tan interior, the car still has its original drivetrain and has only gone about 4,000 miles since being restored.

Kansas City Couple's 1967 Corvette is a Former Chevy Engineering Test Car
Photo Credit: Tom Strongman/KansasCity.com


Source:
Kansas City Star

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