Astronaut Neil Armstrong’s 1967 Corvette Displayed at the Kennedy Space Center

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Astronaut Neil Armstrong's 1967 Corvette Now On Display at the Kennedy Space Center
Photo: Malcolm Denemark/FLORIDA TODAY

The history of the space program is all around visitors to the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex.

Last Wednesday, another kind of history – though still related to the space program – was on display in the Rocket Garden at the space center.

That’s when Merritt Island’s Joe Crosby brought one of the most historic Corvettes ever made so a group of Corvette Enthusiasts from the National Corvette Museum could see it first hand.

Crosby, you see, is the owner of a 1967 Corvette Sting Ray that belonged to the first man to walk on the moon, Neil Armstrong.

The car had sat in the previous owner’s basement from 1981 until Crosby bought it from an undisclosed Georgia owner in February 2012.

After posting the car on eBay, he entertained offers of more than $250,000 but decided instead to keep this one-of-a-kind Corvette and bring it back to life.

He originally intended to treat the Corvette to a complete restoration, but after talking to others in the Corvette world, he says he decided instead to “preserve” the car, only doing to the car what he had to do to keep it as close to original condition as possible.

Crosby, a retired Brevard County Sheriff’s Office west precinct commander, says he had to search the country for three months before finding the original fiberglass fenders made by General Motors that had been sitting on a shelf in North Dakota for 27 years – showing the lengths he went to to only put original GM parts back on the car.

Armstrong died in August 2012 at age 82.


Source:
FloridaToday.com
Photo: Malcolm Denemark, FLORIDA TODAY

Related:
Apollo XII Astronaut’s 1969 Corvette to be Displayed at the Corvette Chevy Expo
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Take One Giant Leap with Neil Armstrong’s 1967 Corvette

 



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