BACKFIRE

CUTAWAY CLARIFICATION

A correction is due to the “Barn Find Reject” letter in the Backfire section of the January 2020 issue of HMM (#197). What Mr. Tallone reports and thinks he saw is not accurate. The “cutaway” 1953 “No. 3” Corvette is actually a cutaway build done on the original frame of the VIN #3 1953 Corvette. Records exist to document that the frame of #3 was separated from the car itself after GM testing and before the car was sold by GM. The car Mr. Tallone thinks he saw in Tulare, California, was in fact VIN #3, but with a replacement frame. At a later time, during the 1980s, 1953 Corvette VIN #3 was purchased by a partnership of three National Corvette Restoration Society members and later fully restored by them with thorough documentation of that restoration. The finished car was sold perhaps 10 years ago, at a Barrett-Jackson Scottsdale auction. I do not know where it is currently. The cutaway #3 was recently built specifically for a client’s collection and display by Corvette Repair Inc. in Valley Stream, New York. So, Mr. Tallone should not worry — 1953 Corvette VIN #3 was not cut up. Instead, an educational display was built using only the original frame of Corvette #3.

Bill Sangrey Carlisle, Pennsylvania

PAPER TRAIL

In response to Tim Downey’s letter regarding the availability of Magnum 500 wheels through the Chrysler