1957 Plymouth Buried in Tulsa

[Mark]

is anyone going to th unearthing of the '57 Plymouth Belvedere in Tulsa?

[Davidinhartford]

I WISH!


  I hear that they are limiting seating around the site.  Then they are going to bring the car into a nearby arena for mass viewing.   Rumor has it that hotels and motels were booked up years in advance!

Even non-Mopar fans are going to see what kind of condition this car will be in after 50 years in a concrete vault.      Details are sketchy about what protection the car had for long term storage.   But they did say that they put a 5 gallon gas can in the trunk incase gasoline was not used in the future.   

LOL.    As if 50 year old gas would still be any good?

   

[The Tassie Devil(le)]

As if 50 year old gas would still be any good?     

At least they might end up with a container of Varnish.

Bruce.

[Jim Skelly]

As if 50 year old gas would still be any good?     

At least they might end up with a container of Varnish.

Bruce.

Maybe Bruce can give us his assessment of the car's condition and restoration potential when it is dug up on June 15?

[Rusty Shepherd CLC 6397]

I WISH!


  I hear that they are limiting seating around the site.  Then they are going to bring the car into a nearby arena for mass viewing.   Rumor has it that hotels and motels were booked up years in advance!

Even non-Mopar fans are going to see what kind of condition this car will be in after 50 years in a concrete vault.      Details are sketchy about what protection the car had for long term storage.   But they did say that they put a 5 gallon gas can in the trunk incase gasoline was not used in the future.   

LOL.    As if 50 year old gas would still be any good?

   

As poorly built and prone to rust as '57 Chrysler Corp. cars were, I'm very curious as to its condition, too.  My late uncle was a physician who had been driving Cadillacs since he began his practice after WWII and a friend of his talked him into buying an Imperial in '57.  On the way home, he felt something really hot on his right foot and then began smelling antifreeze inside the car; it was downhill from there until he took a beating and traded it in on another Cadillac.

[The Tassie Devil(le)]

As if 50 year old gas would still be any good?     

At least they might end up with a container of Varnish.

Bruce.

Maybe Bruce can give us his assessment of the car's condition and restoration potential when it is dug up on June 15?

Thanks Jim,

All it will take is a plane ticket.   Anyone want to send me one, and I will surely give it a good going-over.

Bruce.

P.S.   I will be in need of good accommodation, and a ticket to the exhumation.

[veesixteen]

is anyone going to th unearthing of the '57 Plymouth Belvedere in Tulsa?

What I'd like to know is the current value of the $100 savings account created in 1957 for the potential winner (remember, the purchasing power of $100 in 1957 is equivalent to that of $700+ today). Depending on the compound interest rate that was agreed in 1957, those $100 might have grown anywhere from $1000, i.e. $300 more "value" in 50 years (chicken feed!) to $15,000. Will the latter, higher amount be enough to cover the cost of getting the car looking and running the way it should?
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[Davidinhartford]

If that concrete vault cracked and filled with water over time, there will be little left to restore.   Take the $15000 savings account and use the money as a down payment on a fully restored one on Ebay.   LOL.

[TJ Hopland]

Is there an 'official' site or story about this?

[The Tassie Devil(le)]

Boyd Coddington, of American Hotrod, and his crew will join us and attempt to start the car.

[/i]

I do hope the spectators will bring sleeping bags and the like, because, unless the car has been properly protected, it is going to take a lot of pre-emptative maintenance before they try to start it.

Bruce.

[Jim Skelly, CLC #15958]

is anyone going to th unearthing of the '57 Plymouth Belvedere in Tulsa?

What I'd like to know is the current value of the $100 savings account created in 1957 for the potential winner (remember, the purchasing power of $100 in 1957 is equivalent to that of $700+ today). Depending on the compound interest rate that was agreed in 1957, those $100 might have grown anywhere from $1000, i.e. $300 more "value" in 50 years (chicken feed!) to $15,000. Will the latter, higher amount be enough to cover the cost of getting the car looking and running the way it should?
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I went to an inflation calculator and plugged in $2500.00 for a fully-loaded Belvedere.  The result was that money in 2006 dollars (it only calculates for the preceding year) would now be worth $17,913.21.  You probably couldn't buy a #1 Belvedere for that price.

[Doug Houston]

It's a goner, folks. There are severl high water marks on the car, and nthe vault was full of mud. If there's anything left to raise out of there, it'll be a miracle.

[Bob Hoffmann CLC#96]

I saw the video. It's junk! I was hoping for good news but...  That wasn't a protective vault, it was an underground pool. Sad. Bob

[Davidinhartford]

OH NO!!!!!!   

  I can't believe that they didn't cover the vault with a rubber or plastic lining to prevent water from getting in the lid opening!    ARG!

I hope they sealed that 1998 Prowler they burried much better!    I know I won't be around in 50 years to see it.     

[Johnny F #662]

OH NO!!!!!!   

  I can't believe that they didn't cover the vault with a rubber or plastic lining to prevent water from getting in the lid opening!    ARG!

I hope they sealed that 1998 Prowler they burried much better!    I know I won't be around in 50 years to see it.     

Hey it was 1957, and people were still using rabbit ears on TV!

[Bob Hoffmann CLC#96]

Just saw the pictures. A rusty POS. Think how nice it could have been it an ABOVE ground vault at  the  local museum or some public building. Underground= a  real stupid move. Bob

[Johnny F #662]

Just saw the pictures. A rusty POS. Think how nice it could have been it an ABOVE ground vault at  the  local museum or some public building. Underground= a  real stupid move. Bob
Very true, but keep in mind that at the time, and even today, "burying" time capsules was the way to go.  I guess it sort of added to the mystique of putting something away for 50 years for further generations to see.  If it was in a museum or some ground vault, it could have been viewed almost on a daily basis, and all the mystery would have been gone.  I am sure there are still plenty of 32 year old Cadillac Eldo convertibles in some sort of above ground storage, with less then a 100 miles still around.  In another 18 years they can all get together for a 50th reunion.

[Davidinhartford]

But spirit of ’57 still shines in Belvedere
By RANDY KREHBIEL World Staff Writer
6/16/2007
Last Modified: 6/16/2007  2:17 AM




Now we know what 50 years in a hole does to a Plymouth Belvedere.

The tires go flat. The paint fades. Hinges and latches stiffen, upholstery disintegrates, the engine becomes a very large paperweight.

But what the heck. None of us is what we used to be.

The Belvedere buried at the Tulsa County Courthouse a half-century ago and recovered from its vault on Friday turned out to be more artifact than memento. Displayed to the public Friday night at the Convention Center, its ruined paint suggested just about every color except the original gold and white. Corrosion bubbled the surface of the radiator.

The engine that hot-rod guru Boyd Coddington had hoped to start Friday night was just plain hopeless.

Yet even in her dotage, the old girl maintained a certain dignity.

The lines that characterized a generation that dreamed of rocket ships and believed that automobiles would be obsolete in 2007 still flowed beneath the rust and decay. The tires held air, and many of the names scrawled on their white walls 50 years ago were still legible. The hubcaps and trim shone under a coating of grime.

"We're here to see her regardless of how she's aged -- aren't we?" asked Tulsarama Chairwoman Sharon King Davis moments before the curtain was raised on the Belvedere.

"Maybe," she added, "they should have used Oil of Olay on her instead of Cosmoline."

All 7,300 tickets for the unveiling were sold in advance, and most of them were used.

Coddington, who came to Tulsa planning to start the Belvedere's engine by the end of Friday's program, led off by saying that that would not be possible but that the car "has a lot of personality."

Raising the hood, he said, "She's a mess. That master cylinder actually looks organic. But I love her anyway."

In contrast to the Belvedere, the time capsule buried with it stayed tight and dry, a 1957 Tulsarama bumper sticker still affixed to the inside of the end sawed off Friday night.

The time capsule provided one surprise. The entries for the contest to guess Tulsa's population in 2007 were not on microfilm, as had been believed, but on paper.

The winner of the contest gets the car and the proceeds of a $100 savings account, now worth a little more than $700. The winning entry will be announced June 22.

The first guess on the list was 389,000 -- less than 7,000 off the actual figure of 382,457.

Other items pulled from the time capsule included a 48-star American flag, a passbook for the savings account, a Tulsa Public Schools student-parent handbook and a bumper sticker reading "Made in Oklahoma by an Indian."

Most of the artifacts said to have been left in the car were unrecoverable. About the only thing to survive intact were two glass jugs of gasoline, a cigarette lighter and some thickly encrusted cans of Schlitz beer.

The beer, left in the trunk of the car by nightclub owner Clarence Love, managed to migrate to every nook and cranny of the interior, carried along by the water that inundated the vault sometime during the last 50 years, rotting fabrics and rusting metals.

The day began gloomily beneath heavy clouds and steady rain. Undeterred enthusiasts nevertheless began staking out views of the noon unearthing as early as 7 a.m.

At 9:30 a.m., Doris Leach, 81, and her daughter Billie Carr claimed seats front and center in the bleachers reserved for those who were present for the original burial.

Leach had watched that day while her husband, Bill Leach, who worked for the local Hudson dealer, helped guide the Belvedere into its resting place. Bill has been dead for many years, but Doris did not forget.

"It's all she has talked about for a long time," Billie Carr said.

The rain stopped shortly after 11 a.m. Several thousand spectators had gathered by 11:30, when a program emceed by John Ehrling and King Davis began with a recording of "Ridin' Into Tulsa," a song written by Broken Arrow's Ralph Blane for the 1957 semicentennial.

Lifted from its resting place by a 120-ton crane to Henry Mancini's theme for the 1973 movie "Oklahoma Crude," the Belvedere settled gently onto a flatbed trailer. People rose in unison to applaud, and many surged forward as if drawn to the shrouded object.

Hundreds gathered in the concourse and parking garage overlooking the Convention Center arena's loading area to watch nearly two hours of prep work. The Metalam cover was washed off, the car's tires inflated and the steel skid to which the car had been bolted in 1957 cut off.

Largely silent most of that time, the crowd cheered as the forklift bearing the Belvedere negotiated two pillars and a door at the north end of the arena and carried it inside.

Later, when asked if the Belvedere could be restored, Coddington said, "I wouldn't do anything to it. I'd just put her under glass in a museum and keep her just like she is."

[The Tassie Devil(le)]

G'day David,

Thanks for the update.

Bruce.

P.S.   Maybe an "old car enthusiast" could do something with it.   Heaven knows, we have done more with worse.

[George UK]

I bought a Britich Leyland car in the 1960 it looked worse than that after a couple of years.