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Flashback: Wellborn Museum’s 1971 Charger Event Sets Stage for 2012 Show

2012 WMM Show date is announced! October 11-13

 

story and photos by Geoff Stunkard

 

The Wellborn Musclecar Museum hosted a very special show late last year honoring the 1971 Charger. With vehicle attendance available by invitation, this unique inaugural has set the stage for an even larger, more inclusive edition this coming October 11-13, 2012.

   

“We wanted to honor the Charger’s 40 year heritage last year because that vehicle has meant so much to Pam and I,” says Tim Wellborn. “However, we really desired to showcase and host something that was for the whole hobby. This October, we are making plans for an event that will be open to all makes of musclecars at our facilty here in Alexander City.”

Due to the invitational nature of the show itself, some people might have misunderstood that attendance to the event’s display was open to the public. The invitational process was simply done to ensure the museum was not overwhelmed by participants, and is again open to a limited number of participants for that reason. The Wellborn Musclecar Museum will release the details for the 2012 version shortly, and recommends that interested parties consider registering early to get one of the available openings. There is room for approximately 150 cars between the museum’s immediate parking lots and the nearby small-town shopping area.

2012 Show Dates: October 11-13

Shown this week are a few images from the Wellborn Musclecar Museum show last October. Taken by Geoff Stunkard, several images are also slated to run in an upcoming issue of Mopar Muscle magazine.    

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Tim and Pam Wellborn: Love, Life and Musclecars

The Convertible E-body: 1970 440-4 'Plymouth Cuda

Musclecar Milestones by Geoff Stunkard

Text by Geoff Stunkard / Photos by John Stunkard

 “My dad had Fords, and my first car was a Mustang, so I was not a Mopar girl when we first met; in fact, I had never seen a Hurst Pistol Grip until our first date when I climbed into Tim’s Charger. I saw it and said ‘what is that thing;’ my first thought was that it was some aftermarket redneck part.”

Pam Wellborn was laughingly recalling her first encounter with Chrysler’s legendary musclecar options. Tim Wellborn and Pam Twilley had known each other in high school, and Tim had arrived in a 1970 Charger for their first date that occasion. While the two enjoyed those carefree days, career and life choices would cause them to go their separate ways into other relationships and responsibilities after graduation. Pam moved to Birmingham to get her nursing degree, while Tim ended up beginning his serious work responsibilities at the family business, Wellborn Forest Products.

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One of the Many "star cars" Expected at the '71 Charger Anniversary Event

This 1971 white Dodge Charger 440 4-barrel is heavily laden with options--sunroof (only 33 Charger R/Ts were equipped with sunroofs that year and only three of those were white), 727, power windows, buckets, console, hideaway headlights and, get this--headlight washers. The car was ordered with 14-inch steelies, Goodyear Polyglas G70-14s and no wheel covers (as per the build sheet). Oddly enough, first owner did not opt for air conditioning. To the second owner, Steve, who bought at age 17 in 1971, this Charger was just a car and it became a daily driver. He kept the car stock with the exception of adding an aftermarket A/C system, Keystone mags (but he saved the original rims) and a Bonsonic 8-Track player Oh yeah, he did add louder mufflers but they came off after a couple of year when he finally had enough of those. Steve registered the car in his dad’s name until he was 25 for a break on insurance. After driving it daily until 1978 and logging more than 105,000 miles, Steve parked the car.

Despite several offers to purchase the car, Steve happily kept it in storage. In 2010, Steve wanted to put the car back on the road. A friend of Steve’s told him about a Mopar restoration shop--Creations by Gemza—located about 3 miles from his house. They had heard about this Charger and were anxious to see it. Steve drove the car over and talked about a possible restoration.

Upon inspection, the Gemzas realized that the Charger was a piece of Mopar history and essentially an unmolested survivor. Steve learned that this was one of two identical '71 Chargers purchased by the owner of Charlotte Motor Speedway, Richard Howard, to promote national NASCAR cup races. Howard bought the cars in February ‘71, lettered them and he and some of his employees drove them thither and yon as rolling billboards to promote the races. The World 600 ran on May 30th (the National 500 ran on October 10th) with Bobby Allison taking the checkered, followed by Donnie Allison, Pete Hamilton, Richard Petty, Fred Lorenzen and Buddy Baker in that order.

The Gemzas bolted back on the original rims and wanted to re-letter the car back to its pace car trim, but there was no reference material to go by. Tim Wellborn, noted collector of 1971 Hemi and 6-pack Chargers, among other cars, plus a ton of memorabilia, saved the day. He had an original program for the 1971 World 600 race, plus a sales brochure with several color photo of the pace car lettered, and he sent copies to the Gemza shop.

Steve will be showing this amazing Charger at Mopar events including the Charger reunion at Tim Wellborne’s Musclecar Museum in Alexander City, AL this October. The car should be quite a hit!