A Rental Car? A Vintage Mustang? It Was Both
January 21 2020 - 10:31AM
Dow Jones News
By A.J. Baime
Holly LaCroix, 69, a legal assistant from Oceanside, Calif., on
her 1966 Ford Shelby Mustang G.T. 350H, as told to A.J. Baime.
My husband Terry and I were preparing to get married in 1973,
and he had a friend who had this Shelby Mustang out in front of his
house. The car was sitting there in the elements, and Terry kept
saying, "You have to take care of it." Ultimately, we bought that
car for very little money right before our wedding. I spent a lot
of time in the passenger seat, and we went through tires like
gangbusters.
Not a lot of these cars were made. In the mid-60s, the Mustang
was huge, and Ford partnered with the racing legend Carroll Shelby
to build the high-performance Mustang G.T. 350. Hertz bought a
thousand of these cars for customers, calling them Rent-a-Racers.
Cars were painted in Hertz colors, and the H in the name stands for
Hertz. [When this car appeared in 1966, it cost $17 a day and 17
cents a mile to rent, according to Hertz.]
When Terry first thought about buying ours, he was hesitant,
because he had heard that people would rent these cars, pull out
the high-performance engines, and put their own in. When he figured
out the engine was the real thing, he was thrilled. Most of these
cars had automatic transmissions, but ours is one of the few built
new with a four-speed.
When my husband got ill, the car was no longer his focus, and
when he passed away, the car sat in the garage. I would start it
every so often, but for seven years, it sat there.
Then one day last year a man named Lee Cross called me. How he
got my number is a long story, but he knew I had this car and
wanted to buy it. It was not for sale, so he told me about this
G.T. 350 tour that he hosts. Every year, he picks a spot and hosts
a gathering for Mustang G.T. 350 owners. He asked if I would
come.
I am a shy person, and this was out of my comfort zone. But a
light bulb went on in my head. I thought: This car needs to get out
of the garage. I thought: I am going to do this.
I started getting the car ready. Terry and that car were a
source of pride in our neighborhood, and people came to me when
they heard what I was going to do, to wish me well. The G.T. 350
tour was going to be in the Ozarks in Arkansas, and we would be
staying in Branson, Mo. I shipped the car, recruited a co-pilot,
and flew east in October. The tour started on Oct. 27 -- my late
husband's birthday.
For four days we toured the Ozarks. There were 25 cars, and the
people made me feel like part of the group. For over 45 years, that
car has been part of my life. I was so proud to watch it shine.
Write to A.J. Baime at myride@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
January 21, 2020 10:16 ET (15:16 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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