Ever since I bought the Maverick last year I have been seeing the ghost lines from some advertising on the Maverick, knowing that it participated in the 1979 Winternationals in Pomona was pretty exciting.............but uncovering these hints of its past were even more exciting. In fancy writing on the quarter panels; "Bell & Gaines Cylinder Engr." and on the front fenders; "Herold & Mielenz Inc.", there is a large circle with "Wilson's" wrapped around the top (could have been a Texaco graphic in the circle), and on the door is written in very cartoonish letters; "Greg Nicho--", I can't read the last two letters. I already found out that Bell & Gaines are in Modesto, CA and have a speed shop or build race motors...................and Herold & Mielenz Inc. is a company making electric motors in Sacramento. Anyway, I will make contact with these companies as I would like to have the graphics redone in vinyl and put them on the car so it looks like it did at some point in its life.
Here is the picture of "Herold & Mielenz Inc. I didn't want to sand much more as I am not going to repaint the car and this will buff out really nice...................then I will apply the vinyl letters over the same spot.............................the others are very hard to see even in person. I will try the one with Bell & Gaines Cylinder Engr. also, but since it's on a curved surface it's hard to see it all.
ptpdub, The car was built by Cook Motor Sports.....of the ole, "Stone/Woods/Cook" fame sometime in the mid to late 70's. Not exactly sure what motor started out in its racing career, but it now has a very serious 408ci windsor, some Roush/Yates TF-R heads, 15.1 compression, Mike's 2sp Powerglide and 9" Ford. It has run in the 9.90's with this combination at 130mph+..............it has a drag chute. I got it to get back into drag racing and go out and have some fun!
As a street rodder I have always prefered steel cars over fiberglass, I feel steel cars have a real soul. Your car has both a soul and a pedigree!! Good for you!
Mav1970, It's kind of funny you say that because I was out in the garage setting the valves for the umpteenth time and I caught a glimpse of the lettering and was just drawn to pull out some 2000 grit sandpaper and do some investigating........................who knows............... IMHO
That's what I'm talking about - you see my Maverick talks to me too It's just never that "polite" when it speaks - never says anything nice
Well, it was just a few weeks ago when the Maverick gave me the "Raspberry" when I tried to take it to "Test&Tune" and the transbrake solenoid quite on me going out the driveway! Now I just have to have the vinyl graphics made............put them on and start racing!
That's really cool! A friend of mine, had a Vega when we were growing up, it had the same sorta makings under the paint. It was a x race car, we made street legal, then once he sold it, it went back to the track, full time.
Back in the seventies, I took my 73 Duster to a guy to help me put my headers on. In his driveway sat a caged plain white 66 Nova with slicks and little front tires tires on it. I spent the entire day there getting my car finished up and the whole time we didn't talk much about the Nova other than he was going to race it someday. I looked at it throughout the day under the bright sunlight but it wasn't until the sun started going down, could you start to see writting under the paint. It read Grumpy's Toy with some roman numerals after it. It turned out that he bought it from Bill "Grumpy" Jenkins himself from Bill's shop in Malvern, Pa. Closest I ever got to anything historic.
WOW! Bill "Grumpy" Jenkins was my hero back int he day. This goes back a lot of years but a friend of mine wanted me to go look at a 65 Mustang fastback to see if it was worth what they were asking. I went and looked a the car and it was factory 271hp 4spd car. It was this kind of Orange color and under the paint you could see very plainly it was some X class and was one of Bill Ireland's cars.............he was somewhat famous in the Pacific Northwest as a drag racer. My friend bought the car and someone offered him almost twice what he paid and it found a new home. Drag racing history is something I could never get tired of listening to!
