Jan '10

Written by Gary & Betty Walter | 07 January 2010

Screamin' Yellow Fever - Gary & Betty Walter's '06 GT Convertible

Since becoming a Mustang owner, I have concluded that there are two basic groups of Mustang people. There are the “it’s just another car” owners and then there are the DIE-HARD MUSTANG ENTHUSIASTS. After driving one for about three months now, it’s hard to imagine that the first group really exists, but I see some of them nearly every day. I won’t describe them; you probably know what I’m talking about. I’m sure you’ve seen them too.

I’m sure that every Mustang Enthusiast has a story to tell and we’re no different. I was fourteen when the Mustang was born and like most guys that age, I looked forward to seeing the new car line-up every year. Also, like other young boys, I followed in my father’s footsteps regarding cars. He was a Ford guy, so I became a Ford guy. I took my first driver’s license test in a 1954 Ford Victoria with a manual transmission. The first car that I actually bought was a used 1967 Ford Fairlane. It was a nice car, but it wasn’t close to being my dream car. During this time, a number of my friends were buying Mustangs. I didn’t think that I could afford one even though the Mustang price was not much higher than the used Fairlane I had just bought. To tell the truth, I assumed a loan on the Fairlane, making it an easy purchase.

In the fall of 1969, I made my usual annual pilgrimage to view the new cars at Hilbish Ford in Concord. Little did I know at the time; that in just two more days, I would be driving away a new “Show-Room” car. This all transpired as a result of a bet that I made with a friend. I really wanted a Mustang, but the show room car was a 1970 Ford Torino GT with a 351 Cleveland and 4-speed manual transmission. There weren’t any Mustangs in the showroom. I was afflicted with “new car fever” and I was determined to win the bet. Well, I won the bet alright, and for the next several years, I worked in the cotton mill mainly to support my habit. I wore out White Letter Goodyear Poly-glass tires faster than I could pay for them. Other common expenditures included clutches, transmissions, a few wrecks, Hooker headers, Holley 780 Duel-Pump Carb, Medium-Rise Offenhauser intake, Mallory Duel-point distributors, traction bars, air shocks, under-the-dash 8-track tape players, other performance components, and numerous sets of Cragar & Keystone wheels. Like a complete dummy, I traded the factory Magnum 500 wheels for Keystone Classics. I must have been brain dead.

With the combination of a 300 horsepower Cleveland engine and my heavy foot, it should come as no surprise that I was awarded four speeding tickets in less than 90 days. Finally, all of this foolishness had to come to an end. In 1972, I married the most wonderful woman in the world and after a year of marriage, I knew the muscle car had to go. I traded my Torino for a new 1974 Pontiac Ventura Hatchback. WHAT WAS I THINKING? The trade-in value of my Torino was a mere $900.00. In July of 1975, our first child was born, thus ending any hopes of owning a Mustang for quite some time.

Over the years, we tried every family car imaginable. We even owned a Buick LaSabre. Betty nearly divorced me over this car, claiming this to be spousal abuse. How could any man ask his pretty wife, still in her twenties, to drive such an ugly 4-door “land yacht”?  At one point we did own a new Grand Prix with T-Tops, but still no Mustangs. At least the T-Tops kept me out of divorce court.

There finally came a time, when all I heard from Betty about cars was, “I want a Camry.” This continued on and off for years, but I continued to resist. In the fall of 1998, I talked her into test driving a new F150 Ford truck against her will. I knew that if she thought she could handle the truck, she would surely like what I really wanted. The next day, I headed toward a 1997 Ford Expedition and she immediately said, “I’m not driving that monster”. I told her it was easier than driving the truck and we drove away in an XLT Expedition. A few years later, we were convinced that we needed another SUV, so we bought another Ford Expedition. We were putting more than 600 miles per week on our newest Expedition and had loaned the older one to our son. Fuel prices during the summer of 2008 were killing us. We looked for a smaller car for me to drive to work. At the time I weighed nearly 300 pounds. I looked for a car that would be fun to drive, better on fuel mileage and one that had plenty of room for a tall jumbo guy, easy to get in and out of. Mustangs were not a consideration at that time, although in hind site, it would have been better than the car we selected. I’ll explain later. Our pick was a 2007 PT Cruiser. To be completely fair, we’ve had a lot of good times in this car, but it is not our dream car.

Our Expeditions were really racking up a lot of miles. The ‘97 has more than 270,000 miles and the ‘02 had more than 182,000. We had a few problems with the ‘02 and we talked about getting rid of it. You know what happened next. Here she came with those words again, “I want a Camry.” Oh-my-gosh! What was I going to do?

We finally decided that we no longer needed the “BIG BUS” but we didn’t begin an “all out” pursuit right away.

In August of ‘09, I visited my good friend, Eddie Harrington. The first words from Eddie’s mouth were, “Bubba, I bought me a new toy.” My immediate response was, “You finally found a yellow Mustang.” In his earlier years, Eddie owned a yellow ‘66 Mustang and a 1969 Boss 302 (yellow of course). For years, he kept telling me, “I want another yellow Mustang.” Well, he finally found and bought one. He was quick to tell me that it wasn’t just a Mustang. His new prize ride is a very nice yellow 1998 Cobra Convertible. Eddie offered to take me for a ride. He tried to toss me the keys, saying, “You know you want to drive it.” Of course I did, but I declined the offer and opted for a ride instead. Betty climbed in the back and I settled in the front passenger seat, now weighing only 190 pounds. Did it feel great? Yes, but this was nothing compared to what was about to happen. Eddie put the key in the ignition and after a short quick twist, his Cobra came alive. I instantly fell in love with that awesome Mustang sound. He backed out of the garage and headed for the highway.  Of course you know the top was down, adding to the experience and causing my “fever to rise”. At the end of our ride, Eddie’s remarked, “I know you; you’ll have one.” He followed with, “You better go home and take a real cold shower to get rid of the fever and what ever you do, don’t start looking on the Internet.” WELL, how do you suppose that advice worked for me?

Only days after our ride with Eddie, I started looking at Mustangs online, but I did not specifically look for a yellow one. It was during this same time that we experienced a potentially costly problem with our ‘02 Expedition. A spark plug blew out and I feared that this was going to be devastating. Visions of head replacement flashed before my eyes and there were no sugar plums dancing in my head. Luckily, I was able to fix the problem for less than $50.00, but then I became paranoid, wondering what was going to happen next.

One Thursday after our walk in the park, I turned right out of the parking lot instead of my usual left turn. I headed to Hilbish Ford, even though it was dark. I had no idea what we would find on the lot. We had already decided that we were not going to buy a new car. I hadn’t even told Betty that I was looking at Mustangs, but I think she already knew. When we arrived at Hilbish, there were several previously owned Mustangs on the lot, but one of them caught Betty’s eye almost immediately. It was a 2006 Screamin’ Yellow GT Convertible. WOW – It looked awesome, but I really didn’t think that I wanted yellow. I could quickly tell that Miss Betty loved this car, even though she did not say so at first. We talked to a salesman and made an appointment to return on Saturday.

On Friday, I continued searching the Internet and found two other ‘06 Convertibles and one ‘04 Convertible. I called about the ‘04 that same day and it was already gone. One of the other two was in Charlotte. It was blue. The last, a red one, was in Salisbury. On Saturday morning, I called about the red one in Salisbury first. SOLD! I called about the one in Charlotte and the salesman said, “I’ll check on it and call you back”. His returned call came while we were sitting in the sales office at Hilbish. This one had also been sold. The question quickly turned to, “do we really want the yellow one?” There was little doubt in my mind, I knew that Betty wanted it and this became even more evident after she drove it. I did not ride with her on the test drive. To tell the truth, by this time I had decided that the yellow one was really my favorite. I wanted a manual transmission, but my bride was not in agreement. I had heard many times, “once you own one Mustang, it will not be your last.”  With this in mind, my wife made a deal with me. I agreed to the five-speed automatic and she agreed to let me buy the Mustang I wanted after we pay off “HER MUSTANG”. There was only one other stipulation. She said I had to trade the PT for my Mustang. Tough decision: right? Well I’m already shopping and I’m already coveting a Shelby GT 500. Some people opt to see the world after retirement. I’ve already seen enough of it. I want to travel too, but mainly from car event to car event and I want to do it in a Shelby.

In reference to my opening comment, I really can’t understand how anyone could view their Mustang as “just another car”. Lee Iacocca really was a visionary genius back in the early 60’s. I’m in the process of reading a book on the Mustang story. This book was one of our “Dirty Santa” gifts received at the December CRMC meeting. I don’t know who brought the book, but I do want to say thanks. It’s awesome. Did you know that other names considered for the Mustang were Monte Carlo, Torino, Monaco, Cougar, and T-Bird II? The name Cougar was the unofficial project name. Aren’t you glad the name Mustang won over the others? One other trivia question; would you believe me if I told you that the Chevy Corvair was one of the cars inspiring the creation of the Mustang? It’s in the book.

Oh by the way, I think I finally cured the, “I want a Camry” disease. I haven’t heard it recently. She may need another Mustang vaccination a little later on. I’m sure I’ll be getting a booster shot in just a few short years…

Some of our friends are saying that we’re going through our mid-life crisis. We certainly hope so. Our very first CRMC event was the “Winery Cruise” organized by Leah Gowan. Thanks to Leah and all of the other CRMC members who made us feel right at home as new members. Regarding cars, it doesn’t get any better than this. We’re looking for a great year with our new friends in the Carolina Regional Mustang Club. Oh, one last thing that you might have already guessed. We also joined “The Yellow Mustang Registry”.

I said I would explain my earlier statement that a Mustang would have been a better selection than the PT. Check this out, this is the absolute truth. Our GT Mustang gets better fuel mileage than our PT. The PT is a little better on the highway (PT 27 vs Mustang 26), but the Mustang is considerably better in the city (PT 16 vs Mustang 19-20).