There’s no other place in the world with such a rich history when it comes to the automobile like America. There’s no other place where certain cars meant so much to many, and no other place where the cars that have long left production cause as much stir on today’s collector market as in America.
Proof of that is the huge number of car auctions taking place each year here, each of them bringing to light an apparently inexhaustible flood of fine machines that sell almost every time, for ever-increasing amounts of money.
Like all other years before it, 2022 will kick off en force with such events, with Mecum sending under the hammer on January 6 in Kissimmee, Florida, a huge number of cars. Among them, this extremely rare 1969 Plymouth Road Runner.
Wrapped in a special order Bahama Yellow over a Black vinyl interior, the car is, we’re told, one of just 375 hardtops to have been made that year with a Torqueflite automatic transmission.
The hardware is used to control the matching numbers 440ci (7.2-liter) engine that rocks three Holley 2-barrel carburetors and an Edelbrock intake manifold. The engine spins wheels shod in BF Goodrich radial tires.
The odometer on the thing now shows a little over 59,000 miles (95,000 kilometers), all of which are believed to be original. At one point in its life, in the year 2000, the car stopped being driven extensively, as it entered a collection called Walter Hawk.
Together with a 1970 Plymouth Superbird, 1971 Dodge Charger R/T, and a 1969 Dodge Daytona, the Road Runner is leaving the said collection in January, and it will do so with no reserve. We are not being told how much the owner hopes to fetch for it, but bidders for this rare gem will probably go nuts trying to get it.