[INJUNTOM]

At the last dealership I was at (Ford), the owner's wife, and both kids drove "demo" cars. If someone from corporate was to be there, then they scrambled to make sure everyone had their "demo" there in case anyone wanted to see them. They pretty much drove them until they got a certain amount of miles on them, and moved on to the next one. The wife usually got the newest car out...She drove the first Fusion in town, etc.

When I left there she was driving the new Edge.

All kinds of strange things happen at the dealer level. And not every owner is above doing things the manufacturer may not condone...

[INJUNTOM]

BTW, I'd always heard that the '69 Camaros and Firebirds were carried over into the '70 model year...Were any registered as such?

I have seen over the years cars that are registered as a different year than they really are. A buddy of mine has a '66 Mustang that has '65 on the title (dashes are totally different). Another buddy has a '66 Cutlass Conv that has '67 on the title (totally different body).

I've heard of others...

[tajunkman]

Originally Posted by Transamric

I couldn't have said it better.

PHS is a great resource & we are very thankful to have the information available that Mattison provides. But always the final answer? Not hardly. Why? Remember, at the time these cars were new, Jim was working in the Chevrolet COPO Office, not Pontiac. Not everything was done the exact same way in every GM division.
No one "knows it all". Not Mattison, not me, not John or Keith. And not the cars current owner.
So if Mattison has information that states without a doubt this particular Firebird was at the '69 LA Show, then share that proof with the owner so it can be offered as proof at the time of sale. If there is no documentation, then the cars' exact history will be left up to speculation. Which is what we are doing here, lacking that proof,....speculating to arrive as close to the truth as possible.

Yes you guys are speculating BUT,you have been handing down a VERDICT.

At first PY said that it couldn't be at the L.A. show because of the build date.

That is when I got into this thread...and that's when that verdict got overturned.

But, the speculating continues on.

Paraphrasing the last thing "PY" said about the car .......

1)"OK it could have been there in 69..... (2)but probably not..... (3)because the car probably had miles on it and was already a year old"

The 2nd and 3rd part is PROBABLY crap.

Do any of you have proof that the car had miles on it? Have proof that GM wouldnt use a year old car? How do you know it wasnt sitting somewhere on standby for a show?

Jim Mattison handed down a verdict too. I don't know if he is right or not, but least he based it on some pretty good circumstancial evidence. Not just speculation.

I hope some of you remember the thread about a black 72 TA or, the first few posts made about a little 63 lemans....

again nothing personal!!! "py" = the group of expert skeptics

[gregsgtos2]

tajunkman-WELL SAID!!!!!

[Kurt S]

Noone has ever stated that this latter part of the discussion is anything but speculation, pending more facts. Yes, several different people posted and theories evolve.
Me, I'm just trying to get to the bottom of the story of this car.

Originally Posted by tajunkman

1)"OK it could have been there in 69..... (2)but probably not..... (3)because the car probably had miles on it and was already a year old"

That last part about the 1970 model year show wasn't posted by "PY", but by me.
Don't overgeneralize. Seeing that you post here, that makes you part of "PY" too, especially since you seem to be a skeptic.

Y'all are entitled to your opinion. I don't state what I'm not sure of as fact, but I highly doubt that PMD stored a car just to use it at a car show that was a whole year in the future. That's a lot of inventory costs to carry. We never arranged show cars until (relatively) soon before the show, depending on what features /options marketing wanted to highlight.

Jim Mattison handed down a verdict too.

I don't believe I mentioned him in any of my posts.
Jim Mattison made some comments about the car, but noone but the seller has seen them. Unless you've been privy to them.........

[tajunkman]

I didnt name any PYers because I did not want to hurt any feelings. I was talking about the group.

I am just tired of this type of stuff. Never the benefit of the doubt, in case after case. So, I spoke up. I have never even sat in a 1st gen by the way. This thread was just such an obvious example of how it always goes.

What if YOU find your dream car. One that no one has seen before. You get a lot of history from past owners with it, that confirm it has never been touched.. But, then you find there is something goofy with the block code or, the vin number is missing on the block .....

[1969T/A]

I wasn't going to post anything
But I thought I would put in my two cents
One thing this group should know by now is John V & Kurt S
Like to write a two page long thread on their theories
and people are to believe it as fact and many do
because they are the so called "Research Experts".
What I have never once heard them say is the 1969 T/A & Firebirds
were "FLOPS" and they were doing anything they could to get rid of them
before the 1970 model came out and thats a known fact.
So for them to say they never put this car in a show in 1969
is just a shot in the wind and a guess.

[70Steve]

Originally Posted by Transamric

Steve, is there a printing date on that brochure? Don't think I have that one. Could you post a pic of the cover?

Sorry, I don't have the brochure, just saw it on U.S ebay. It was listed as a G.M. Shareholders brochure, sent out to preview the upcoming range. The front cover had a big G.M. Logo. Apparently it covered all of the U.S. G.M. Brands and models. It went for $50 IIRC. Shortly after I saw a similar, if not the same, one go for about $20, but the seller didn't respond to my question of postage costs, so I missed that one too.

Mike Noun, that wagon pic triggered my memory about the '70 wagons brochure (the one with the 67/8 Firebird loaded up with junk on the cover), in the background a few times is a red '69 Firebird. It never wears a 1970 plate though. One shot has Rally 2,s, the next, clearly airbrushed dog dishes.

[Transamric]

Ok, thanks for the info Steve. I'll keep my eyes peeled for one.

[70Steve]

Well, I should have looked in the wagon brochure first I guess. The red '69 is on every page inside as a background filler of some sort. No 69 Trans Am (like Mike Nouns pic) in it either. Brochure is dated 9/69.

FWIW, the picture I posted above clearly shows the '69 Firebird in the upcoming 1970 model range, the 1970 Wagon Brochure just shows the '69 Firebird as background material. Anyone got the G.M. brochure I pictured above? It would be interesting to read what they describe the '69 as.

Also, forgot to welcome you Jcoyer. Welcome!
Good luck with your car and I hope someone digs up a great old shot of it on display somewhere too.

[tajunkman]

Originally Posted by Kurt S

Jim Mattison made some comments about the car, but noone but the seller has seen them. Unless you've been privy to them.........

P.S. YOU got ME there.

[gregsgtos2]

i will say it one more time-tajunkman-WELL SAID!!! i know-maybe DISPLAY on phs means it sat in front of a grocery store-on display!

[roundportponchos]

I saw that pic in a book.....

Originally Posted by muscle_collector

mike, that is a really cool photo. i have never seen that one before. what is it out of? thanks for posting it.

[John V.]

Tajunkman, I know you mean no offense, and none taken by me. I will try to answer the criticisms.

1969T/A, you are also welcome to your opinion. I apologize if my long-winded posts are not to your taste, that is just my nature. I do need to correct you a bit on one point. I HAVE commented about the '69 'bird sales or lack thereof. Within this very thread, I commented on PMD's effort to unload the remaining inventory of unsold '69 'birds months after production ended. I may not have made it very clear since I assume the reader has a modicum of intelligence and will understand that when I mention a "fire sale", I've implied that PMD had trouble selling the '69 'birds in the latter months of production. I have also mentioned the reason for this in the past. Buyers were waiting for the arrival of the brand new 2nd gen 'bird, the 1st gen '69 had become a tired offering in the waning months of 1969. The TA had problems of its own owing to the very high price for the option. But you can fault me for not mentioning the possibility that this 'bird was exhibited at the '69 Southern Cal Auto Show (held 10/30/69 thru 11/9/69).

For all, Jcoyer did send me an email as I invited him to do so. He sent me a copy of the correspondence he received from Mattison. In my reply to him, I suggested a couple possibilities for why Mattison seemed to believe the car was displayed at the LA Show (this was BEFORE I learned the dates of the '68 Show for exhibition of '69 Models). I encouraged him to take it up further with Mattison since I believed it was possible that Mattison had more specific documentation that he had not shared with Jcoyer.

When I discovered the dates for the '68 SoCal Show, I concluded the car could NOT have appeared at that Show and said so in a post here.

Tajunkman, I did NOT contact Mattison myself. I do not hold myself out as an expert, but I DO consider myself to be a pretty thorough and serious amateur researcher of Pontiac "stuff". I have had occasion to contact Mattison in the past. Although I have made a couple purchases from PHS, I have no special relationship with PHS. When I've attempted to elicit Mattison's help on some research I was doing, I was more or less brushed off or ignored. PHS owes me nothing, but based on past experience, I've chosen not to bother them for information. Based on some of the info they have consistently published that I know to be inaccurate, I have never considered PHS to have added much to serious research and certainly not the "final word". That is just my opinion. Tramsamric summed it up very well.

I believe it is appropriate for Jcoyer to ask Mattison if he speculated based on the word "DISPLAY" on the Invoice. I think he did, but if Mattison has some other documentation available that says MORE (perhaps a 2nd Invoice record?), perhaps he will share it with Jcoyer.

As to whether this car might have been displayed at the SoCal Show in Nov. '69, keep in mind that the Invoice document that we HAVE seen had "DISPLAY" typed on it and was dated 3/24/69. Clearly, the car was sold at that time to Royal in North Hollywood.

Could Royal have exhibited it at the '69 SoCal Show? Sure, the car was in existence. And there is no evidence that they had sold it to a retail customer prior to the '69 SoCal Show. But whether they did or didn't, the 3/24/69 dated Invoice certainly didn't point to that possibility. You can believe that the car was exhibited at that Show, but you can't point to specific evidence that would prove it.

So whatever the meaning of the word "DISPLAY" on that Invoice, it had nothing to do with a Show that would be taking place 7 months later.

Mattison is the one that stated the invoice note made it appear that the car was used "for the Pontiac display at the Los Angeles Auto Show" and possibly others on the West Coast. Once I discovered the Show wasn't even called the LA Auto Show at the time and that the dates didn't jibe with the build, my conclusion was that Mattison had just guessed.

I don't think it is for me to prove that, rather Mattison can tell Jcoyer whether he just guessed or if he in fact has more conclusive documentation in his possession beyond what he reads (just like anybody else) on the Invoice record.

I stand on my earlier stated opinion:

"The Invoice points to an out of the ordinary early history, but unless I miss my guess, whatever the early usage was, it can't be discerned from the Invoice and without specific documentation, IMO, the story is just speculation and adds nothing to the value of the car."

and,

"Whatever the real story, I still think it is lost to history, so the bottom line is, it has no impact on the value of the car today."

If somebody wants to pay a premium for a word of mouth story connected to this car, that is their business. I'm not in the market for any '69 'bird coupe, so means nothing to me. But because I believe I have some knowledge of actual facts about the '69 Invoices, I thought I could be helpful in explaining certain unusual things found on this one. If you read my comments, you will see that I am usually pretty careful about qualifying these things based on "my interpretation".

I'm aware that PMD considered updating the '69 'bird and selling it as a '70 model. Those plans were scuttled and they ultimately continued to produce and sell them as '69 models until production finally ended at Norwood in Nov. '69. I do not personally know when that decision was made. I do know that Norwood changed the Body No. sequence sometime around Aug. '69 for both the Camaro & 'bird, presumably at the same time that regular '70 Model Year production should have begun.

Whether any '69 'bird was ever titled as a '70 by a DMV mistake, I don't know. But the VINs all show '69 and the Dealer Invoice ID Nos. all were added to the '69 Model Year totals.

I do not know what cars were displayed at the '69 SoCal Show or which Dealers provided them or whether PMD supplied any cars. It is conceivable that a pre-production '70 Firebird could have been exhibited by PMD. Even if it was, that doesn't mean a '69 'bird wouldn't have been on the show floor.

For all we know, this silver 'bird was displayed at the '69 Detroit Auto Show, although how or why it wound up in California subsequently might be difficult to explain.

The only thing I believe is certain is that NO evidence or documentation has been presented that PROVES it appeared at any Show, so the value of the car most logically would be unaffected by such a claim. IMO.

[1969T/A]

John V. Your what we call in the business a "double talker" you go on a 10-15 minute rant for something that anyone else could have been said in 2 seconds.
I know you mean well but you are very winded.. LOL
All you had to say was.....

Originally Posted by John V.

The only thing I believe is certain is that NO evidence or documentation has been presented that PROVES it appeared at any Show, so the value of the car most logically would be unaffected by such a claim. IMO.

[Transamric]

Dave, some of us here actually enjoy John's "rants", as you call them. I find his discussions to be very well thought out & thorough. And he will be the first one to admit when he's blown it.
Short enough for ya?

P.S., no, I'm not on John's payroll. LOL!!

[guccieng]

Originally Posted by INJUNTOM

BTW, I'd always heard that the '69 Camaros and Firebirds were carried over into the '70 model year...Were any registered as such?

I have seen over the years cars that are registered as a different year than they really are. A buddy of mine has a '66 Mustang that has '65 on the title (dashes are totally different). Another buddy has a '66 Cutlass Conv that has '67 on the title (totally different body).

I've heard of others...

i don't think what year it was registered as means much. now how it was titled, that's a different story. i would think the vin carries more weight than some piece of paper issued by the state.

[Kurt S]

The state could write whatever on the title. I've seen Z28, Yenko, SS, etc on the title cause that's what the person told the clerk - that info did not appear on the MSO. All the VIN's for the late 69 cars were coded as 69 VIN's.
There's also promo pics of the 69 Camaro body style with 1970 plates. I don't think they were used anywhere, but they exist.

[JLHarper]

I had a title that said: PONTIAC TUDOUR, I kid you not.

Must have been the strong southern accent from someone saying "two door" at DMV.

Jeff

[keith k]

Well stated, John.