Long Island Vettes - Membership Profile

How It All Got Started
Richie Shields

Well, I would guess to tell my story I'd have to go back to when I was about 12 years old. I was raised with my Grandparents and my Grandfather was an excellent mechanic (aircraft mechanic). By the time I was 16 I had learned enough about auto mechanics from him to get a job after school at a local Texaco Station. To tell the complete truth, it probably didn't hurt that the owner (Tony) was a friend of my Grandfather's.

One of our regular customers owned a 1958 Corvette. He was some sort of an electronics salesmen and would drive up and down the east coast in the Corvette making sales calls. Needless to say he racked up the miles fairly quickly.

One night he pulls into the station in the ' 58 Corvette which is popping back and on the verge of stalling. He jumps out of the car tosses me the keys and yells "Fix It", gets in the Taxi which had followed him in and leaves on a business trip.

My first Corvette
Black 1958, Silver Coves, Red Interior
3 Speed with a whole bunch of miles
(Sorry about the poor quality - it's an old photo).

My Second Corvette and one I kept!
1963 Split Window Coupe
Silver Blue / Dark Blue Interior
300 HP - 4 Speed - 12,000 Miles

The 1963 Split Window Coupe (Left)
A short while after I bought it from the original owner.
Yes, that long haired hippie freak on the left is me.
Well it was the sixties!

My friend Ralph on the right with his
Black 1963 Split Window Coupe.

I pulled the car into the shop, yanked a valve cover and quickly determined that several of the rocker arms were barely moving. I left a note for my boss saying I though the cam had gone flat (rounded).

Next day after high school I went to the station and found a pile of parts with a note from my boss simply saying "Fix It" - so I did.

But the car sat because the owner was away on one of his selling trips. I made sure to put the car inside each night when I locked up.

Three weeks later the owner returns and pulls into the station in a brand new 1963 Corvette Dark Blue Coupe - first one I'd ever seen. I promised myself right there and then I'd someday have one like that.

He signs over the registration to the 58 Corvette with instruction to sell it, get what we can for it and to take out the money for the repairs (he never even asked how much) and he's off again on another road trip.

I put the registration to the '58 in my pocket.

Now the '58 had high miles probably close to 100K as I recall, but with the exception of a well worn driver's seat it was in terrific shape. I'd just finished rebuilding the engine so that was solid as a rock.

I had to have this car! My boss Tony knew I loved Corvettes and we figured out about how much we had into it in parts. It came to a little under $400. He figured the car was worth about $1,000 at the time.

He told me to take the "For Sale" sign off the car and put the car behind the station and cover it.

Well at 17 all my available cash amounted to about $300. I couldn't even pay for the parts we'd put in. I wasn't sure what my boss had in mind.

A couple more weeks went by and the owner returned once again.

Tony (my boss) spoke to him - I have no idea what was said but after the conversation he came over to me, shook my hand and asked if I still had the registration in my pocket. I said I did and he told me that was good because you should always carry your registration with you. What?

After the shock wore off I found that my boss had negotiated a pretty good deal for me. My $300 plus another $500 which I could work off at the station over time (a very long time at $40 a week). But the numbers just didn't add up? Turns out my boss had waived the labor costs associated with the repairs because I had done a lot of the work on my own time (yes I have to admit I would rather work on a Corvette then do my high school homework back then and probably still would today).

I was on cloud nine! Here I was just turned 17 and I owned my first of what would be many Corvettes. Unfortunately by that time my Grandfather had passed away, my mother didn't drive and my Grandmother refused to put me on her insurance. Now at 17, on a Junior Driver's License and with no money I had a real problem. To compound the problem my mother decided that if I owned a sports car I'd wind up killing myself - she told me the car would have to go! And to my everlasting regret she sold the car. On the upside she got top dollar for it - about $1,200 which I put away in a little envelope and labeled "My Next Corvette". A little sidebar to this part of the story. Many years later my mother moved in upstairs with us. At that time I had six Corvettes. Whenever I would catch her looking at me working on one of the cars I would call to her "Look Ma, surrounded by Sports Cars and still alive! Amazing!". Humorous now, but unfortunately it would be many more years before I was able to own another Corvette.

The 63 Coupe sometime around 1974.
I just love those Split Window Coupes.

Putting a new engine in my 1967 Convertible.
Still have this one also.

Two of my other Corvettes
can be seen in the background.

Time went by, college came and went, a few years serving with Uncle Sam's Misguided Children (USMC), hopped around a couple of jobs but kept the dream of owning a Corvette.

Finally settled in a secure job and started looking for a Corvette. After all - I still had the envelope.

By 1969 most of the '58s I looked at were junk so I decided to just look for a good car.

I remembered that '63 Coupe I had seen so many years earlier and started looking for one like it. A friend I worked with was also looking for a Corvette at the time and we spent may weekends driving around looking at either junk or way overpriced cars.

One weekend I had something else to do and didn't go with him on our usual weekend quest. That was my bad luck - he found and bought a very nice Black '63 Split Window Coupe, exactly what I was looking for.

I was very disappointed but some weeks later he told me about a car he'd heard about in Brooklyn that might be for sale by the original owner.

Not expecting too much, after all the car wasn't even officially for sale, we took a ride to see it. The owner, a NYC Firemen, was reluctant to let us see the car but his wife, who was very pregnant with twins, insisted.

When he opened the garage door you couldn't see any car.

What you saw was a pile of kid's stuff stacked up on something under a mover's blanket. They already had 3 kids with 2 more on the way. After spending the better part of an hour moving stuff into the driveway we finally uncovered the car. Well, it was covered in dust and had 2 flat tires. So I knew a test drive was out of the question but could I hear it run? No of course not. The car hadn't been registered since 1965 and the battery was stone dead. The mileage read just under 12,000 and the owner said it was original, that he had bought the car new before he was married. I looked around and everything looked okay but without hearing the car run I wasn't going to shell out any money. I asked him how much he wanted and he told me that he really didn't want to sell it, that he was hoping to put it back on the road after the twins were born. His wife chimed in with $1,800. Now back in 1969 the average going price for '63 Corvettes was somewhere around $1,000 so she was way over priced. If she had said $800 I might have thought about it. I thanked them for their time, helped them load up the garage, left them my name and phone number and feeling once again disappointed went home never expecting to hear from them again. The car gave a poor first impression, yet there was something drawing me to that car?

A few weeks went by and I received a call from the wife. She said that something had come up and they needed to raise cash quickly and was I still interested in the car?

I told her I wasn't going to buy a car that I hadn't driven or at least heard run. She asked if I had cash available and I told her I had. Her price came down to $1,400. No sorry your price is still too high I told her.

The following evening the husband called me back and asked if I would be interested in the car if I could hear it run? I told him depending on how it ran I might be. We set up an appointment for the following Saturday.

When we arrived that Saturday morning I had wrongfully assumed that he was going to have the car ready to run. He was working and wasn't even there. His wife seemed to be under the impression that I was going to get the car running? She said her husband knew very little about fixing cars.

My 1967 Convertible - When I first bought it.

Goodwood Green, Green Interior, White Ragtop
350 HP / 4 Speed / Auxiliary Top (not shown)
Looks good but it needed an new engine.

Later replaced bolt-on wheels
(they were pretty beat up & they leaked)
with rally wheels.

Well I did have some tools with me and the battery from my '62 Impala would fit in the Corvette so I decided to give it a try. After installing the battery and getting the engine to crank over a couple of times I realized there was no gas in the car so out came the battery once again and back into the Impala, off we went to buy a couple of gallons of gas. My friend told me to forget it - this car was just bad news all the way around but I felt there was just something about this car. We eventually got it to run and it sounded okay. Of course still 2 flat tires so no test drive. When the husband came home he was amazed when we started the car for him. He seemed less inclined then ever to sell the car now that it ran. A private conversation between the husband and wife and he came back and halfheartedly said "Okay, $1,400 and it's yours". I offered $1,000 and he began to close the garage door. Wait a second buddy, my battery is in your car! I was in the process of removing my battery when he asked what would be my best offer - I went up to $1,100 he came down to $1,300 - no deal! The wife then said they needed to get $1,300 for the car and nothing less. I took out "the envelope" and all the money I had, counted it out for them and it came to $1,200. They looked at the cash, then at each other, said yes and picked up the money from the hood of the car. He signed over the registration, handed it to me and asked when I wanted to come back to pickup the car. I told him I'd take it now. He was more than a little puzzled as to how I was going to do that with 2 flat tires and no battery. Well I had a plan. One spare from the Corvette, one spare from the Impala and the car was up in the air again. Yeah but what about the battery? No problem! Get the car started with the battery from the Impala and after it's running just put back the original tar-top battery. Front plate from the Impala on the rear of the Corvette and we were good (if not legal) to go. With $6 left in my pocket I had to stop before we got on the Belt Parkway and get gas. I was very nervous on my first ride but we made it home just fine. I had thought there was a problem with the steering but came to realize later on it was the 14 inch wheel and under inflated tire I'd put on the front. When I bought the 1963 Coupe in 1969 it had 12,000 miles. I still have the car today, 36 years later now with 39,000 original miles.

It occurs to me that I've explained how I got involved in the hobby but not how or when the passion overtook me.

I was 14 and in High School. My locker was next to the most beautiful girl I had ever seen until I meet my wife. She was always smiling and never failed to say hello to me. I was desperately in love. The problem was she was a senior, I was a lower classmen - a freshmen. Back then that was a major problem.

Now those of you who know me today might find it difficult to believe that I was shy but I was. It took me most of the school year to decide I was going to ask her out. But of course I had to be very cool about it.

Another shot of the '67 with the new engine.

My 1975 Semi-custom with 350/350
Aftermarket Side Pipes

One Friday afternoon I decided I'd "accidentally" bump into her as we were leaving the school - you know real casual like. My timing was perfect. I was following her down the sidewalk as we left school and as I walked faster than she I figured I'd catch up to her just about the time we got to the road. 5 more steps, then 3 and then she was at the road and I one step behind.

What was she doing? She got into a little red convertible. Well, so much for my great "plan". There she was sitting next to some guy in a college sweater behind the wheel of a 1957 Red, Fuel Injected Corvette! Damn! I found out the next day that she was engaged to the guy, had been for over a year (I had never noticed her engagement ring - what a jerk I was!).

Now you might think that with my plan for romance dashed on the hood of a '57 Corvette I'd be devastated. But instead a strange thing happened - instantly I fell in love all over again with the Corvette and that's when the passion began!

Now at 14, without any kind of a driver's license and without any money to buy a real Corvette I was somewhat "limited" in my ability to exercise my "passion". I wound up buying every magazine that had a Corvette on the cover, reading every article I could find, I had posters all over my room, inside my locker door and I'm sure the Revel stock must have gone up with all the Corvette Models I bought and built.

But as they say I was "Born too soon" and I would have to wait until I was older to get my hands on a real Corvette!

But I never had any doubt that it would happen!

My 1977 Corvette - just a decent driver.

1982 Collector's Edition - Actually it's my wife's Corvette

As luck would have it there was a neighbor one street over who had a '56 Corvette. Pete was about 25 (10 years my senior), he was a great guy but a terrible mechanic. He didn't know it though until he put his clutch in without the pilot bearing. I was always hanging around pestering him whenever he was working on the car. In fact he used to call me "Pest" until I told him what he'd done wrong. Then I became his "assistant". After that he'd call me to tell me when he was planning on working on his Corvette. I became "invited" to "help" work on the car.

Made me happy.

Now if we jump ahead again to 1969 when I actually had a real Corvette of my own I got into it full bore. I joined the NCCC, NCOA and several local clubs: South Shore Corvettes, Empire Corvettes, the Long Island Corvette Owners Association and years later the NCRS.

Back then the emphasis in all the clubs was on performance and driving ability much more than appearance. I also join EMRA (Eastern Motor Racing Association) and SCCA (Sports Car Club of America).

Throughout the '70's I ran at tracks like Bridgehampton, Watkins Glenn and Limerock as well as on local "AutoCross" tracks. When a guy I knew was killed in a headlong collision with the Perelli Bridge at Bridgehampton, I decided that 'wheel to wheel' racing (even in the amateur class) while thrilling, was too great a risk and after that I only ran in 'time trials'.

Our 1987 Automatic Coupe at some show.

Getting a little track time in the '87 at Bridgehampton.

All the clubs back then had "workshops" where the members actually learned how to work on their own Corvettes. I was often surprised by how little some of the owners knew about what made their cars run.

Well, all things change I guess and with today's technology there's probably not too much the backyard mechanic can do except "wax on / wax off".

Most of the local clubs from back then have gone the way of the dodo. Those that have survived don't remember the early days.

While I am still a 36 year "Lifetime" member of LICOA, several years ago I was told that the club had "outgrown me" and that my concepts about mutual help, information exchange, camaraderie and friendship amongst the members and in fact among all Corvette owners were "yesterday's news".

At the suggestion of several "old timers" on January 16th, 2002 we founded Long Island Vettes. Originally our working name was "Long Island Classic Corvettes" and our membership was limited to owners of 1982 and older Corvettes. Before long, other people wanted to get in on a good thing and the name was changed to Long Island Vettes with no restriction as to what year Corvette you had. The motto of our club is "founded on friendship" and so far we have been able to adhere not only to our motto but to the policies and principals that made "yesterday's" Corvette Clubs so much fun.

I am very pleased to have been re-elected to a fifth term as the club President but more importantly I am once again enjoying the members and the things we do together as a club. Thanks to these great people I have experienced a true re-birth of my "Passion for the Corvette".