[VIDEO] Two Brothers Details their 119 Years of Combined Corvette Ownership

We’ve all heard about folks who have owned their Corvettes for more than 50 years, which is quite an accomplishment in itself.

But the Heart & Horsepower channel on YouTube recently posted a video about long-term Corvette ownership that takes things a step or two further.

Check out this story of the Smith Brothers – William and Glenn – who have owned their C1 Corvettes for a combined total of a whopping 119 years.

William, who was getting ready to celebrate his 83rd birthday when the video was being shot, got the ball rolling, or perhaps more appropriately, got the engine running, way back in 1962 when he bought a 1960 Corvette for $2,800.

“I worked with my dad in a car wash, and the guy that owned it brought (the Corvette) through there all the time,” William recalls.

While considering the purchase of a new Impala or Galaxie 500, William says the Corvette came up for sale for about the same money.

“My dad, he said, ‘I’ll never understand how you pay the same money for a 2-year-old car that you would for a new car.’ He says it rides like a wagon, and you can’t get but two people. Anyway, he came to like the car as much as me.”

Now some 63 years later, William still has that same two-seater Corvette, though it’s undergone lots of changes over the years, including two paint jobs. He figures he has also installed about 15 engines in it, including the current 436-cubic-inch supercharged monster that he estimates generates between 700 to 750 horsepower.

William says he has too many fond memories about the car to pinpoint one favorite but has no such problem identifying his worst memory.

After being drafted during the Vietnam War, he had to park his Corvette in the basement of his mom’s house. Upon returning home, he and his brother got the car running again.

One day, Glenn asked if he and his girlfriend could take the Corvette for a drive. “So he was gone a few minutes and the phone rang and he said, ‘the clutch went out in your car.’ I said, ‘well, it was slipping a little bit before I put it up.’ He said, ‘yeah, but it went out through the floorboard!’ The clutch (had come) apart and it tore out all the pedals on his side, knocked the heater core out on her side, cut a hole in the steering column, busted an ear off the transmission, knocked the starter off the block…”

Asked if he had ever considered selling the car over the past 63 years, William chuckled and said, “No. If I was smart, I would have, but I never been accused of that.”

The Corvette tradition stayed in the family when Glenn also bought a ’60 model, but he soon wrecked it and turned it into a parts car for the bright red ’62 replacement he bought in 1970 for just $1,200 and still has to this day. A sharp eye will detect the grille and chrome headlight rings (instead of the painted ones) moved over from the ’60 because he preferred the look of the earlier model.

Check out Heart & Horsepower’s 13-minute video to get a closer look at the Smith Brothers and their remarkable history of Corvette ownership.

Source:

Heart and Horsepower / YouTube

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