Real Wheels: 1964 Mustang quite a buy for $1.50
LIMA – Greg Tomlinson of Lima calls it a most unusual story.
And that it is.
He’s referring to how his father paid $1.50 for a 1964 Mustang that Greg now estimates is worth at least $55,000 today. The car’s serial number is 21, meaning it was the 21st vehicle to roll off the assembly line when the Ford Motor Co. debuted its pony car 58 years ago.
Greg’s father, Robert Tomlinson, came upon the car in the 1980s when he sold a building and parking garage that housed his business, an Avis car rental agency on East Market Street in Lima.
“Part of the garage was used for storage. When dad sold it, our customers were informed they would need to remove their items,” Greg recalled.
All but one person did.
“We had trouble getting ahold of the guy who owned the Mustang, and when we finally did, he told us he didn’t want it,” Tomlinson said. “It was literally in pieces.”
Junk?
Hardly the case, Greg’s dad knew.
This was a Mustang whose introduction was one rivaled by few other products at that time or since. Ford debuted the car at the New York World’s Fair on April 17, 1964. The day before saw its marketing blitz buying advertisements in 2,600 newspapers and purchasing the 9:30 to 10 p.m. advertising slot on all three major television networks.
“My dad recognized what he had and what it still could be,” Greg Tomlinson said.
First things first, though.
Robert Tomlinson needed to get the title transferred, which he paid $1.50 to do. He then got the car in driving condition so his daughter, Jill, had wheels during her days at Bath High School and Bowling Green State University.
“She was a pretty lucky girl to be driving around in a convertible,” Greg said of his younger sister.
Upon graduation from college, however, Jill wanted a new car.
“Dad was going to restore the Mustang for her, but he died in 2001 before he finished. That’s when I took over the project,” Greg said.
Two years later, he completed the restoration his father had started.
“Between the two of us, we re-did everything but the paint job, which was done by 3G Body shop,” Greg said. “We restored it back to its original white color and red interior, rebuilt the engine, fixed the floorboards and fixed the top … you name it. All new.”
It’s been nearly a decade since the restoration was completed, but the story doesn’t end there. Jill, now Jill Gruber, drove the car to her home in Pittsburgh, where she keeps the Mustang in a storage facility.
“She probably has put 20 miles on it during the last 10 years and hasn’t even had the convertible top down,” Greg said, shaking his head with a disbelieving smile. “I tell her to drive it, to enjoy it … but she must be afraid something may happen to it.”
As for Greg, he uses a photo of the Mustang to anchor an advertisement for his business that often appears on this page, Tomlinson Motor Service.
He has a treasure chest of stories that he’s come across over the years about people and their vehicles. As for himself, the first car he owned was a 1957 Chevrolet Bel Air. Later he would purchase a 1959 Corvette that he would take to car shows. That is, until one day when he was approached by a wealthy woman from New York City.
“She insisted on buying it,” Greg said. “She told me she drove one just like mine when she was in high school. She said she had a class reunion coming up and wanted to show up driving the Corvette.”
While he pocketed a profit on that deal, he’ll tell you it still doesn’t beat the one his dad initiated, paying $1.50 for one of the first Mustangs to roll off the assembly line.
Greg Tomlinson stands by one of his favorite photos, a group of men all with their heads under the hood of a car.
This 1964 Mustang was in pieces when Greg Tomlinson’s father, Bob, purchased it for the price of a car title at the time – $1.50. Together the two Lima men restored the vehicle, which was the 21st Mustang to roll off the assembly line when Ford introduced the pony car 58 years ago. Greg estimates it is worth $55,000 today.