Carroll Shelby Tribute Thread

[CSX 4027]

How about we change gears a bit in order to not fight about whose car is better and whose car is more original and whose car is real etc, etc, etc,
How about us nonviolent, nonvulgar, happily opinionated say a few words to Shel about how he changed their life. No bull about how you lost your family because of the car. Just some good words to that ever effervescent businessman they called Carroll. He fought many wars to get to where he is today and has had more wives than possible he can remember. Lets make this about his accomplishments and the direct effect they had on us.

Me first.
I grew up to love the Jaguar XKE. I couldn't even look at another car until one day in 1965. My dad and I were on Sunrise Highway on Long Island. We visited a ford dealer. my dad wanted to look at the ner Galaxie 500 which in 1965 was said to be quieter than a Rolls Royce. While he checked out the car, there was a rumble coming from the service dept. It was of Course the most beautiful car I had ever seen. I didn't know what it was. It pulled away in screaming smokescreen. I just stood with my mouth open. My dad asked the salesman what it was. He only said one word,
COBRA. That word never left until the day I got mine. Shelby created what no one had done before and in such a way.

Any others please post

[Excaliber]

I've been a gear head all my life and love working with my son on cars since he was in diapers. Nothing has brought us closer together than working on, talking about, and researching the world of Cobras, Coupes and the legend of Carroll Shelby.

Thanks for the legend.

Ernie

[Jamo]

Great idea Sunshine Boy!

For me, it was 68 or 69, Ocean Street in Carmel, California. There, across the street was a beautiful S/C in Blue with white stripes, Bluestreeks, etc. Guy came out of the store it was parked in front of and started it up...that's all it took for me.

Thank you Carroll Shelby, you miserable old basturd (and I mean that with reverence).

[CSX 4027]

As long as those diapers where clear away from the project

[OZ]

JUST ONE VERY SINCERE WORD FOR MR. SHELBY..........

THANKS

[rdorman]

It started for me even before I got a license. My first car was a '67 Mustang Fastback black on black 289 with a toploader. I loved the cars and ended up having six different ones between 67 and 70. The best of the best for the Mustang was of course the Shelby models. For me, the 65 GT350-R is still one of the most desirable cars on the road. I didn't know much about the Cobra back then or for that matter CS himself. Just loved that '65.

Thanks CS for some the finest, baddest hot rods ever made and adding a bunch of 'color' to our little world.

Rick

[klayfish]

Damn, I feel so young. I wasn't born until about 5 years after the last of the cars we so much love were built by 'Ol Shelby.

I always loved the Cobra, but never had much of an obsession with it when I was younger, as I didn't hear much about it or read much (Car and Driver didn't write about it alot in the '80's and 90's). I had a picture of it always, but it wasn't my passion until....

For me, it was summer of 2001. I just wasn't getting enough satisfaction out of the weekend cars I had been trying. I had an '80 'Vette, and at the time, had a 1939 Dodge 5 window coupe. Was looking for something else and completely wild. September 7th, 2001, Las Vegas, Nevada. There, in the casino of Ballys, high up on a platform, surrounded by slot machines, sat a gorgeous black Cobra. I don't know what make it was, but I have to assume it was a CSX, since it was right near their home. Didn't matter to me anyway. I just stared and stared at the car. Loved it, but thought no way. But for the rest of the trip and ever since, I fell more and more in love with the Cobra legend. Thanks for the replica, Mr. Shelby!

Steve

[casaleenie]

I saw my first and only "real" Cobra in 1965 in Ft. Bragg NC.
I was driving a red MGA down the main drag and (can't even remember the color of the Cobra) a Cobra blew by me... Didn't even know what it was till a week later. I actually tried to catch it with my "hot" MGA. Didn't see another one for 35 years. Always wanted a Cobra but didn't even know it was a possibility until about two years ago. I saw a red one driving around the neighborhood last year (Dan Styfflers car) and I was hooked again. Did not know about replicas and assumed it one of only a few. Owned a couple of Vettes over the years but nothing like this Cobra...
I thank Steve B, Dan S. and CS.

[REAL 1]

Mr. Shelby: Thank you for bringing us the most awesome and legendary car of all times (IMHO).

Keep making those COBRAS!

[computerworks]

(...spoke to Carroll this morning. Despite this, he's still not gonna check the forum from work.)

[Jamo]

{Damn it--just trying to make sure we get some more of them Bob Marsh hot dogs...}

[Blue66]

well I got "in" in 1965... I was a die hard Ford guy.. ( maybe doin a comeback now ) . I read every article in mag's an went to every Shelby dealer around... I took a camera one day down to Tasca Ford... have pics of ROW's of Shelbys .. over the years 1970-1981 we have had prob 25-30 Shelby's an a 427 Cobra... only thing I have left is Shelby's 66 GT 350 blue convert... awesome cars to sum it up!!! good job CS!!!!!

Dan

[Dan Stryffeler]

I can't imagine a more difficult business to be in, much less be successful at, than automotive manufacturing. My earlier posts notwithstanding, I respect Mr. Shelby for the products he has brought to market and the incredible talent that he assembled to help him do so.

I still get excited when I see one of his cars, whether at his factory/museum in Vegas (I sneak out there twice a year), or at museums/TV etc. Unfortunately, I don't have too much access to an original car here in Cleveland. Although I know someone, who knows someone, who is a doctor and has one hidden away (yeah - right).

P.S. - Thanks Al !

- Dan

[PDHse]

Hi, i would also like to thank Carroll Shelby for the marvellous cars he built. I have always liked cars and especially cobras ever since i was a kid. When i was quite young my uncle was mad on hot rods and custom cars, he still lived with my grandparents then so we saw a lot of him. I remember he built a hot rod from scratch once, and a custom car he also built was featured in a magazine.
He told me this story once that he had a passenger ride in a cobra and to a twelve year old i was hooked. To add to the story he dug out in his shed, amongst the old wheels, gauges and car bits a plastic model kit of a cobra made by Frog and gave it to me. A few years later i actually saw one near where i live, it was pouring with rain and this cobra had its top up and was filthy dirty but what a sound. Remember in Britain you don,t see or hear many V8s on the road.
Ever since i ,ve collected any book, model or magazine article on the subject within my grasp. I can,t afford a cobra or even a replica as i have not the means but enjoy reading about the racing history and seeing them at Goodwood. My wife supports my interest/ hobby and now my son also loves cars especially Ol Yella which he sat in recently.
Finally , i would also like to say thank you to the CCmembers who share their memories and old pictures of cobras on this website. If it was,nt for you and ultimately Carroll Shelby there would be none of this.

[427SSSS]

Saw a wrecked Cobra for sale in the San Jose Mercury Newspaper in 1966. Still in school, part time job, I only had half the money, $1000.00 Asked my Dad to loan me the rest, he wouldn't, for typical Dad reasons. So I did not get it, but swore to him I'd have one someday.
Two years later, I'm in the Army overseas, and he writes he considering buying a Porsche 911S, I try talking him into buying a Cobra instead, but no luck.
Lot's of fun ribbing the next 35 years, as I compare what his Porsche is worth compared to the Cobra I/he woulda/coulda had.
I now have my dream car, and were it not for Shelby, I'd probably be driving a 1968 911S Porsche.
Were it not for Carroll, these things might be just like TRs, MGs, etc., nice British cars, but not COBRAS.

Too bad BIG BOB doesn't post here anymore, now he has some great Cobra stories to tell.

[Larry Cleveland]

My Cobra experience began while attending a local community college. I was board stiff in a biology class. The teacher is showing slides of various plant life. We are all just about to fall asleep. All of the sudden he shows a sequence of slides of his son's 65 Cobra. I just about fall off the chair. Later I see the Corbra in person and I fell in love. Twenty four years later my wife lets me buy one. Thank you Carroll! Nothing compares to the Cobra!

[Sal Gerace]

Originally posted by Jamo


{Damn it--just trying to make sure we get some more of them Bob Marsh hot dogs...}

HOT DOGS!! Marsh didn't offer me any Hot Dogs?

[pk]

shelby's up to 4300! I got to get my sh1t together or I'll end up with a csx 5000!

Thank you Carroll you gave birth to the most amazing blend of beauty and power.

pk

[RallySnake]

As a kid, I was into Ferrari's. I built models and loved the shape of the 250 GTO, the 275 GTB and the '57 Testa Rossa. Until 1964, when my fellow Texan, Carroll, started kicking their butts on the racetrack.

In 1964, I saw a silver 289 Cobra outside a slot car track. I had wire mesh headlight protectors and was just beautiful. A few years later, there was a Cobra in the Houston car show with an amazingly deep candy red paint job. It wasn't until 1970 that I saw one run. It was on an autocross course in Oklahoma city. It was an ugly orange 427 with short sidepipes coming out of the hole where the louvers normally are. The thing was a beast though, tearing around the track and knocking cones every which way. The brutishness of the car had everyone in awe. I had to have one.

Thanks, Carroll,
Paul

[Eddy K]

The first Cobra that I saw was at our local dragstrip.
A Ford dealer from Louisville brought one down one night and cleaned house.
It was a little red 289 and he beat every Corvette entered that night, also a 421 Pontiac Catalina and was finally beaten by a 64 427 Thunderbolt but not by much.
That did it for me. I went thru several Mustang drag cars, an altered roadster and a dragster before finally getting my SPF.
Although it is hard to beat the thrill of the dragster the Cobra is in a class of it's own.
Eddy