John Chun and Shelby American

[Richstang]

John told me he came to SA in the middle of the design of the 67's and had his hand on that year, then had free hand on the 68. He did say one criteria he had was any mods he wanted should be cheap and he could use anything from the Ford inventory, thus the 65 T-Bird taillights on the 68.

Sometimes our memories are not always in line with the history. If he graduated in February '67 and started at in March, just about everything was well underway on the '67's except maybe for the later raised taillight panel. Although Pete thinks otherwise, I would think his focus was more on the '68 designs at that point in time. Weren't the first 2 sets of fiberglass for the '68 styling made by AOS in April '67? That's seems about right timing wise. I'd think after they did the exterior, they moved on to the interior pieces, and then all the the emblems.

[FL SAAC]

I had the good fortune of running into John at a car show some years ago. Thought I would share something that he told me. As most of you probably know John was hired by Shelby American to work on the design and engineering of the 67-68-69-70 Shelby Mustangs. He had many great stories. But one thing he told me is a good perspective on us and our cars.

One day someone John was talking to in his wife's Asian restaurant, told him he should go to the Muscle Car show the Local GTO club hosts each year, that he might see some of the cars he helped develop. So he convinced his wife to carry his bag of Shelby Stuff on that 100 degree day to the event. That is where he ran into me and my car. Apparently he had no idea or expectation that most of these cars still existed. Back in those days Mustangs were expected to be disposable cars with maybe a life expectancy of ten years or less. John was not connected to the hobby or even attending the Shelby reunion events. He was amazed that people like us had saved these cars and many if not most were still around. In his last years, John did attend the Shelby employee reunions in Vegas.

A couple of stories John told me you might enjoy. When I first met him he walked up to me while I was talking to the GT500 owner beside me and said something like "I designed that car." I mean I am in at a Motorplex in Chanhassan MN. A small Asian fellow walks up to me and says what? I am sure the look on my face suggested surprise. He said come with me and took me to the rear of the car and pointed at the taillights. "65 Thunderbird taillight. I picked them out for this car." he said. Anyone that knows this year car would know about those taillights. So I was not real impressed. So I started asking him questions. He knew all the answers plus some. It was John Chun, ex Shelby American employee.

I talked with many times. I'd have lunch at his wife's restaurant. I had a several car books that actually had pictures of my car in them taken by Nicky Wright. I gave a couple of extra copies I had to John. You would have thought I'd given him a million dollars.

Many stories but one other that stands out is I asked him about his story. He was from what became North Korea. As a teenager he got to South Korea and ended up working on a freighter to get to Japan. He managed to go to engineering school in Japan. When he got to California someone said he should learn auto design so he signed up for a well known school near Los Angeles, the name escapes me right now. It was at that school that he saw an ad on the bulletin board from Shelby American looking for a designer with an engineering background. He said he could barely speak English but got the job. His first task was to finish the design of the 67 Shelby Mustang.

As you know for the 68 Shelby Mustangs, the whole operation was moved to Ionia MI. John was with Shelby when that happened. He told me they had huge issues getting reliable and quality fiberglass for the 67's. None of the hoods fit the cars. The Ford guy assigned to Shelby American was sent to solve this issue. So happened he knew the people at AO Smith and knew that AO Smith was no longer going to be doing Corvettes for GM. And knew AO Smith has production lines already in place. Plus quality fiberglass parts were available through AO Smith. The decision was made to move the production to MI. All the Shelby American production team was laid off including John. The employees were encouraged to apply for a job at AO Smith. John did, was hired and moved to MI.
When the Shelby dream ended they were all going to be laid off again. John went to Ford thinking that Ford would be happy to hire him from Shelby American. He said Ford offered him a job but they could care less whether he worked for Shelby American. One of the other Shelby people went to Chrysler and they were delighted to hire ex Shelby people. John got a job at Chrysler for more than what Ford had offered him.

I asked him what he did at Chrysler. "Designed cars" is what he told me. Ok like what cars did you design? John was in the performance car division of Chrysler.
He said to me "did you ever see one of those Plymouth with that huge wing on the back of it? That was my idea." It was John's idea to put the big wing on the Daytona's. He also told me if I look at a 69 Charger the front radiator screen is the same as my 68 GT350, said he designed both. Chrysler was losing money on their performance cars so they laid the entire department off shortly thereafter. John got a job designing toys for Tonka Toys in Minnesota which is how he got to MN.

I attached a couple of pictures I took of John. The next summer after I met him he called me up and I thought he asked me to bring my car to a car show on July 4th in Delano, where they lived. Sure John, be my pleasure. When I showed up it was not a show it was a parade. I don't do parades in my car. It idles faster than a parade moves. And he had these HUGE banners. We would have been taped inside the cars if I had put them on the doors like he wanted. We compromised and put them on the fenders. I did ok in the parade until we got to a small hill. I couldn't let the clutch out completely since we were going too slow. I smoked my clutch getting up the hill trying not run over the marching band in front of me.

fantastic story thanks sharing this history with us

[Bob Gaines]

John told me he came to SA in the middle of the design of the 67's and had his hand on that year, then had free hand on the 68. He did say one criteria he had was any mods he wanted should be cheap and he could use anything from the Ford inventory, thus the 65 T-Bird taillights on the 68.

Sometimes our memories are not always in line with the history. If he graduated in February '67 and started at in March, just about everything was well underway on the '67's except maybe for the later raised taillight panel. Although Pete thinks otherwise, I would think his focus was more on the '68 designs at that point in time. Weren't the first 2 sets of fiberglass for the '68 styling made by AOS in April '67? That's seems about right timing wise. I'd think after they did the exterior, they moved on to the interior pieces, and then all the the emblems.

The raised taillight panel was being lead time manufactured by sub contractor to ship to SA if not already being put on the cars by March 67 let alone being initially designed.

[shelbydoug]

Chun is a guy that seems to have slipped right through SA history with just a couple of mentions? I suppose it didn't fit into the "legend thing" to pay much attention to him?

Maybe he was just a tough interview? "What did you do at SA?" "I designed cars". Maybe just his own fault? I see it as a missed opportunity of sorts though, like just mentioning KarKraft in passing.

[Bill]

Sometimes our memories are not always in line with the history.

That is the bottom line, back "in the day", they had a job, they were designing and building cars. There were far more important things going on in their lives at that same time for anyone to remember every detail of their lives, let alone "their job". As such, any time you have an interview with this person or that, the answers are always suspect based on the way the actual question was asked, or even formulated before it was/is asked.  This is why we rely on factory documentation whenever we can, as it is that pen to paper(work) that provides better proof vs the memory of someone going through the motions of their day to day lives 50+ years ago.

Just my personal two cents worth on this particular subject.

[shelbydoug]

Sometimes our memories are not always in line with the history.

That is the bottom line, back "in the day", they had a job, they were designing and building cars. There were far more important things going on in their lives at that same time for anyone to remember every detail of their lives, let alone "their job". As such, any time you have an interview with this person or that, the answers are always suspect based on the way the actual question was asked, or even formulated before it was/is asked.  This is why we rely on factory documentation whenever we can, as it is that pen to paper(work) that provides better proof vs the memory of someone going through the motions of their day to day lives 50+ years ago.

Just my personal two cents worth on this particular subject.

I see it a little differently. I understand that as a journalist one needs to take a perspective to create a story, even if it is a 'Devil's Advocate', but it would seem that some have had the drum beat for them, over and over and others completely passed by?

To some, it seems more important who designed the "Lemans stripes" rather then who designed the car to put them on?

...and therein lies a tale?

[dbegley]

thanks for pointing out those SAAC articles on John. Some of the info in those articles is a bit different than what John told me.
SAAC should have identified those Shelby Mustangs in the pictures of John. The red 68 is mine. The Black one is Dan Mattila's.
I took a bunch of pictures and gave John copies of all of them and here are two of those pictures.
John was a pretty great guy. Fun and interesting to talk to.
In his wife's restaurant he had a Shelby American display on the wall when you walked into the small lobby.
Probably didn't mean much to the town's folk in Delano MN.
He was fighting cancer when I first met him. Sad to hear he died.
The local Star Tribune newspaper ran a big obit for him.
A celebrity among us.... John was part of automotive history.

[Richstang]

Anyone who worked on these cars, in any capacity, at Shelby American is greatly appreciated today among us enthusiasts. We enjoy hearing these short stories about them, even if they are not perfectly in line with the history. Maybe to the line worker it was just a job, but to the engineers and industrial designers (like John Chun), it was the kind of job one dreams of when attending a 4 college to get a bachelor's degree in the field. John must have had quite a lot to offer in talent and knowledge to get Goodell's attention. I envy him for getting through the door. It nice to hear he was proud of his role however big or small it may have been.

It seems he is one of the few people who saved a few sketches of the development ideas. For that I'm additionally grateful. If his son and or wife ever read this I hope they will share more of these type of insider details with us.

[Bob Gaines]

Sometimes our memories are not always in line with the history.

That is the bottom line, back "in the day", they had a job, they were designing and building cars. There were far more important things going on in their lives at that same time for anyone to remember every detail of their lives, let alone "their job". As such, any time you have an interview with this person or that, the answers are always suspect based on the way the actual question was asked, or even formulated before it was/is asked.  This is why we rely on factory documentation whenever we can, as it is that pen to paper(work) that provides better proof vs the memory of someone going through the motions of their day to day lives 50+ years ago.

Just my personal two cents worth on this particular subject.

+1

[FL SAAC]

Anyone who worked on these cars, in any capacity, at Shelby American is greatly appreciated today among us enthusiasts. We enjoy hearing these short stories about them, even if they are not perfectly in line with the history. Maybe to the line worker it was just a job, but to the engineers and industrial designers (like John Chun), it was the kind of job one dreams of when attending a 4 college to get a bachelor's degree in the field. John must have had quite a lot to offer in talent and knowledge to get Goodell's attention. I envy him for getting through the door. It nice to hear he was proud of his role however big or small it may have been.

It seems he is one of the few people who saved a few sketches of the development ideas. For that I'm additionally grateful. If his son and or wife ever read this I hope they will share more of these type of insider details with us.

+1

[dbegley]

John told me that he really enjoyed working for SA. Had some great stories about being there. Said he was real surprised when SA offered him the job over all the other applicants. Per John the key thing he had going for him was his engineering education plus the design school. But as he said it surprised him to be offered the job as his English was pretty poor.

He said that he had a lot of flexibility in what he wanted to do with the 68 cars but had to have everything blessed by Carroll or others. And he had to keep the costs of the mods down. But he did have access to off the shelf Ford parts.

He told me about his first time driving a Cobra. Said he needed to run an errand and someone tossed him the keys for one of the Cobras. John told me he knew what the Cobra was but had no idea what he was going to be driving until he took off in it.

I'd say John knew it was a pretty cool job but didn't appreciate what part he played in Shelby and automotive history while he was there. He later had a better appreciation of the part he played.

[68countrysedan]

Very interesting thread.

I can believe that he didn't fully "appreciate" his part in SA history. In a close time frame, I'm not sure anyone did and I would include Shelby himself. In the last half of the the '60s, it was a job, albeit a very cool one.

Most people don't see greatness at the time; it's only through the perspective of time that we understand it. Remember, in the '70s, Shelbys were just used cars.

Finally, was Mr. Chun into cars during his SA tenure? Did he drive Shelby Mustangs; work on cars; go to races after work?

[Bigfoot]

Cool story

[dbegley]

John was into cars. He went to that LA school to learn automotive design. But I did NOT get the impression that he was a car guy like we might define ourselves today. I am sure he did drive the Mustangs but the only driving story he told me was about that one time in the Cobra. No he didn't say anything about going to races. Worse, once he left AO Smith he was all but away from the Shelby Mustang world. Sadly he missed all those years as they grew in value and appreciation. I got the impression that the car show he ran into me was the FIRST time he had attended a show looking for the cars he help design. I really don't think he believed any of his cars still survived. Mustangs were disposable cars. His wife was carrying a bag of his Shelby American stuff. He still had his employee badge from SA. So he obviously was proud of what he did while at SA. He even kept the drawings.

An add in story on the value of our Shelby Mustangs that has little to do with John. I found my 68 GT350 in January 1982. I knew what a Shelby Mustang was but it was nothing more than a special Mustang to me at that time. The prior owner had been trying to sell the car for a year or more. No one would give him the $6000 he was asking for it. True, the car was not in great shape. When I ran across it, some guy out of Toledo OH was going to buy it for $3000 if he couldn't sell it for more than that. I got his wife to sell it to me for $3500. But my wife couldn't believe I paid that much for a car in such poor shape. It's all relative, right? It wasn't that bad. Well maybe it was pretty rough but it was worth saving. I got it running then restored within that first year. When I took it to car shows, few people had any idea what it was. It looked like a Mustang sort of but the word Mustang was no where on it. I had great conversations trying to explain to the uninitiated what a Shelby Mustang was. It wasn't until Gone in 60 Seconds came out that Shelby Mustang values exploded. But that is more current history. During those early years, a handful of people made offers to buy it from me at shows. But those offers were few and far between. Few people had a clue about it's history. To the rest it was a nice, red Mustang.

[Side-Oilers]

Thanks for sharing your stories and photos of Mr. Chun.  I was not aware of his contributions to SA.