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n 1971, I was able to purchase a
1966 Shelby GT350H, 6S1431. At
that time it was just a five year-
old used car. A rather unique one
which had seen rental service its first
year of life, but still a used car. The
story of its history, my purchase and
its subsequent journey from that used
car to a rusty piece of junk and then
back to being restored to better than it
was when I bought it is a story full of
ups and downs, highs and lows, ex-
treme pride and extreme frustration.
Through it all, the car always re-
mained a constant; something that
was always there, that I have always
treasured, and mostly tried to honor.
In high school I used to see it driv-
ing by. I knew the owner’s name – it
belonged to Jimmy Willson and his
wife drove it to work every day. That’s
right, it was a daily driver for a
woman who commuted about ten
miles back and forth to work every
day. I had a friend who loved Corvettes
and I always loved the Cobra. Seeing
a Cobra was an extremely rare sight-
ing, even in the late 60s. The one that
stands out in my mind was owned by
a midshipman at the U.S. Naval Acad-
emy. It was dark green with an auto-
matic transmission. It was the only
Cobra I have ever seen that wasn’t a
four-speed, and it must have been ex-
tremely rare even back then. Owning
a Cobra was a dream I was never able
to realize, even though I came close
once. I would see this Hertz car every
day and, like all high school students
at that time, we would discuss how
fast a particular car was, how much
horsepower it had, and how it had
never lost a race. All of this, of course,
was just high school talk.
My friend Dave Brown and I have
been screwing around with cars since
before we could drive. He had a 1968
Mustang with a 302 engine that we
had modified, and then modified some
more. Then it became a D/Modified
Production drag race car. The owner of
the Shelby, Jimmy Willson, was also
had a drag racer; he had a 406 Ford-
powered 1965 Mustang fastback with
a one-piece, fiberglass flip-open front
end. It ran in B/Gas. We would help
Jimmy with the car and he would help
us with ours. Eventually I began to
help Jimmy more and more. He had a
school bus as a race car transporter,
with ramps in the back to pull the race
car inside. His wife would drive the
Shelby to the track to watch him run
and it was occasionally used as a tow
vehicle. Jimmy started to let me drive
the Shelby to tow the car back to the
pits after each run and I really was in
heaven. Driving that Shelby was more
than a young teenage motor-head
could ever want.
At one track in Delaware, Jimmy
told me to get behind him in the Hertz
car and leave as soon as he did. At this
track your tow vehicle followed your
race car down the track. I helped him
get the race car started, helped him do
the burnout and stage, and then
jumped into the Shelby to follow him.
I pulled up right behind him and as
soon as he left, so did I. I think he had
psyched the guy in the lane next to
him, who was driving a Camaro.
Jimmy had really jumped him off the
line and then I took off and I think
that frazzled him even more; when he
looked to the left he saw the flash of
the black and gold Shelby. He must
The SHELBY AMERICAN
Summer 2016 70
When you’ve owned a car almost forever you accumulate
a trunkful of experiences and stories. 6S1431 has more than it’s share.
– Steve McDonald
I