The first photo is of my first GTO, a black '65 four-speed with a console and parchment interior. I got this car four days before I graduated from high school in Huntsville, Alabama in 1966. It was a year old and had 15,000 miles on it and had been sold new by Taber Pontiac in Atlanta.

There were a lot of black '65s in those days, but I never saw one then or since that was factory black with parchment. They always had either black or red interiors and red pinstripes. This photo was taken by my Dad in the Summer of 1967. My little brother was standing next to him and their shadows are visible in the lower left corner of the picture. I had just finished waxing this black beauty and then parked in the street out front for pictures.

I kept this car almost two years and then traded it for a used '67 GTO H.O. four-speed that had a lot of other neat options on it. Unfortunately, I have no photos of that car as it was stolen about two months after I got it, in May, 1968.

And this brings me to the second photo. At the end of the Summer of 1968 and the end of the '68 model year, I got this Verdoro Green '68 GTO brand new from Doug Willey Pontiac in Birmingham, Alabama. Thirty-nine and a half years later we're still together!!

This car is quite different from my first two GTOs. I was 1A in the draft in 1968 and never expected to keep the car very long. My mother needed a new vehicle, so I decided to get a new GTO with automatic, A/C, PS and PB and my plan was to just let her take over the payments and keep it when I got drafted. I ended up in the first draft lottery and came within 17 numbers of being drafted. So, my mother never got the GTO. But, she had signed for the loan for me and her name is on the Protecto Plate.

For the long term, the automatic and A/C were great things to have as the car was used on lots of trips, did lots of boat towing in the hot summer months, was our honeymoon car and later became my wife's weekly driver for 9 years.

Today it has 106,000 miles on it and is mostly original including the paint, cordova top, interior and entire drive train.