HOW WE GOT THE HONOR TO TAKE CARE OF ONE OF THE MOST BELOVED HEIRLOOMS OF OUR INDUSTRY

My dad, Jim, and I love a good story.

-  CHRIS SHELTON

Take Brian Burnett's Deucari, for example. The son of famed cutaway illustrator Rex Burnett had Dick "Magoo" Megugorac build a Deuce roadster with a Ferrari mill (Brian was a Ferrari dealer). The car won the '79 Grand National Roadster Show. That's an accomplishment that usually guarantees a car a pampered life, but Brian chipped the paint off that car driving it around the country. It's one of our all-time favorites.

The same thing is true with Gray's car. He loved the fur right off the thing. Twice! It's like the hot rod version of the Rock of Gibraltar, so, when my dad started building his own roadster, he used Gray's as his muse. My dad and I had a good relationship with So-Cal Speed Shop, so we asked Pete Chapouris if he could arrange a meeting. We wanted to study Gray's car. This was around November 2000.

Gray drove out to Pomona and we did our thing in the So-Cal parking lot. It's a cool, dreary day and Gray's a little muted-and he's wearing pants. The reality of his illness had taken hold.

My dad regularly updated Gray on his car's progress. We all had similar musical interests, so he started sending Gray some of the stuff he was listening to.

Gray died about a year later. I was covering the '02 Grand National Roadster Show that weekend. There was a definite mood. Not too much later I got a call from my dad. He was almost disoriented with excitement. That's when Pete told him about "the conversation."