Original Owner: B-52 Navigator and His ’73 Big-Block Corvette
This C3 was stored for almost 30 years, but was finally resurrected about 10 years ago
Throughout his Air Force B-52 Navigator career and to this day, Don Webb has kept the ‘73 Corvette he bought new as a dealer demo in 1974. As a young guy, he had tried to buy a ‘72 Corvette two years earlier but realized he wouldn’t be able to afford the insurance premiums at that time.
“Coming out of officer training, I was living in Texas and looked at a 1972 Corvette,” Webb recalls. “I could afford the car, which was about $7000, but insurance was going to be $1000 every six months, because I was 23 years old. I couldn’t do it.”
So he compromised and bought an Impala until he was in a position to afford a Corvette. A couple years later, after piling about 100,000 miles on the Impala, he took the Impala in for service at Harry Sadler Chevrolet in Goodlettsville, a Nashville suburb. He had worked there over summers in high school and college.
While waiting for his Impala, Webb strolled into the showroom to look at two leftover Corvettes that had been used as demo vehicles, a ’73 and a ’74 Corvette.
“Both had been dealer demos, never sold,” he said. “I didn’t like the ’74 with the two-piece plastic back bumper. I bought the ’73, which had the 454 and automatic.”
As a demo, the Corvette Yellow Metallic coupe was nearly loaded with options to reach its $7310 list price, including that regular production option (RPO) LS4 454-cubic-inch V-8. The car had accumulated nearly 8000 miles in the hands of salesmen and the dealer’s family members, but Webb was the first titled owner. Those were some tough miles, though.
“About six months after I got the car, it was burning oil like crazy,” Webb says. “So, they put a new short block in it.”
While stationed at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio, Webb drove the Vette in all weather. As with the Impala, he piled on miles with family visits to Tennessee.
“I got an assignment to an aerial gunship stationed in Florida, and I would drive from Florida back to Nashville on days and weekends off,” he says.
Later, he was stationed with a Strategic Air Command wing at Wurtsmith Air Force Base in Iosco County, Michigan, on Lake Huron.
“I met my wife, Alicia, there, and the Corvette became my secondary car,” he said. “I still drove it, but not as much.” When he entered the Air Force Reserve in 1981, Webb was stationed in Milwaukee, and the couple had a home built there while living in Chicago. The house had a three-car garage, so the Corvette could always be inside.
But as with all these stories, life happened, children were born, his military career took precedence, and the Corvette rested on jackstands. The months and years flew by as the kids grew up, went off to college, and eventually married. The Corvette, which had about 83,500 miles, didn’t come off the jack stands again until 2015, when Webb decided to get it back on the road.
He decided to return the Vette to road use while maintaining originality as closely as possible and he left the original paint and interior as delivered from the factory. Working on it when time allowed, he started with the brakes and the fuel system. The starter and alternator were rebuilt and an electronic ignition was installed. When the engine was finally in running condition, the transmission was also rebuilt.
When the Corvette was road-ready, Webb began driving it about 1200 miles a year, including the Lap the Lake road rally around Lake Michigan. He also makes it to numerous shows around Michigan and to Hagerty’s cars and caffeine events at its Traverse City headquarters.
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