Hemi's, Daytona and Big Block Darts... OH MY!: BARN ONE

What started out as a terrible weekend, ended up as a not so terrible weekend. A friend of mine's Uncle had passed away and I had known him for many years. So I would be attending his funeral on Sunday, November 9th. I planned on spending the weekend out there, so I knew I couldn't help the family in Saturday, why not go out and hunt for cars... oh boy did that thought snowball.

I made a post about me heading to Bloomington, IL on www.moparts.com forums. Two members from down there, Shad and Scott both told me that they would like to meet up and show me some of the stuff they knew about lying around. They didn't get into specifics though.

I drove down Friday night, so I could meet up with the guys on Saturday. That was a long drive at night. The Challenger did fine, and I got on the girl a bit. But still I was glad to plunker down in my hotel room for the night.





The next day I headed out to Shad's home where we were both meeting up. I pulled in and introduced myself and met Shad and his lovely wife. We chatted for a bit, he showed me the 70's RamCharger he was working on. Really nice 4x4 with a removable top, in better shape then my 93!

It wasn't long before we hear the roar of a Mopar Big Block and what comes down the road but Scott in his 70 Superbird! I introduced myself to Scott and we all began talking. We went over my new Challenger, his Superbird and everything in between. When we were beginning to depart, I thought we were all going to pile into the Challenger, Scott had other ideas.





We all piled into the Superbird, a 440 with a 4-speed car fyi! Now he doesn't baby this car, we were flying in the Bird. I had never driven with one so far. Hell, I've can count on one hand how many Wing Cars I've driven in.





We fly down highways and county roads until we come to the barns of our host. We pull up and he's out mowing the lawn. Shad had told us the guy was not a big fan of cameras, so don't pull them out right away.





Our host and us began talking, he was telling us about his life collecting Mopars from the 70's and 80's when they weren't popular. Still does when he can.

I noticed the nice older Dodge extended cab pickup out front. I talked to him about the truck for a bit, and asked if I could snap some pictures of it. He said that was fine. So I did. Then we made our way to the first barn.....





Right at the door of the first barn was a very nice 1969 Dodge Charger R/T SE. 440, auto, a/c, the works. It was in immaculate shape and was his main driver muscle car. I asked if I could take some pictures of the car, he said sure, take pictures of what you want! Oh boy was that the wrong thing to say!





EVERYWHERE you looked there was Mopar parts, lying on the ground was original Hemi intakes, heads, carbs, valve covers and a Hemi block just sitting there. Across from that was a 65 Satellite drag car I believe. Next to that was ANOTHER Satellite or Fury that was all covered up. I believe this was an original Max Wedge car from the original aluminum hood we found.










After having a mild heart attack from that first grouping... then came the second helping. The back row with the Cars in the Barn was full of B-bodies. From first glance it was from left to right a 69 Charger, 69 Charger, 69 Charger, 65ish Satellite Convertible then a 70 Charger. It wasn't until we took a closer look that the real heart attack happened.








The 69 Charger in the middle wasn't a normal Charger... it was a 69 CHARGER DAYTONA! Q5 (Turquoise Greenish) 440 4-speed car! I couldn't believe it, no one could. Here was one of the most valuable Mopars around, in pieces, covered in dirt and bird poop with raccoon prints all over it.





Scott and I jumped all over this car. We snapped pictures of everything. I only know of one other Daytona in a Barn, yet never actually seen it. Here it was, right in front of us. A real Barn Find 69 Daytona. It was almost too much to bear.











Then our host said, “Wanna see one of the Hemi Chargers?”.... The 69 Charger next to the Daytona is an original 69 Hemi Charger R/T, with Hemi in it!... I almost wet myself at this point. He popped the hood to show us the engine setup and everything. Looked original, I don't know if it was numbers matching, but I didn't really care. We descended upon the Hemi Charger like locusts. My large body couldn't really get around to view the car very well, but Scott did. And he snapped a ton of pictures of the car.










Now after a second or third heart attack, we eventually made our way to the “lesser” cars. The 69 Charger on the far left side was “just” a R/T SE 440 4-speed car. It was complete from what our host said. But we weren't going to move the boxes to find out. (You know you've gone off the deep end when it is “just” a 69 Charger R/T). It was well buried, so we didn't bother it much.






A 65 Satellite sat next to the Daytona, it was a standard Satellite Convertible, no large engines or anything. Just a cool old Mopar in it's own right. The 70 Charger on the end was something special though.





The 70 on the end was a 70 Charger R/T SE. 440 car, PS, PDB, 4-speed car. It also had the original power sunroof. Very rare option on Chargers, also very hard to find one. They are like hen's teeth, and there it was sitting in the corner, along with about 20 Mopar Big Blocks.













After recovering some from obvious overload of AWESOMENESS. Our host showed us around the rest of his collection... in the first barn. A 70's Firebird, another what looked like 63 Plymouth Fury, I'd say about a million dollars worth of NOS Mopar Parts (Need a NOS 69 Charger quarter panel... he has 5). Tons of vintage shop tools from oscilloscopes and spark plug cleaners. Ever minute I was screaming out “IS THIS REALLY A _______________ SITTING IN THE CORNER?” It would take weeks to go through everything.





















Next to one of the Satellites was another 69 Charger R/T was ANOTHER Hemi car. But was so covered in stuff we couldn't get to it.







We made our way into the light eventually. I don't know how much time we spent in there, but it was quite a while. Scott and I were still in shock, Shad had known and seen the stuff before, so the shock wore off on him. We were chatting with our host and he said, “Would you like to see the rest of the collection?”... We nodded, not knowing what to expect and followed right behind him to the next barn.

To View ALL OF THE PICTURE from this part of the adventure, please click below.

Ryan's Cars in Barns Adventure Pictures