The Story of my
1963 Falcon Sprint Convertable

Back in 1973, the summer before my senior year at Franklin High in Franklin, North Carolina, my father and I purchased this car for $500. As I recollect, the mileage on the car at that time was somewhere in the mid 40's.

For a high school car back then it was pretty cool. Although those were days of  real hot cars, this pretty little thing's 260 V-8 did get noticed. Especially when the hood was up and the chrome of the air filter cover and head covers was shining brightly. I took great pride in the car, and washed it practically every day. I helped my father at his concrete plant, Macon Transit Mix,  so it got dusty pretty quick. As a matter of fact, I eventually rubbed the paint thin on one of the fenders!

I drove the car while in college at the University of Tennessee. After graduation in 1978 the miles were getting up into the 90's and I eventually needed a more reliable vehicle, as I was moving to Houston to start work at Texas Instruments. I took the care home and my father stored it in one of the garages at the concrete plant.

My dad was always interested in cars, and through the years had collected a number of Thunderbirds. We still own a '55 and a '57 that are still excellent cars. Somewhere around the late '80s he decided he wanted to restore the old Falcon. I worked for Memorex/Telex in Raleigh by then, and it was about a 6 hour drive  home. I looked forward to seeing his progress when I made the trip up there. He did almost all of the work himself, except for getting the engine rebuilt a bit and the car's paint. The undersides were clean enough to eat off of.

After dad passed away a couple of years ago, I decided I wanted to bring the car home with me. It stays in the garage most of the time, but I do get it out and drive it on pretty weekends.

I am a big fan of Jimmy Buffett, having listened to him for as long as I've had that car. A couple of years ago a friend of mine gave me a Buffett calendar. In it, one of the month's had photos of Jimmy and his '63 Sprint convertable, which looks exactly like my car. He is a pretty big of fan of his car too, including it in his book of short stories "Tales From Margaritaville"..

This truly is a special car....