In the late 1960s and early 1970s I worked for the Boeing Airplane Company, commercial airplane division. One of the planes I did production illustrations for was the brand new 747 jumbo jet, which was being assembled at Boeing's Everett plant across from Paine Field. A friend, Randy Remmon, and I used to car pool to and from the job. About 25 miles up Interstate 5 from Seattle.

Randy's old turtleback Volvo 544 cough up a lung and died. The small garage where he had his repair work done sometimes had cars for sale, and they offered to sell Randy a very nice looking 1966 Mustang Fastback (silver-gray). For a mere $900. Randy jumped on it!

It was not long before we realized that this was a most unusual automobile. The little bit of chrome on the front fenders that indicated that it was powered by a 289 cc V-8 engine was belied by the fact the when the car was idling, the rumble registered about 3.5 on the Richter Scale. And if Randy put his foot to the firewall, it took off like a shot and we felt like a couple of astronauts mashed into our acceleration couches! On one occasion, we were late, and we made our way up I-5 at about 90 mph, and Randy (who, incidentally, had once worked for the King County Sheriff's Department and had driven prowlers at speed on a number of occasions.) said there was plenty more to go!

For a 289 Ford Mustang, this was one helluva car!

Randy went back to the garage that sold him the car and asked them to give him the skinny on it. They told him that the California Highway Patrol wanted five "Q-ships:"   cars that could overtake anything on the road, but looked innocuous. Sneakers. For nailing speeders who would stay within the limit if there was a Highway Patrol car in sight, but who floored it when they felt they could get away with it.

They commissioned Carroll Shelby to do his thing on five Mustang fastbacks, which he did. But shortly after they took delivery of the cars, someone put the kibosh on the plan—claiming "entrapment" or some such thing—and insisted that they get rid of them. So they had to sell them quietly, outside of California. Randy's repair man managed to acquire one, and Randy lucked out!

One most impressive automobile!!

Don Firth