1999 Chevrolet Corvette Fixed Roof Coupe
Personal story and photograph submitted by owner Ken Hartwig - courtesy of the National Corvette Museum website - for participation in the National Corvette Museum 2008 Historic Motorama II.
I was born in 1952 in a small town in southern Wisconsin. As a child I grew up on a farm and actually attended school at a one room country school, where grades 1- 8 were all in one room taught by 1 teacher. At about the time I was in 6th grade we moved to the city. There I attended Junior and Senior High School - graduating High School in 1970.
I then worked a year before going to college and receiving an Associate Degree in Marketing and Business Administration, at which point I decided that I wanted to stay in school. I decided to study Real Estate and also have an Associate Degree in Real Estate. All during this time I was working part time jobs along with attending school and studying, while working and going to school for Real Estate, I met the young woman that would become my wife. We were married in 1975 (I think she liked the 1969 Camaro that I had at the time). I have had a passion for cars all my life (no I don't have the Camaro anymore - yes we are still married for 33 years). We have one son who is grown and married with children of his own (he also has a passion for cars like his father).
I can remember watching Route 66 on television as a child that was probably my first exposure to a Corvette; living in a small town you just did not see them. I remember buying Hot Rod Magazine and reading about guys that were racing Corvettes back then. When attending college I remember there was this one '67 Goodwood Green Coupe that would come around, it was beautiful and powerful with side pipes, for some reason that image is just imprinted in my brain. We bought our first Corvette in 1993 - a 1981 coupe.
1999 Corvette
I was looking around for a second Corvette in the summer of 1996 and had driven a couple cars, when I saw an ad that a dealer had in the paper for a brand new '97 inviting people to look at it. We went to look at it and I asked them if I could drive it, they let me drive it. Man that car was so superior to anything previous. It was amazing. We then went home. I said to my wife I want to get that car somehow, so we made a plan. Well, in the meantime, I read that Corvette was going to introduce 3 models over the course of the next 3 years.
When I read about the Hardtop, I said that is the car for me. So we made plans and waited. I was going to my local dealer salesman and telling him about the car before they even knew about it (they don't sell a lot of Corvettes). In October of 1998 ,when they had information on the car in their system I put a deposit down to order the car. It was 3 long months until the dealer salesman called me to say our car was being built on 1-11-1999. It was delivered to the dealer on 1-15-1999 (not a good time to drive a Corvette in Wisconsin ). I was so excited when the salesman called to say my car had come in that I went right up to look at it before they even cleaned it up. The dealer was only about ¾ mile from our house at the time and we had just had a big snow and the streets were not good, so I asked the dealer if they could keep it inside for a couple of days, which they did. On 1-20-1999 when the roads were finally clear we picked up the car and drove it home. That was a long winter waiting to drive the new Corvette but finally spring and dry roads came and it was worth the wait.
1999 Hardtop, Pewter metallic-exterior, Black leather interior
Order Date-10-20-98
Build Date-1-11-99
Ship Date-1-15-99
Pickup Date-1-20-99
When GM celebrates the beginning of its next 100 years on September 16, 2008, 55 Corvettes will be on display outside its World Headquarters at Detroit’s Renaissance Center. The Corvettes are in fact the Historic Motorama II, a caravan from the National Corvette Museum (NCM) which is comprised of one example from each of the 55 years of Corvette production. The caravan will depart from the National Corvette Museum on September 10th with stops along the way. People attending the GMnext Day activities on September 16th will be able to view the Corvettes before and after the official program.
Look at the next Historic Motorama II Corvette participant, representing a cross-section of Corvette enthusiasts from across the country.
Tag Cloud
 |
English |