1960 Chrysler 300F GT Special

This 300F, Lot 19, sold for $236,500, including buyer’s premium, at the Gooding & Company Amelia Island auction in Amelia Island, FL, on March 8, 2013.

Let’s take a quick ’50s automotive quiz:

Which U.S. automobile was the first to break the magic one-horsepower-per-cubic-inch mark? Which U.S. automobile was the most powerful of the 1950s?

If you answered “Corvette” to either question, you’re not alone. It’s easy to assume General Motors’ famed flagship was the top gun of the ’50s. But you’d be wrong. Actually, the 1956 Chrysler 300B could be ordered with an optional 355-hp 354-ci first-generation Hemi a year before the 283-hp 283-ci fuel-injected Corvette was available. And the 1957 Chrysler 300C with the optional performance package produced 390 hp, while the top Corvette generated 283 hp. Amazed?

Chrysler’s rare and beautiful “letter cars” were amazing. Today’s Mercedes-Benz S65 AMG and Cadillac CTS-V are spiritual brethren to the 1955–65 Chrysler 300s, which were living large in every automotive sense of the word.

From showroom to winner’s circle

Chrysler called their 1955 300 NASCAR racers the “world’s fastest stock cars” and backed it up with championships on the NASCAR and AAA circuits. They also tore through the Flying Mile on the sands of Daytona Beach at 127.58 mph that year, faster than the Corvettes or anything else that tried. The results for the 1956 Chrysler 300B were the same; in fact, Chryslers won 51 out of 101 races in NASCAR those two years (Ford was next with 16 wins). And during the Daytona Speed Weeks in ’56, NASCAR Champion Tim Flock blasted a Chrysler 300B through the Flying Mile at 139.37 mph.

Chrysler’s campaign at Daytona Beach those two years was by Carl Kiekhaefer’s well-financed, factory-backed NASCAR team. But the Big Three signed an anti-racing agreement in early 1957, and all racing for the next few years was by privateers (although some factory support was still supplied covertly). In ’57 and ’58, Pontiacs nudged Chrysler from the top spot in the Speed Week trials, while an Oldsmobile did it in 1959, although Chrysler’s record of 1956 wasn’t surpassed. The GM cars were smaller and at least a quarter ton lighter, and ran in Class 6 (305 ci to 350 ci), so technically Chrysler was still the king of Class 7 (over 350 ci), but the 300s were no longer the kings of Daytona Beach.

One of those privateers was Gregg Ziegler, a hardware-store owner from Elgin, IL. After Chrysler’s performance at the Beach in 1956, Ziegler was so impressed that he sold his Buick Century and bought a 300B. He tried his hand at the Speed Weeks in 1957 in his year-old Chrysler, then returned in ’58 in a friend’s new 300D, where he finished 10th in the Flying Mile.

Ziegler traded his 300B for a new 300E the next year, and grabbed 4th spot in the Flying Mile. But Chrysler discontinued the first-generation Hemi for the 1959 model year, and the new 300E had an image of being less potent. Could that image be the reason Chrysler 300E sales were a disaster?

A special 300

Toward the end of 1959, Gregg Ziegler received a surprise phone call from Chrysler engineer Burt Bouwkamp. Chrysler was planning a full assault on Daytona Beach for the 1960 Speed Weeks, and they wanted Ziegler to join them. But the 300F they offered Ziegler was hardly standard issue.

Six 300Fs built in early November were sent to the engineering garage at Chrysler’s Jefferson Avenue plant. Engineering staffers installed engines prepared by the Jefferson Engine plant that produced 400 hp, and also fitted these cars with heavy-duty 4-speed manual transmissions. The gearboxes were manufactured in France by Pont-a-Mousson (Chrysler did not produce a 4-speed until 1963), who made the transmissions for the Chrysler-powered Facel-Vega, and the cars had to be modified to accommodate the 4-speed, clutch, and floor-shift.

The six cars were called the GT Specials, and Ziegler and the other privateers had to purchase these cars for full dealer price — about $6,800. Ziegler also had to drive the car from Detroit back home to Illinois, then drive it to Daytona a few days later. Before heading to Florida, he took the GT Special for a shakedown run on the Illinois Tollway. “I’d go 60 in low, 90 in second, 120 in third. Lay in into fourth gear and go right off the end of the speedometer,” he told Collectible Automobile magazine.

On February 7, Gregg Ziegler crushed the five-year-old Flying Mile record with a two-way average of 144.927 mph, and all six GT Specials finished 1st through 6th. The Chrysler 300 was again the “world’s fastest stock car.”

The all-time record holder

Later that year, Ziegler sold his GT Special to Robert McAtee of Bloomington, IL, so he could buy a new 400-hp 300G for the ’61 Speed Weeks. Again, Ziegler was the fastest through the Flying Mile but fell just short of his 1960 record. 1961 would be the last Daytona Speed Weeks on the sand, as residential sprawl made the beach no longer suitable for racing, and Bill France’s new Daytona Speedway became the center of attention. That means Gregg Ziegler’s record run will likely stand forever.

Along with the six Daytona cars, a few more GT Specials were built, including one convertible. It is estimated that only nine to 15 were made out of 1,217 300F cars in 1960, and just four are known to exist. Robert McAtee kept Ziegler’s GT Special in climate-controlled storage for decades, and the car had just 11,000 perfectly preserved miles on it at the time of McAtee’s death in 2007. Another Illinois collector then purchased it.

Valuing the winner

Chrysler’s rare, unique “letter cars” have always been strong sellers, but none of the other 300s comes close to the legendary performance of the Gregg Ziegler 300F. Mecum tried selling this car in 2010, with bidding reaching $275k without hitting reserve (ACC# 165763). It was offered again by Worldwide Auctioneers in Atlantic City in 2011, where it was bid to a then-insufficient $250k (ACC# 169025).

The lone GT Special convertible, another 11,000-mile car, sold for $437,250 (ACC# 168371) at RM’s sale of the Robson Collection in 2010. I would have loved to have seen this 300F sell for at least as much, but considering the car’s previous appearances at auction and the soft values American performance cars have been showing throughout the past two years, the price Gooding & Company achieved here was correct in the current market.

But for the history, condition, and desirability as one of the best 300s out there, the new owner got a lot of car for his money — a car that will always have a spot at the top of the 300 hierarchy. I’d call it very well bought.

(Introductory description courtesy of Gooding & Company.)