Which topless celebrity would you most like to meet? Kim Kardashian? Ryan Reynolds? Patton Oswalt? How about today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe Chevy Celebrity? It’s both coach-built and a Eurosport, but will its price prove to be anything worth celebrating?
So I have an old Apple Newton kicking around my garage somewhere. It’s a 100 - the first-gen model - which are the quirkiest, and the screen’s not all that good any more. I’d like to sell it for twelve million dollars because I am keen to own the 1967 former Steve McQueen Ferrari 275 GTB/4 and I figure that amount should get me in the running.
Perhaps no where near as ludicrous an endeavor as that was yesterday’s 1991 Mercedes 350SD whose seller was seeking an amount in trade sufficient so that he could get within sniffing distance of a Ferrari Testicle-roaster. Fully 97% of you felt that he should be denied this opportunity no matter how nice of a Benz he was offering. It did seem very nice, but still, we have to move on.
Do you remember the Chevy Celebrity? Maybe your mom had one? Or maybe your Grandma? They were Chevy’s mid-size front-drivers from the Eighties, and even in their most gussied up form - the chrome banishing Eurosport - they weren’t all that memorable.
This 1985 Celebrity might snap a few synapses however, as it is one of about 200 that were converted by Ohio’s Hess & Eisenhardt into a full-on convertible. Summer’s coming, and while the apex predator of open motoring may be Mazda’s Miata, this bad boy will let you bring three friends along for the ride.
There’s a 2.8-litre V6 under the hood - thankfully the Iron Puke was banned from the Eurosport editions - and a 3-speed automatic with a console shift sitting between vinyl and velour buckets doing shifting duties. Overall, other than the convertible conversion, that’s pretty freakin’ dull. Not that there’s anything necessarily wrong with that.
Hess & Eisenhardt had a long and venerable career, building everything from fancy one-offs to JFK’s infamous X-100 Lincoln. When it came to chopping the tops off of cars, their work was generally accepted to be top-notch.
Oh sure, this is a unibody and no matter how much reinforcing has been added to it the cowl is likely to shake like Shakira’s ass over anything but the smoothest surfaces. But then, you’re not going to go to the Gymkhana in a car like this, you’re going to go to the Dairy Queen. Or maybe Applebee’s after church.
This 98,000-miler seems reasonably able to undertake such a trip. The ad notes that everything works save the power door locks. The top - in Ron Burgundy - is new, as are the tires, brakes and exhaust. The bodywork looks clean, although the presentation in the ad - stuck between garages in an alley - doesn’t shed the best light on the car. The snow on the ground however, indicates that perhaps the seller didn’t have many options as to locales.
That seller claims to be ridding himself of the car as his summer ride is now a Harley, which makes this a fading Celebrity for his fanbase of one. The price is $2,000, which amazingly even I could afford - well, come Friday. Just for giggles, here’s one that apparently sold for quite a bit more than that.
What’s you take on this particular Celebrity - representative of perhaps the marque’s only interesting model - and its two-grand price? Does that seem like a fair deal for a summer ride? Or, does that price make this a Celebrity only fit for reality TV?
You decide!
Milwaukee Craigslist, or go here if the ad disappears.
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