A Pontiac For All Mankind…

For the past week or so I have been obsessing on the Falcon/Dragon/Endeavor launch. I waited and watched on Wednesday and then spent most of Saturday sitting around with anxious anticipation. Once the candle was finally lit, I spent a good five hours straight just watching the live feed and basking in the escapism that I so badly needed given the troubles here on earth.

That evening, I got the chance to talk to a buddy of mine that works for JPL. He was just as excited to see us back in the space race.

“I wish there was some way to tie this into hot rodding just so I had an excuse to write about it.” I said. “If you really think about it, the rocket industry is the pinnacle of hot rodding. No one goes faster and no one puts more on the line for the sake of that speed.”

“Wait.” my buddy stopped me. “Have you written about the Flyin’ Tac yet?”

The Flyin’ Tac was a 1963 Pontiac Catalina that was fitted with a 421-inch motor borrowed from NASCAR, a “modified” 4-speed, heavy-duty suspension, and an over-built cooling system. Because… well, it’s NASA… they installed a roll bar as well as a modular seating configuration allowing for both rearward and sideward facing spotter seats.

The spotters were responsible for keeping their eyes on the M2-F1 in which the Pontiac was designed to pull. The M2-F1 was a lightweight experimental aircraft built to flight-test a wingless lifting body concept. The idea behind the hot rodded Pontiac was that it was big enough to hold enough engineers for data collection, but was also fleet of foot enough to handle the power needed to get the M2-F1 off the ground.

The project was headed by Walter Whiteside – a retired Air Force Maintenance engineer that spent his twilight years hot rodding his own personal vehicles and farting around with his pals in the NASA Flight Research Center. When the need came through the pipeline for a big car capable of 150mph, Walter spoke up and got the job.

Can you imagine the fun he had with a 1960’s NASA budget? He did what any proper hot rodder would do – he called Bill Strope and Mickey Thompson. Together the three men set forth building a car that would meet the single line RFP set forth by NASA – “a car capable of holding a driver, two spotters, and can achieve 110mph within 30-seconds while towing 500-pounds.”

As you might have guessed, the fellas had no issues fielding the thing… With legendary hot rodders throwing wrenches and the full use of NASA’s fabrication shop, the sky was no limit. The car was used for a few years to tow the M2-F1 to speed, but even longer as a toy on Edwards Airforce Base. Whiteside was pulled over a number of times on public streets and eventually, the government transferred the hot rod to Langley Research Center in Virginia. Once gone, NASA memorialized the car in their newsletter:

“No longer can we drive along the lakebed and pass the airplanes in flight.”

***

My buddy saw the car in Houston a few years ago and said it appeared to be restored. I did some research and found that the car was restored by a museum in Georgia and then put up for sale sometime in 2019. However, all of those ads have subsequently been deleted and there’s no reports on who now owns it.

If you know, please fill me in… I desperately want to do a photoshoot with this beast and will travel to do so!