Projects Barn find - 1964 Pontiac Catalina 421 early custom car

I need a little help...I found and have bought an interesting project with some history. It's a 1964 Pontiac Catalina 421, 4 speed manual car and need a little help finding out more information or period photos at the various shows...was it ever featured in custom magazines of the time?

The car has always been in the Minneapolis area...originally bought by a vet who owned it for a year or so, in 1966 it was bought by Bob Langhans who did a few mild custom things, he fitted electric trunk and door, shaved the door handles, detrimmed some of the bright work. At this stage it was still in the original factory Marimba red.

I was told he saw the front cover of a custom magazine that featured a custom truck painted lavender and wanted the car painted exactly the same colour...so in 67 he had his local painter paint the car. His local painter was non other than Jon Kosmoski from House of Kolor.

We think it was shown in 67 at local shows in the Minneapolis area...The following year he went back to Jon Kosmoski to have the black lace insert panels done, he also had his local pinstriper add pinstripes to the car...this was non other than Cliff Anderson Jr.

We know the car was shown with the following:
- dechromed
- molded taillights
- Lucus headlights
- molded seams
- dual sunken antennas
- electric trunk and doors
- chrome reverse rims
- 4 speed manual
- 421 ci

at local shows from about 1968 to 1970 and I have lots of period photos and all the original trophies which include:

- 2nd Place Semi Custom at Ray Farhner's 7th Annual Auto-Speed and Sports Show, Feb 28, March 1st and 2nd 1969. Municipal Auditorium, St. Paul, Minnesota.

- 4th Place at the 4th Annual International Custom Fair, Minneapolis 1969.

- 5th Annual International Custom AutoFair, Minneapolis. 1970.

- 1st Place Winner, 8th Annual National Auto-Speed and Sports Car Show. Feb 27th & 28th, March 1st 1970. Main Arena Municipal Auditorium, St. Paul's

- 9th Annual National Auto Speed & Sports Car Show, St Paul. 1971

- Outstanding in Class at the Beater Boys Car Club, 2nd Annual Custom - Speed Spectacular.

From what I've been told Bob kept adding and changing elements in the car each year...I guess he didn't want to show the same car each year, so as a woodworker he replaced the padded armrests with hand made armrests, he added wood veneer to some of the dash(inc the knobs), wood veneer strips to the stacked headlight panels. He threw away the factory bench seat and made his own custom bucket seats, from the photos they look very upright and not that comfortable. But after a while the buckets seat went too. The factor steering was replaced with a Cal Custom wheel along with Cal Custom Pedals too. With the buckets seats he installed a Chevy Caprice center console (which is still with the car). Not sure what the rims are but they have AP center caps.

Bob didn't like the blue that Pontiac painted their engines, so he painted it Chevy orange and added lots of little Cal Custom parts to the engine and engine bay.

Sadly all that's left of the paint is the hood, In the early 70's the car came off the road with only 49,000 miles on the clock. It was then stored in a barn until about s month ago when Bob finally sold it to the guy I bought it from. He was thinking of taking it back to the original Marimba red, but I feel this cat had to go back to that late 60's custom look. I'm going to save the hood as I can't bring myself to strip it and repainted it.

The car also comes with a couple of the original show signs that list what's been done to the car and who painted it and did the stripping.

As I mentioned it was sold about a month ago and moved from its long term storage...3 weeks later a tree fell down in a storm and crushed the barn the car had sat in for all this time, but sadly Bob Langhans was in the barn at the same time the tree fell, and he was badly injured with a broken back in 4 places, rib cage crushed, he's now recovering from a 17hrs operation, but as far as we know he has no feelings in his leg...fingers crossed he pulls through, but it's not looking good. For obvious reasons I'm not going to bother him or his family to find out about the car. I just wish him a speedy recovers and hope when he's better I can get a message to him to let him know the car will be restored to his vision of the custom...and eventually I'd like him to be part of the process and hopefully see the car when it's restored.

So for now I'm looking for any period photos of the car, any details like the trunk or interior would be great. Or any stories or memories you might have of the car. Have you seen it in a period magazine etc...really any help no matter how small would be great.

Here are a few photos of the car as it looks now and how it used to look.

 

Cool - Congrats

 

Well shit the bed Fred!
Good on you!

This is Marimba Red. There cannot exist a better looking 1962 thru 1967 Poncho, than a Poncho painted Marimba Red. This is not conjecture, it is Cosmic Fact, and facts matter.

Not my cars, but yes, I would kill for them.

 

That is such an awesome save. A little late for my taste but cool none the less.

I might suggest letting Bob know your intentions of restoring the car in the very near future. It might help with his recovery. I know, injured or not, it would make me feel better to know my old car was being restored to its former glory and not chopped up or worse, restored to stock (egad). You might find that he contacts you with information. Just start with letting him or his family know of your plan to save the car and leave it at that.

Congrats on a very cool find!


Sent from my iPhone using The H.A.M.B. mobile app

 

Thanks for the comment, yes I've already passed this message on to a family member but for now it's still to early and he needs to recover. Hopefully in a few weeks he will be strong enough to have messages related to him.

Thanks again

 

Cool, I agree with going back with the show car lavender color.

 

I've never see it before, but you could try contacting the Minnesota chapter of the Pontiac-Oakland Club International to see if any of the older guys in the club has knowledge of it: http://tomatalk.org

edited to add: it may be possible that Jon Kosmoski still has some information on the car as well, you could try contacting him. However, he's painted a lot of cars since then...

 

Yes I will be contacting Jon to see if he remembers this car, he might do as he paint a few things for the owner. I've been in touch with Cliff Anderson (son of Cliff Anderson Jr), so I'm slowly building a better idea of the car

 

Nice survivor! Will be neat to see it restored to it's former self.
Wonder why they never changed the show board lettering...electric truck and doors?

 

...and misspelled "stripping" - but I'm being petty for a 40+ year old sign.

EDIT: Also, the OP says the owner was "Bob Langhans", but the sign says "Bob Langmans".

 

Thanks, I'm hoping to do the custom restoration work justice.
I think Bob didn't change the car that much between 1968 and 1970 because he was tweaking the custom paint job and trying to get the interior sorted (home made bucket seats etc).

He also had a custom BSA bike around the same time as the 64 Pontiac, and also painted by Jon Kosmoski.

 

Also 'Tailites' and 'Headlites' too...I guess no spell check in those days. As for his name you need new glasses as the sign says "Bob Langhans"...

 

Hey, I know an "M" when I see one!!!

 

Lol...and I have the original sign...

 

...the text on the left has an 'H' and 'M' and the style is different between the letters

 

...and the brochure text when he displayed his BSA bike.

 

HaH! Well I guess you do!!!

But you got to agree with me that what I saw in that first photo sure looks like a skinny-assed "M"?

Either that, or whatever letter is there has a "dangler"....

Anyways, sign is kool, having the car is WAY COOL, so best of luck to you!!!

 

I didn't want to admit it, but I thought it was an M too when I first looked at it and I had to check the sign again.
Glad you like the car, as we start to work on it I'll post photos.

 

glad to see the car on here.worked on the merc convert next to yours a couple weeks ago,making some patch panels for tom,so looked at this car a lot. so cool you are restoring it to its show glory.best of luck,ross

 

Hi Ross, thanks for the comments...Tom's Mercury convertible will be stunning when he's finished if his 2+2 is anything to go by. I just thought I'd start the ball rolling to find out more on the car or if anyone had any period photos tucked away. Will updated this thread as and when we do work to the car. Thanks, Peter

 

Wow. Never thought that a pink car with lace on it could look so tough! Not usually my style, but something about this car just grabs me. Can't wait to see it restored to its showcar glory. Keep us in the loop progress.

 

The show paint would be the way to go to keep it correct. I'm not sure I could pull the paint gun trigger on that lavender though, whoa.
Love the panels and layout, Id be inclined to adjust the basecoat if it were my car. Silver?

Really a great find, and a good looking car that survived well. Keep the updates coming.

 

Haha, yes the more you look at it the more it draws you in...there are so few of these cars around any more it has to be saved and taken back to the time in the late 60's when it was shown. Thanks for the comments.

 

I know what you mean about the Lavender, but it's grown on me a little.

 

I love these old boats!

 

I thought I would add a few more photos of the car...I plan on showing the car to House of Kolor in November and hopefully Jon Kosmoski will see it at the same time and who knows he might even remember the car.
Did I mention it had a Rathskeller Gettelman Brew beer tap knob as the shifter head.

 

Love it. The only thing I like more than the lavender/lace panel paint are the wood veneer accents, now that is 60's cool

 

Thanks for the comment, yes he liked his wood veneer...even the headlights had little strips of wood in the horizontal grooves. I just have to figure out at what point of the cars life do I restore it back too as some of the later pin stripping on the doors was Bob's and not Craig Anderson Jr and you can see the difference between the two...I think as he kept adding to the car over the years I'll probably go with something in the first couple of years, maybe just after the black lace was applied.

As for Bob the news isn't good. I heard the other day that he's now in a nursing home but doesn't remember anything or recognise anyone. He is paralysed and is just existing. It is so sad. Hopefully there will be some improvement as days go by and I really hope he gets to see the car finished.

 

The car is cool, but it sucks about Bob.
I started reading this thread, and after your first post, was thinking, I've seen this car somewhere.
Then I checked the date, and realized it was here.
Forgot I'd seen this thread in July.