Good afternoon, I am working with Norm Kraus (Mr. NORM) on a project related to the history of Grand Spaulding Dodge and the drag racing that went along with it. I am looking for any photos, video, stories, etc. that had to do with his dealership, funny cars, customer cars, and anything related to GSD.
I know of two Mr. Norm cars in the hands of two of my buddies. Both OT 1968 Hemi four speed Coronet 440s. Both matching numbers and both had Mr. Norm bumper stickers on them when they got them. I believe that only two were built. I can probably get photos of the red one. The other is blue. Both came from GSD.
Very nice!!! One thing we are trying to do is get stories from customers on their cars and if possible, pics from then too.
The blue car is gorgeous and the red one looks ready for a fresh restoration, solid looking car. Thanks for sharing.
I've gone there quite a few times over the past few years. It's very sad to see it like that. I believe it's a warehouse now for a steel manufacturing plant. Did you know in the mid 70s Norm and his brother opened a Dodge dealership in Buffalo Grove?
No, I didn't know about Norm and his brother,where is Buffalo Grove. I'am glad another young guy cares about the past, and history. A good source might be Steve Magnnte. He lives in Mass. I see him a few times a year.
Buffalo grove is a suburb of Chicago, norm built a very large dealership there. I believe it is a Toyota dealership now.
Thanks for sharing the pics Jeff. Love the ones with Gary Dyer, he built my blower and is a really good guy. The video posted is kind of sad to watch.
look at the door jamb alignment and buckled rear quarter. the car is also bowed in the middle. the car is really bent at this time early 66. its also on its third paint job in just over a year. one of my all time favorite cars. mine bent the same way.
Those cars got twisted up pretty quickly once blowers and nitro were thrown at them. Norm has told me many good stories about that car and how it constantly needed to be "fixed". I have the original negative (and many more) of this photo. You can tell at this point it's been raced hard pretty extensively. Man, I would love to find this car!!
Looks pretty straight here, still has lindamoods motor, wheels, tired, and hood. If you look closely, the blue on this car is actually the paint on lindamoods car and the silver and letter rom was added after Norm bought it
Here is a pic of a original unused sticker that norm gave me. The repo stickers dont have dodge on them. There were several stickers that the dealership used. The earlier version was dark blue with almost chrome lettering. I have some of those to. There were also the buffallo grove stickers from the 70s.
I know some the stickers he used were reflective with "fleck" in them, very hard to find. I had one years ago that ended up on a restored demon GSS. I have a few of the dark blue ones too, knot many left though, I sold some that also ended up on restored cars. I have only seen one buffalo grove decal, it was on a van! A friend of mine has some of the water slide flying ram decals he used to sell for 2 for a buck really early on. Man this stuff is getting really hard to find!
Have you seen the super stock magazine article on norm from around 2000. Tony defeo wrote it. Im in one of the pics holding up the body on the 69 charger. Its a great story. Very informative. Tony drove in from new york. We all met up at the dealership. I think we all got there around 9am and didnt leave until about 5pm. The stories were priceless.