I had a favorite Uncle, Earnest Robbins, Jr. . . . better known as Junior. In 1964 he purchased a brand-new 1964 Monza convertible,
white with a blue interior for his wife to drive. She did not share his excitment over the cute Corvair and soon had another car. Junior kept the Corvair,
driving it once in a while. By the mid-eighties it had less than 30,000 miles and Junior decided to sell his Corvair. My father helped him to
sell the car to a member of the Heart of America Corvair Owners I wanted to buy the car,
but there was no way I could get hold of that much money.
Fast forward to 2003. Mel Horstman, senior member of the Mid-Continent Corvair Association, announced he was thinning out his car collection,
starting with his White 1964 Corvair Monza Convertible. I had seen the car often at club events and traveled behind it on several tours. Mel set a price,
and I purchased it. The price was the same as Junior's Corvair sold for over a decade ago.
Mel "dressed" up the convertible by adding a Spyder dash and trim. With the PowerGlide knob hanging under the dash,
most Corvair fans will know it is not the real thing. After spending a couple of days getting the rest of the gauges and lights working,
I have a great respect for people that work on Spyder dashes . . . a lot of wires and not much room.
Owners of 140 hp Corvair engines with stock aircleaners have a difficult time explaining that the engine is not a Spyder engine.
Too many observers think the four legs of the aircleaner makes it a "Spyder" engine (ever see a spider with just four legs.
The Spyder emblems on this car will not make the explaination any easier.