Mustangs in Boardman rev up for film
The bill of sale for Trustee Kathy Miller’s car is still around. It cost $2,535.
STAFF REPORT
BOARDMAN — A film crew was in town working on a documentary that will include Trustee Kathy Miller’s 1964 Poland Seminary High School graduation gift.
No, not the watch her mother gave her — although she still has the timepiece.
The other gift, the one her father gave her, drew Tony Begley from classicmusclecars.com. Based in Wauconda, Ill., Begley travels the country looking for classic cars.
Miller’s fully restored 1964 “prairie bronze” (think dusty gold) Mustang will be in Begley’s documentary of early Mustangs and appear on his Web site about a year from now. The documentary may also be shown on Speed TV, he said.
Begley and his crew photographed Miller’s hardtop and a 1964 Mustang convertible, also prairie bronze, that her son Nate bought in Texas and restored. He owns Buckeye Automotive Restoration in Boardman.
The crew first filmed at Miller’s house and then behind St. James Church in Boardman Park. Begley said it’s rare to find a 1964 Mustang with its original owner.
Miller said her mother was “shocked” when she learned about the Mustang graduation gift. “She didn’t know my father bought it. She bought me a watch.”
Miller still has the bill of sale — $2,535 — from Gough Ford in Poland. The Gough Ford license plate holder is still on the car, too, and Miller has the original license plates for her standard coupe.
The Mustang had no radio or side mirrors, so Miller used some of her graduation money to buy them. During the restoration process, to make the car look as it did when new, the radio and mirrors were removed.
The Mustang served Miller well for her four years at The Ohio State University. She’s convinced that’s why her father bought it — so she could drive herself to and from school.
The car went out of commission in 1971 or 1972, when Miller’s husband, John, after his return from Vietnam, got into a wreck. The odometer, which has not been repaired, had 65,000 miles on it at the time of the crash.
The wrecked Mustang went into storage at Scandinavian Health Spa, a building owned by Miller’s mother. It stayed there until 1993 and then moved into one of the Millers’ garages. Restoration, done by Nate, began in 2003. He said about 1,000 hours of work over the next year returned his mother’s Mustang to its old shiny self.
The cost? Roughly $35,000, which includes “new” old parts.
Miller said her son’s Mustang was the real draw for the film crew because it was manufactured within the first 30 days of production.
Begley said the first Mustang rolled off the Ford assembly line in Dearborn, Mich., on March 9, 1964. He’s hoping to track down more of the early models.
A Ford Mustang Web site explains that Mustangs produced between March 9 and July 31, 1964, are often coined the 1964 1/2 Mustang by enthusiasts. Initial production of the second round of Mustangs began on Aug. 17, 1964. Both the original production Mustangs and the second run are technically considered 1965 Mustangs by Ford.