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I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that's probably from a program where you could watch and participate in the assembly of your car at the factory. So you'd have to have ordered a new car and gone to Kentucky and picked up some tools to get one.
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that's probably from a program where you could watch and participate in the assembly of your car at the factory. So you'd have to have ordered a new car and gone to Kentucky and picked up some tools to get one.
Not really. Earnest Foote, the First Start Operator that signed the certificate would often pick out a pretty girl from one of the factory tours and have them perform the first start. The girl would then receive a certificate. My wife got one when we first toured the plant back in ‘89.
Earnest was a really great guy. He often came out to the Baymont Inn during Corvette Forum Cruise Ins. Sadly no longer with us.
Not really. Earnest Foote, the First Start Operator that signed the certificate would often pick out a pretty girl from one of the factory tours and have them perform the first start. The girl would then receive a certificate. My wife got one when we first toured the plant back in ‘89.
Earnest was a really great guy. He often came out to the Baymont Inn during Corvette Forum Cruise Ins. Sadly no longer with us.
Well that's cool.
I could have sworn there was a program where you could watch your car be assembled (for a few extra bucks, naturally) but maybe it was Mustangs.
Not really. Earnest Foote, the First Start Operator that signed the certificate would often pick out a pretty girl from one of the factory tours and have them perform the first start. The girl would then receive a certificate. My wife got one when we first toured the plant back in ‘89.
Earnest was a really great guy. He often came out to the Baymont Inn during Corvette Forum Cruise Ins. Sadly no longer with us.
Thanks for this, love learning more about our cars and their history.
And, Wil Cooksey, Corvette Plant Manager from 1993 - 2008, went on to have a Corvette model actually named in his honor:
I could have sworn there was a program where you could watch your car be assembled (for a few extra bucks, naturally) but maybe it was Mustangs.
I shouldn’t have implied you were wrong. There very well could have been something like you describe for later C4 production and they would most likely have let the owner do the first start and issue the same certificate. I had first hand knowledge of the earlier process and thought I’d share.
I shouldn’t have implied you were wrong. There very well could have been something like you describe for later C4 production and they would most likely have let the owner do the first start and issue the same certificate. I had first hand knowledge of the earlier process and thought I’d share.
No worries. I was just going by my recollection which is more likely to be wrong than right. However, I suspect that you're right, and it's a combination of the two. Thanks for sharing your personal experience. As RPO JOE said It certainly does enhance our knowledge base of our favorite cars.
No worries. I was just going by my recollection which is more likely to be wrong than right. However, I suspect that you're right, and it's a combination of the two. Thanks for sharing your personal experience. As RPO JOE said It certainly does enhance our knowledge base of our favorite cars.
You know when they started RPO R8C in around ‘95 I believe, they gave you a date range when your car would be built and if you could be there during that time, you could watch your car being built where you’d be able to first start and get the certificate. This info is a bit hazy as I was pretty drunk at one of the Forum Cruise Ins and had a long discussion with Adam Boca, who back then organised Museum Delivery.
08-14-2023, 08:16 AM
Corvette Plant "Certificate of Appreciation"
