‘If a Buick Special ever got a fierce ambition to become a Ferrari – and tried hard enough – it would be likely to end up just about like this.”
Car and Driver magazine – September, 1963
Such prophetic words from Car and Driver magazine back in 1963 underscore the goal of three California twenty somethings who sought to build a world-class grand touring sports car. And, for a while, found themselves on equal ground with Europe’s best.
Their concept: A marriage of Italian style and the mechanical excellence of a premier American manufacturer – Buick – to create a true gran turismo sports car with head-turning looks, outstanding performance and comfort, and something that, up to then, was not common among European exotics: Reliability!
Their challenges were legion: A complex product combining hand-crafted bodies with mass-produced engines and transmissions on an assembly line spanning two continents and an ocean. A limited capability for product development and testing. And the need to create a marketing program to promote the car to an enthusiast public as well as develop a distribution channel to get the car into their hands. All this with limited operating capital.
The result? The Apollo was highly praised by both road testers and owners alike. “Workmanship is of the highest quality…comparable to cars costing twice that of the Apollo” crowed one magazine report. “…the Apollo handles as well or better than a 2+2 Ferrari, an Aston Martin DB4 or a Sting Ray Corvette,” exclaimed another. High praise indeed from the critical press!
And the owners? “I dearly love my Apollo!” enthused singer Pat Boone. And this from another owner: “It’s a wonderful work of art. You can see the quality. You can feel the excitement they felt when they were hammering it out, putting it together and driving it for the first time. It is a milestone, a one-of-a-kind car and no one can really compare anything to it. It stands on its own.”
This is the story of the Apollo GT. The American Ferrari.
Details: 8.5″ x 11″, 138 pages. 87 color and black & white photos and illustrations.
Pontiac: The Performance Years represents a compilation of the best of three volumes covering the peak years of musclecar performance. The books were first published as part of the Quicksilver Supercar Series in the early 1980s. Out of print for decades, original editions of the books are coveted by collectors and rarely come up for sale. Not content to let collectors have all the fun, we’ve brought them back to provide a unique window into musclecar history. Pontiac is the brand that brought us the GTO in 1964 and created a whole new market segment: Supercars. First an option in 1964-1965 and then a full model line in 1966, the GTO was the first of the Supercar genre and was supported by incredibly creative marketing programs, in-your-face advertising, and almost endless option lists. Today we call vintage GTOs and competitive mid-size models with high-profile trim and large displacement, high-horsepower engines “musclecars.” Back then, though, it was the Supercar Sixties, and Pontiac started it all! Pontiac: The Performance Years is packed with a treasure trove of period photography and information from Pontiac engineering, specialty marketers like Royal Pontiac (Bobcat), and factory and private racecar builders.
