<VV> Huge Chevy Performance Car and Parts Stash, No Corvair

[ChiefTAM at aol.com]

A friend of mine sent this. Those WI guys have all the  luck. Thought you 
might find interesting, even though I saw nothing about  Corvairs.  When I first 
started reading this, I thought it was a hoax, but  it doesn't appear to be.  
Interesting for people who like Chevy  performance.  I don't know if this has 
been talked about on the list before  or not.  Click on the link on the bottom 
for pictures, make sure to look at  them all, Fantastic!
 
Todd Miller
Terrell, TX 


Huge muscle car stash  found!
(Pic's at bottom)
 


Larry Fisette  had no idea whether he was buying King Tut's tomb or Al 
Capone's vault when he  agreed to buy 21 trailers said to be full of Corvettes and 
Chevrolet muscle cars  and parts. Luckily, all of the rumors he had heard 
whispered around his  northeast Wisconsin home turned out to be more true than  he 
ever dreamed. 

So far, Fisette, a De Pere, Wisconsin, restorer and  automotive repair shop 
proprietor, has opened 17 of the 21 sealed trailers  one-by-one and found a 
Yenko Camaro with 45,000 miles; a pair of low-mileage  1970 LS-6 Chevelles; a 
1972 Camaro Z/28; two 1957 Corvettes, one a fuel-injected  car, the other a 
dual-four-barrel-equipped example; and several other Chevrolet  performance cars. 
Filling in the space around the cars like water around pebbles  is an inventory 
of NOS and used performance parts that would make a Nickey  Chevrolet parts 
manager jealous, and Fisette is not done cracking trailers open.  He's also 
confident there's more muscle hidden in the trailers.

How the  trailers came to be full of new Corvette side exhaust systems, 
factory Corvette  race parts, and highly desirable engines and parts is as 
interesting as the man  who filled them.

Donald Schlag's passion for Chevrolet performance cars,  even when they were 
new, gave him the foresight to realize that someday, others  would have just 
as much interest in them. So while he was working at his  father's John Deere 
dealership, Green Bay Implement, Schlag began buying the  parts from the local 
Chevrolet dealer's parts counter in the 1960s and stored  them at the John 
Deere dealership. He also made annual trips to California, pulling a  trailer 
behind an RV for a month at a time in order to retrieve more parts for  his 
stash. When his father died and the dealership was liquidated in the early  1970s, 
he tucked the parts and cars in semi trailers.

But when the very  people who Schlag was saving parts for betrayed him by 
stealing a part, Schlag  stopped sharing his collection. He even went so far as 
to completely seal the  trailers off once they were full. By butting the 
trailers up against each other,  not even he could go back in them. Schlag also 
stopped driving the cars he  collected after one of his Corvettes was keyed in a 
parking lot. From that point  on, he swapped the engines and slipped the cars 
into the trailers, never to be  gazed upon again.

Many local car collectors believe the reason why Schlag  pulled the engines 
from his cars and installed a different engine before he put  them away was to 
thwart thieves, since the cars wouldn't be numbers-matching.  Even rare parts, 
like a first-generation race Corvette gas tank, was separated  from its two 
filler neck pieces and its parts spread between three trailers.  Another theory 
to explain why Schlag swapped and separated engines was because  he predicted 
the engines would be worth more than the cars, so he pulled the hot  engine 
from most of the cars and put a slightly less desirable engine in its  place. 

Despite his unfortunate interaction with some of his fellow  hobbyists, 
Schlag remained friendly. When scouring car shows and swap meets  around Chicago, 
Milwaukee, and Green Bay for more parts in his rusty El  Camino, he could be 
found engaged in a conversation in which he would even  mention if he had a part 
or a car.

"He'd talk about what he had, but he  didn't brag and he didn't sell 
anything," said Fisette, who met Schlag before  his June, 2005, death on two 
occasions. Through these brief interactions, people  began to piece together what he 
had hiding.

And while no one knew exactly  what Schlag had, Schlag knew what they had in 
their garage. By being the local  expert on fuel injection units and offering 
other mechanical services, Schlag  became acquainted with cars in the area, 
which also helped him feed his  collection.

"There was a rumor that Don would remove your big-block and  install a 
small-block [as a gas-saving measure during the second fuel crisis],"  Fisette said. 
This would explain why about half of the engines Fisette has  uncovered are 
big-block Chevrolet engines. 

Upon learning that Schlag  passed away, Fisette took a chance on acquiring 
the collection and contacted  Schlag's family.

"I called her [Schlag's sister's] number, told her my  name, and said I'd buy 
everything and told her I had the capability to buy and  disperse it all," 
Fisette said. After checking with other hobbyists, Schlag's  family decided that 
Fisette was the right person to buy the  collection.

"We were so lucky to find Larry," said Joanne Stepien, Don  Schlag's sister. 
"I received several phone calls [from people interested in  buying the 
collection], so I took their names and numbers. I had about five  different people to 
choose from." Stepien then researched the reputations of  each party, and 
Fisette was the only person to come back with stellar  credentials.

Once the deal was sealed, Fisette was ready to break down  the doors of the 
trailers to see what he bought, and the first trailer he opened  didn't let him 
down.

"I hadn't seen inside any of the trailers. I did it  all on Donny's 
reputation," Fisette said. "The first trailer I opened had two  [1970 Chevelle] LS-6s 
in it," he said. "It was absolutely total amazement." The  Chevelles were 
parked bumper-to-bumper in the trailer, and the first he gazed  upon was a gold 
four-speed, bench-seat car that Fisette soon realized was the  LS-6 Chevelle his 
neighbor bought new. Fisette even remembers the day the  neighbor brought it 
home from the dealership and showed it to him. Regardless of  his memory of the 
car, Fisette prefers the Chevelle parked in front of the gold,  four-speed 
car: a blue Chevelle with bucket seats and an automatic transmission,  which he 
considers more driveable.

Unearthing the Yenko Camaro shortly  thereafter was obviously an exciting 
experience for Fisette, but it was opening  a trailer full of factory performance 
engines that made the hair on the back of  his neck stand up.

"The most exciting moment was when I opened up a  trailer and saw shiny 
engines up one side and down the other, and then two  stacked shelves of them," 
Fisette recalled. More than 150 high-performance  engines have been found, in 
addition to 14 nice, low-mileage cars, but the bulk  of trailers contain parts. 
And lots of them. 

Since finding the trailers,  Fisette has organized the parts in a warehouse 
to best determine what he has.  While looking down the line of engines, Fisette 
smiled at a complete engine for  a 1969 Camaro Z/28 engine and asked, "Isn't 
that pretty? It's a DZ-302 that's  complete down to the breather!" The Camaro 
302-cid engine is one of  approximately six such engines he's found, and he's 
hopeful that it and many of  the other engines will land back in the cars they 
originally came from, right  down to the cast-iron COPO 427-cid engine block 
he's found.

"I think it's  going to give people a chance to make their cars correct," he 
said. One hobbyist  has already contacted Fisette to ask if he has the 
original engine to his Nova,  which was sold to Schlag many years ago following an 
engine transplant. Although  Fisette plans to sell all of the parts in one lot, 
he said he would try to  reunite the Nova owner with his car's original 
engine. 

For Fisette, the  hunt was more fun than the catch, and he wants to share 
that experience with  fellow car collectors. Pointing to a 1958 Corvette radio, 
he said, "Imagine how  happy this is going to make somebody."

A happy man himself, Fisette is  thoroughly enjoying the challenge presented 
to him. "I've done nothing but empty  trailers since September," Fisette said 
while surrounded by all the parts he's  organized in his warehouse. "I walk in 
here and feel like Scrooge McDuck. I can  remember as a kid thinking, 'I'd 
kill for a four-speed.' Now look how many I  have got!"

Finding such parts continues to be a treasure hunt in itself.  Each time he 
opens a trailer, Fisette doesn't know if he'll find it filled cars  or SS 
wheels hanging from the ceiling, engines lining the walls, and 55-gallon  drums 
filled with performance heads and crankshafts. And even when he finds a  trailer 
loaded with cars, he's never sure if he'll find another stash of  
fuel-injection units or Corvette knock-off wheels in the cars' trunks as he has  on 
several occasions.

Regardless of his few interactions with Schlag,  Fisette feels he's come to 
understand the man, and if he's right, there are more  surprises great cars and 
parts waiting to be found. One of those potential  surprises may be another 
Yenko car. Fisette has found a rust-free front clip for  a Nova in one trailer, 
a hubcap center specific to a Yenko Nova in another  trailer, and he's heard 
that Schlag owned a Yenko Nova with a damaged front  clip. Combined with the 
fact he has a title and keys to a Nova, Fisette is  confident he'll soon 
uncover another muscle car icon from the Canonsburg,  Pennsylvania,  dealership. 
"I've really got to know him through this puzzle," Fisette  said.
 
 
Pictures here:    (open link, then there is another link  "trailers were 
opened" and "organized and categorized" you have to see  it!
 
_http://www.depereautocenter.com/parts.html_ 
(http://www.depereautocenter.com/parts.html) 
 _De Pere  Auto Center_ (http://www.depereautocenter.com/fulltrailers.html)