<VV> THE CORVAIR'S 50th ANNIVERSARY IS HERE!

[Dave Newell]

This is it, folks, the most important date in Corvair history. The Corvair's 50th Anniversary is happening...NOW! 
50 years ago, you could have been the first to scurry down to your friendly Chevy dealer's to see and buy the "Revolutionary New Corvair".
Today isn't merely the 50th Anniversary of the 1960 Corvair, but the 50th Anniversary of the Corvair itself. This is the critical date for Corvair faithful everywhere, be they '60 cavemen, balls out racers, FC Rampers or Ultravan campers....the BIG FIVE-OH is upon us at this hour. Drive your Corvair if you can!
True to crazed Corvair form, I'm emailing this at 7am EST (Detroit Vair time, 4am PST), the precise hour that Chevrolet took to the airwaves on October 2, 1959. At 7am, thirty-three TV stations were hired by Chevrolet to run a 1960 introduction show called "Right from The Start". The show was primarily intended for dealers and salesman, but it was also required fare at Chevy field offices and plants. At Willow Run, manager Pete Rausch invited local Chevy dealers and newsmen to the plant for breakfast and to watch the show. 
On this fateful morning 50 years ago, Pete was running late. Pushing his Corvair a little too hard...you guessed it....he spun out in a corner almost within sight of the plant. What could be more ironic on the Corvair's announcement day? Fortunately only his ego was damaged and nobody spotted him. But the skid marks on the road haunted him for months. Pete told me that "Every time I spotted those GD tire marks I thought of that rear end letting go and was thankful no one saw me".
Keeping with the October 2nd spirit, I'm writing this a few miles from Ypsilanti, where the Corvair Preservation Foundation 50th Anniversary coins will be be mailed today from the CPF Corvair Museum. The Postal Service folks will be there at noon to stamp each mailing label with the special Corvair 50th postmark. Everyone is welcome to attend and bring along anything (within reason!) that they'd like stamped with the postmark. 
Thanks to superb efforts by a crew from the Detroit Area Corvair Club, all is in readiness for today's coin mailing. Special thanks go to everyone who ordered a 50th Anniversary Coin...the coins sold out weeks ago and there will be no more. They're the CPF's definitive recognition of the Corvair's 50th!
The many 50th celebrations being held by CORSA chapters around the country today, this weekend and later this month are a hearty and fitting tribute to the Corvair's 50th Anniversary. I hope you'll be able to attend one of them. Or at least take a moment to reflect on this moment that we'll never be able to share again. Well, at least until the Vair's 100th...maybe we should start planning for it?!
Sleepless in Detroit,
Dave Newell