First in-shop shots of the 61 Apache

[GMCNUT]

Hey guys - wanted to share a few shots I sneaked while at my body man's house yesterday - There is a "Father's Day" type story on this truck below, so if you have some free time, like old truck stories and want a little fun reading
See what you think....

I got a call from a local wrecker driver last Fall who said he was being paid to remove 20+ vehicles from the pasture and down in the woods behind an older gentleman's house, and carry them to be crushed, but that he had heard I liked old trucks and wanted to know if I would be interested in a 1961 Apache w/ factory 283 V8 and factory Cast-Iron Powerglide all still in it and untouched. I asked what he wanted and he said "I am asking 900.00 on Craigslist but if you will come get it TODAY you can have it for 400.00 cash"
I hung up the phone and was on his doorstep in less than 20 minutes. He still had it hooked up to the wrecker and after a short verification that is was a real "MA" suffix and date coded 283 engine and drivetrain, I paid him on the spot. He was so happy to get the 400.00 bucks he offered to haul it to my house 20 miles away for free! So we spent the weekend tuning it up and doing brake work the engine fired right up - the original generator was still on it and it didn't work but this truck turned out to be a less than 100,000 miles original (and thought to be 1 owner) truck that runs like a top. This is the same 61 Apache you see in my Avatar picture.

Parked it in my garage over the winter and "played" with getting stuff to work; headlights, taillights, wipers, and to my surprise nearly everything worked - even the accessory Driver's side spotlight. So enter the wife - she was less than happy that I now had a new "friend" to play with because women want 100% of your focus to be on them, the house, and their agenda in general.
However, through the evenings of going out to the garage to "play" with my new toy, my cotton-topped 3 yr old son became fascinated with it - he wanted to roll the windows up and down, pretend to steer it like a race car and flip the spotlight on and off a million times. He even offered to help me "paint it" back Black by adding Black electrical tape to the sides where it was dented, scraped etc....
So seeing the father-son fun we are having with it, the wife begins to warm-up to this truck being here, despite its ugly half-rusty / half Black painted appearance, and then she really gets nailed - he starts asking Mommy if he can go to the garage to play with "his" truck....so he claimed it. Seeing his young interest in the thing we we decided to restore it this Spring to "semi-show / clean driver" condition. Not so nice you can't touch it with anything but white gloves, but a frame-off job intended to be driven and enjoyed on weekends and local shows and swap meets.
So the truck was Black when I got it, but Black is so hard on the pocketbook due to the intense blocking required to make it look as good as other colors, we decided to let my son choose one of the factory colors, so I pulled an original 1961 Chevrolet Truck color chip set out and and since Red is his favorite color, he picked the Cardinal Red over Cameo White combination.

Here are the first pics of the truck as its nearing completion - I cannot wait to load up my Son and go for a ride in "His" new Red 61 Apache!