Wife Almost Crashed New Viper RT/10, Husband Built Hemis, Yenkos, Boss Mustangs Collection

At the turn of the millennia, Wayne Schmeeckle’s investment In the stock market returned a neat eighty grand profit, money he and his wife spent on a brand-spanking-new car. A Dodge vehicle was their go-to machine, and they spent nearly all of the $80k on the least comfortable, least fuel-efficient, and least inconspicuous Chrysler products of the day.

The car ranked at the top in three categories: number of cylinders, horsepower, and displacement. The Viper RT/10 was the entry-level, with the GTS as the superior version. 24 years later, the car is still in the couple’s possession – along with everything else that it summoned in its wake.

And to think it was all within one whisker away from ending up in a complete disaster. Fortunately, it turned out perfectly. Now, the Schmeeckle collection is one of the most jaw-dropping curations of high-end muscle anywhere on Planet Piston.

Hemicudas, Boss Fords and GT40s and Torinos, Yenko Novas and Chevelles and Camaros - some of the gems are so original, even the tires are from the sixties. At one point, the collection outgrew the man’s possibilities. Not financially, but logistically: in 2016, at the Mecum Kissimmee event in January of that year, Wayne sold twenty of the twenty-three cars he took to the auction block.

With that burden off his warehouse, the man focused on the remaining cars – and recently, he’s invited a friend over to showcase the present collection, one that began with a near-crash and a magazine article. The grey Viper was responsible for all of it – well, the car and the man’s wife, who made a 30-mph 90-degree merge on the highway in the car just moments after taking delivery of it.

The car was bought from Nebraska and delivered to Colorado. The lady wanted to drive it, and Wayne happily obliged, taking the other seat. Since the Viper was a six-speed manual, the brake pedal was about one-third the width of the Suburban Mrs. Schmeeckle was regularly driving. When the woman lifted off the gas and moved her right foot to the ‘slow down’ pedal, she didn’t get the car to stop.

Fortunately, the highway they were about to drive on was clear, and the car made the turn unharmed. The couple laughed about it once they got the Viper stationary, but a bit later, Wayne went shopping. Not for another car, but for groceries – and while he was waiting his turn to pay, a car magazine caught his eye. It was about a Viper, and it sparked his interest in more ways than one.

The author of the story compared the Dodge sportscar to the legendary ‘Hemicuda’ from 1970-1971, the Plymouth pony armed with the nefarious 426 cubic-inch hemispherical-heads V8. Wayne was hooked right there and then, and he made it a personal goal to get one example of the iconic Mopar. He did, and the rest is history – one written in cubic inches, build sheets, library-level paperwork, and meticulous care.

That four-speed Plymouth Barracuda with a Hemi in it is just one of the sparkling automobiles in the collection. It is restored (with incredible attention to detail), so it is hard to believe that it has 84,027 original miles (135,228 kilometers). It’s one of the 284 Hemicuda cars built with a manual gearbox in the moniker’s first year of boasting the infamous seven-liter big-block, out of a grand total Hemi production of 666 Barracudas.

But it pales in comparison to the survivor Mopar next to it, a 1970 Plymouth Duster 340 with 64k (105,000 kilometers) miles under its belt. Also, a four-speed car, like the same-year Barracuda, lined up next to it. This Duster was probably pampered like the firstborn of a royal family because it doesn’t show its (mile)age one drop.

The Mopar section is completed by two Dodges—THE 2000 Viper and another red example—and a 1971 Cuda. The car is also a survivor bought new by a Milwaukee sheriff on May 29, 1971. The late-build Cuda sports the 383 big-block (the 6.3-liter Chrysler motor) with a four-barrel carb. However, that’s not the interesting part about it. Five build sheets are about four more than what the average Barrcuda hid in it even when new, back in ’71.

Still, there’s better: an array of three All-American Ford Mustangs, three stunning survivors from the 1969-1970 glory days. A 1,600-mile (some 2,600 km) survivor Boss 302 from 1970 (and another four-speed car) – probably one of the lowest-mileage second-year Little Bosses left around.

The Boss 429 from 1969 next to it is also a survivor that came from the factory with an add-on Ford never offered on any of its products in the company’s entire history: bad spirits. The Boss 429 was a race-homologation engine that needed to be sold to the general public in order to be accepted in NASCAR.

However, not a single Blue Oval automobile ever came with a vodka bottle in its rear quarter. The owner suspects a worker on the assembly line forgot it there. The car’s window wouldn’t go all the way down, and when they took it apart, they found the spirits bottle (emptied!).

Like all cars in the Wayne Schmeeckle collection, this Boss Nine has a neat story attached. The first buyer was slammed with a $4,900 bill of sale, and he retorted by trading in his 1966 E-type Jaguar. The Ford dealership valued the British icon at $3,100, so the rowdy Mustang only set back the customer a neat eighteen hundred bucks. It must have been a great practical joke to play on his friends when he said, ‘I paid $1,800 for it.’

In 2016, when storage started to become insufficient, Wayne sold a part of the collection - and this Boss was among those auctioned. The high bid didn't meet the reserve, so the 53,000-mile (85,300 km) survivor didn't leave the stables until today.

The last Mustang in the red-white-and-blue trio is a 1969 Mach 1 survivor – so survivor, in fact, that it never saw the dark of night on the road. The owner took it out on perfect-weather weekends and ensured the car wouldn’t be caught on the road at night so that air humidity wouldn’t condense on his pony.

The 390 V8 (6.4-liter) has 8,000 miles (just under 13,000 km) on it, and the Muscle Car and Corvette Nationals recognized the car’s time capsule originality with an award. Play the video below (courtesy of Dennis Collins) to learn the details of this unbelievable collection of American icons. The Yenkos are featured in the second part, most likely due next Friday. Stay tuned.