Holy Grail Hemi

THE WELLBORN COLLECTION GROWS BY ONE MORE CAR WITH THIS 13,000-MILE ONE-OF-ONE TRICOLOR 1971 HEMI ’CUDA.

- Geoff Stunkard

What? Read that one again!” 

Curtis Wellborn was looking through the extensive paperwork that had come with a car he and his better-known brother Tim had just purchased. He had been reading the options out loud—the ’71 Hemi ’Cuda itself was already headed to Roger Gibson’s Missouri shop for detailing. There, listed in between 2642969 (heavy-duty red-cap battery) and 1944154 (Hemi power brake vacuum fitting) on a broadcast sheet breakdown, was “V6W.” White longitudinal sport stripes. Billboards in ’71, and on a four speed. Add in the black top and interior, and this is the only ’71 Hemi ’Cuda so equipped from the factory. So Curtis did read it again, and Tim instantly began to see what this car might be.

“We already had a 1971 Hemi ’Cuda here with black billboards, and we were buying this one really because it was so original,” says Tim. “When Curtis read that code off, it was like a shock: white billboards, red paint, black top, four-speed. It had to be one-of-one, and it is.”

In the late summer of 1971, the factory ended production on a lot of stuff as that model year concluded. Many of them were victims of huge insurance increases and federal emission controls. The ’Cuda was done and so was the Hemi. By the end of that selling season, just 62 (59 for the U.S. market and three for export) of this design had come off the assembly line with the four-speed transmission, and only one of those is known to exist having gotten the big billboard side stripes in white at Hamtramck. This one. Nevertheless, nobody in the hobby knew this until Tim and Curtis bought the car and began researching it.