It was 1958.  I was 15, with six months to go before qualifying for a drivers license.  My Dad, John Steers, was building a car out in our two car garage in Palo Alto, CA.  He had built four cars before, but this one was different.  Gorgeous, with swoopy lines, a Ferrari-like grille opening, long, streamlined back end and a light flywheeled, rumpety, solid lifter Chevy V8 under the hood. Instead of just dual exhaust, it had four pipes all the way back.  A feast for my young eyes and ears, and did it GO.   It was sensational.  I loved it.   Like so many in the day, his backyard creation was street legal, yet he raced it at SCCA events like Laguna Seca in 1958 and 1959.       

To a 15 year-old kid this was pretty exciting stuff.  Pop kept the car until 1961 and sold it to a family friend.  I never forgot it and all my life casually looked for Victress stories and pictures in old magazines.   

46 years later in 2004 I was 61, living in Illinois, between projects and decided to seriously look for a Victress.  For years I had saved a tiny sale ad for a Victress body shell.  I chanced a call to its owner.  He said, no, it never did sell years earlier, yes he still had it and yes he’d consider selling.   Hot damn! 

When I got to his home I couldn’t believe my eyes.  There, hanging in a garage was a weather beaten, but new Victress S1-A body shell.  It was never painted, still was in natural fiberglass color, still had mold release on it from some fifty years earlier and still had the factory jig clips molded in all four corners.  When Victress produced these bodies, buyers had options to have factory door, trunk and hood hinges, or just have the body come with scribed lines, leaving the buyer to cut out the pieces, fashion return edges and laminate in hinge assemblies.  This body had the hood cut out, but had only one hinge in place, the other, gone.  The passenger door was cut out and had a factory cast aluminum hinge.  The headlight blanks, drivers door and deck lid were scribed but never cut and no hinges were installed.  It was just a shell, no floorboards or bulkheads and the 50 year old fiberglass was very thin, almost flimsy.  In all the body crevices there was a half inch of fine, compressed, Texas dirt, as if it had sat out for years in the dusty West Texas wind.  But there it was, 50 years old and basically like new, mounted on a couple of 2X4’s hanging from the ceiling. 

But it got even better.  To my amazement, over in a corner was a factory Mameco frame with a crude cowl hoop, rear bulkhead and a mess of angle iron welded to it, obviously someone’s attempt to fit out the frame for the Victress.  It also had a dual exhaust underneath suggesting it may have been engined at one time.  The body’s hood had a round cutout for an air cleaner so I suspect the body had at least sat on that frame over an engine at some point, but the car was never finished. 

I felt 15 again.  We made a deal, I rented a 20 Foot Ryder truck and two days later the whole shebang was in Chicago. 

The car is now a roller with independent front suspension, a four link setup and coilovers in back.  Power is a 1957 Dodge Hemi KD500.  Work left to do is build a windshield, plumb and wire it, build a dashboard, install gauges, upholster it, and probably scores of smaller jobs along the way getting it finally finished.  Target date, Spring, 2008.  Stay tuned to the website for progress reports.

Thanks to:

  Bob McKee, Russ Olsen and Ed Brett at McKee Engineering, Lake Zurich, IL....engineering, fabrication and machining.

 Skip McCabe and Al Bauschke at McCabe Auto Restorations, Mundelein, IL... body work and paint.

 Mike, Tony and Joe Yank at Speed Performance Engineering, Wauconda, IL ....engine buildup and dyno.

 Friends Jack Bowser, Herb Lederer, Jack Heist, Jim Manz, Bill Ulrich, Derry May, Jim Robinson, Geoff Hacker, Jon Greuel, Mike Feldman, Don Devine, Doug Karon, Tim Steers, Tom Steers, Linda Steers.....moral support and extra hands.

 John D. Steers, Father, racer, engineer... for inspiration and showing the way.

 For further information contact:

 Steve Steers

ssteers@comcast.net

(847) 295-2257

 January 14, 2008

My first views of the body hanging in the owners garage. It was just a shell....the passenger door was factory hinged and cut out, the drivers marked but unhinged and uncut. No floors, bulkheads inner fender panels or dashboard. The hood was cut out and held with one factory hinge. It had never been painted or finished, although a hole was cut in the hood for an air cleaner to stick through. Note the gray, 50 year-old factory mold release still on the body.