Mint Numbers-Matching 1969 Camaro Z/28 Finds New Home After Three Decades With One Owner

Alright, I can almost hear the red-hot blood pressure shooting through the roof right now, so let’s get this thing cleared right off the bat. There’s a group of classic car rescuers called Mopars5150 that save classic cars (go figure), most of them Chrysler products (Elementary, my dear Watson). However, they’re not the kind of fanatics who think the Hemi is an All-American invention and history begins with Richard Petty’s first NASCAR title.

They appreciate a classic just as much as every other guy with a four-barrel heart, even if that automobile happens to bear the seal of approval from other Detroit makers. And truth be told, what would motoring be without the honest, cutthroat competition that led to the development of some illustrious nameplates?

The Plymouth Barracuda outpaced the Mustang, which triggered the Camaro response from Chevrolet. Pontiac’s muscle GTO spawned an entire lifestyle, while the Corvette is still the undisputed sportscar of America. The examples could continue, but let’s get back on track to 1970.

That’s the year Reece Jones bought his 1969 Camaro Z/28 in Xenia, Ohio, and for the next three years, he raced the high-performance out of that Turbo-Fire small block V8. There you have it - the connection to 1970 is strong here, too.

Reece Jones is the gentleman in the video below, courteously telling a fabulous story – his story – to the guys from Mopars5150, who came to inspect his 1969 Z/28. Sadly, it’s not the same car as 55 years ago, but it is one with a history that is just as exciting, if not more so. Let’s rewind to 1970 and get to the bottom of this story.

Reece Jones was a racer from Ohio, and he had just bought his Bowtie pony car, a 1969 Chevrolet Camaro Z/28. The fast one – not the ZL1 abomination, but one that people could actually buy (and they did: one in every eight Chevrolet Camaro buyers ticked the Z/28 RPO code). 20,302 Chevy ponies rolled off the assembly lines with the nasty 302 cubic-inch V8 stuffed between the front fenders.

It might not sound like much – 4.9 liters was not something to write home about in 1969 when the streets were filled with 440, 427s, 428 Cobra Jets, 429s, and 426 Hemis. Imagine when 1970 came around, and GM really let loose – 454s and 455s were the talk of the town, but the Z/28 wasn’t afraid of any of them.

Reece Jones raced his Camaro throughout Ohio and Kentucky, sweeping like a tornado across the tracks. His photograph with 'Miss Hurst' Linda Vaughn is a testimony of those successful racing days. But as glorious as his drag-racing career might have been, his personal life wasn’t mirroring the blitzing quarter-mile achievements.

In 1974, he was out of a divorce, and the Camaro fell on the wrong side of the separation. The man sold his trusty racer, which he had bought from his hometown of Xenia, in Ohio, and moved to Florida. Not a moment too soon, as the Super Outbreak hit the United States in early April 1974. Xenia was ravished by the deadliest tornado in the recorded history of America, but Reece was already in Florida, rebuilding his own life in the aftermath of the sentimental twister.

Years went by, and he got back on track – not the 440-yard speedway, but he met Toni, a coworker with whom he fell in love and started a new family. In the early 90s, the couple attended a car show (you can take a racer out of the track, but you can’t take the track out of his heart) and stumbled upon a 1969 Chevrolet Camaro Z/28.

Reece looked over in, in it, under it, to it, at it, and then went for a hot dog and put the past behind him once more. His wife Toni, however, knew better and got the Camaro’s owner’s phone number. Without Reece suspecting anything, she called the man, struck up a deal, bought the car, and put it in a garage. (Yes, I know, I want to go to that town where they make women like this, too).

That was the easy part. The hard part came when she had to convince Reece to go with her ‘to look at my company’s new logo.’ That’s the excuse she pulled out of the hat to get the former racer to accompany her to the garage. You can picture the rest of the story, but playing the video and listening to the couple remember that moment is better.

Reece Jones won’t admit to shedding emotional tears when his Toni lifted the garage door, and his jaw hit the pavement. Little by little, the couple began restoring the Camaro to what it looks like today (if a gang of Mopar guys are lost for words when nitpicking inspecting non-Chrysler automobile, then you damn right know that’s one helluva ride).

The paint on this Florida car is not original, but it has more than two decades on it (would you give it a second over two weeks?), and it isn’t the factory-applied shade. Reece wanted to recreate his former racing machine from the early seventies and did it to the tee.

Everything is there, and the car looks like it’s 1970 again. The 302 high-compression Turbo-Fire isn’t particularly happy with gearshifts below 3,000 RPM, as Reece explains to a young Mopar man while they take the car out for a spin.

Chevrolet rated the power output at 290 hp and as many pound-feet of torque (that’s 294 PS and 393 Nm), but… there’s again that ‘but’ that kicks in at the right moment. In the Z/28 case, just above 5,200 RPM (where GM measured the 290-hp performance).

However, the 302 was a mongrel of two Chevy thoroughbreds, the 238 and the 327, inheriting the four-inch bore of the latter and the three-inch stroke of the former. Massively oversquare, the Trans Am homologation engine (because that’s what the 302-cube V8 was originally built in 1966) could rev to well beyond 7,000 – and still pull like a mule.

That’s one reason for street talk about a more realistic figure of well over 350 hp (some venture as far as 375) – that was outright 396 big-block territory. In fact, the Z/28 engine package option offered by Chevrolet prompted Ford to counter with the Boss 302 in 1969, while Mother Mopar reacted with the AAR Cuda and the Challenger T/A in 1970.