Finders Keepers: Bill Woessner’s Q5 Turquoise 1969 Dodge Daytona Charger


When it comes to second generation Dodge Chargers, our good friend Bill Woessner from Pittsburgh, PA has the market pretty well cornered on them. With having a large collection of high quality 1970 Charger R/T’s in his garage and having previously owning a few others, Bill can admit he’s just a little obsessed.

Over the years, we’ve showcased quite a few of Bill’s Chargers including his restored examples as well as some of his rare finds but his latest rare find takes the cake in our opinions!

He explains, “Back in 2017, I unveiled my 1970 Charger R/T SE factory promo sunroof car at MCACN and that following summer, I showed it at several other shows.

“I met a lot of people that had similar interests with factory sunroof cars and at one of the shows, I received a phone number for a guy in southern Illinois named Dan that had a 1970 promo ‘show car’ that he was considering selling. Once I got home, I called Dan and confirmed that the 1970 he had was one of the “Chicago 16” show cars I thought it was.”

Bill continues to say, “The “Chicago 16” were consecutively VIN numbered V-code 440-6 Pack R/T SE Chargers built as early factory show cars to showcase the new 1970 Charger model. They were all optioned identically; V-code 440 Six-Pack, automatic transmission, EV2 Hemi Orange with Charcoal leather interior, black vinyl top, black bumble-bee stripe, luggage rack, tach, console, Special Edition package, AM/FM radio, rear window defroster, passenger side mirror, V21 hood blackout treatment and 6-way adjustable driver’s seat.”

Figuring it was a great addition to his collection, Bill made the drive out to Illinois to purchase the car for his next project. When he walked into Dan’s pole building where the car was stored, he couldn’t believe his eyes at the collection of cars he had stored away.

Bill shares, “There was a R4 Red 1969 Hemi Charger R/T 4-speed with 32,000 original miles, a Q5 Turquoise 1969 Hemi Charger R/T automatic with 26,000 original miles, a Q5 Turquoise 1969 Charger R/T SE 440 4-speed, R6 Red 1969 Charger R/T automatic, 1968 Dart GTS 383 4-speed and several 1963-1964 Plymouths.” Needless to say, Dan had some good taste in Mopar muscle throughout the ’80’s when he was collecting.

What caught Bill’s attention right away though was a real deal 1969 Daytona Charger in Q5 Turquoise with a 440 4-speed and 22,000 original miles. “It’s always been a dream of mine from an early age to own a 1969 Daytona. From my first pinewood derby car to inspecting them in detail at MCACN, I’ve always been fascinated by them and have always wanted one.” The problem was, as he made more money the value of these “winged warriors” continued to increase at a more rapid pace.

After purchasing the 1970 Charger he originally came for, Bill established a relationship with Dan and went back 6 months later and purchased the R4 Red 1969 Charger R/T Hemi car. This Hemi Charger is an extremely rare R/T itself being R4 Red, 426 Hemi, 4-speed, 4:10 Dana 60 Super Track Pack, rocker moldings and the extremely rare, mid-year release of the V21 hood paint.

With only 32,000 miles on the clock, this was a must have for a future project for Bill. At that time, they started talking about some of the parts he had and the Q5 Turquoise Daytona. Being as it was his childhood dream car; Bill managed to work a deal on the Daytona and brought it home just before Christmas.

According to all of the records from Winged Warriors, there were only 5 Q5 Daytonas produced in 1969. All of which were 440 Magnums and only one was produced with a 4-speed. This is that car! The car was optioned with black bucket seat interior, center console, hood pins, the Super Track Pack with a 4.10 geared Dana 60, power disc brakes, power steering, three-speed wipers, tinted windshield, Tic-Toc-Tach and the very rare 15” Kelsey-Hayes “recall wheels” with Redline tires.

Once he got it home, Bill started researching the car’s history. He learned that it was sold new at Karp Motor Company (now Southern Motors) in Savannah, Georgia.

He tells us, “It looks like it was used as a dealer demonstrator in some form until February 20th, 1971. That’s when a lady by the name of Ruth Kaminsky purchased the car for $3,605 for her son, Sammy. Ruth and her son had some type of affiliation with Karp Motor Company, but I haven’t been able to get in touch with anyone to obtain the exact information.”

He continues to say, “On the top of the paperwork, it says ‘$1,500 discount: hit while used as Demo.’ The Kaminsky family kept the Daytona until September 23rd, 1985 and then sold it to a gentleman by the named of Jesse (Jay) Meeks, also of Savannah GA for $3,000. Jay kept the Daytona for about a month and then flipped it to Francis Burley of Moultrie, GA for $3,600.”

“Francis was big into wing cars, and I’m told by his close friends (he died back in 2013) that he had over 40 of them in his time. He was the first to advertise a wing car in Hemmings in the late 1970’s and everyone told him he was crazy. Francis had a vision for these cars and in a 1983 local newspaper article; he said these cars would exceed $100,000 by the turn of the century. Was he ever right about that one!” says Bill.

Francis would drive the car locally for a few months before advertising it for sale in the Winged Warriors of Wisconsin newsletter in late 1985. That’s where Dan purchased it from. When he purchased the car, it was in rough shape with a 340 automatic under the hood, but he drove it from Savannah, Georgia back to Illinois without any problem.

He parked the car shortly after and placed it under lock and key for the better part of 40 years until he sold it to Bill. Bill explains that briefly in the late 1980’s, Dan had the car at a local body shop to get restored but nothing ever came of it other than the shop removing the front clip. The car was pulled from the shop and came back to Dan’s and was locked up.

Bill shares, “After purchasing the Daytona, I tracked down Francis’s daughter on Facebook. She put me in touch with two of her dad’s best friends, Mitch and Dennis. They knew the car well and have been very accommodating. When Francis passed, his daughters let them go thru his house and take any car related ‘stuff’ they wanted.

“They got boxes upon boxes of documentation, pictures and Francis’s favorite, original dealership advertisements of the new cars for that model year. When speaking to Mitch, he could have sworn he had seen paperwork in one of the boxes related to my Daytona.”

“A few weeks passed and I received a message one day that Mitch looked thru all the boxes and all he could find was a scribe of the VIN number. That night, he woke up at 3 am and he just couldn’t sleep knowing he had documentation somewhere. He searched again and finally in a folder in his office desk, the last envelope in the folder was the documentation he was seeking.

“The original paperwork from when the car was sold new, the cashed check copy from the bank, repair invoices from Karp Motor company from the early and mid-1970’s, registration changes for prior owners when the Daytona exchanged hands in late 1985 and a deposit letter from when Dan purchased the car and wanted to come get it between Christmas and New Year’s in 1985. I have considered myself lucky on a few occasions in my past, but never this lucky.”

Over the first 15 years of its life, the Daytona lived a very hard 22,000 miles. The paint was falling off on the nose cone so Sam Kaminsky had the car painted by Earl Shibe. The repaint didn’t match but the original Q5 color still remains in the door jambs, headlight bezels and under the hood and trunk lid.

At some point, the original 440 blew up so it was replaced with a 340. When the car was sold, the original 440 was with it still but eventually was rebuilt and stuffed into an orange 1971 Duster 4-speed that was last seen in Jacksonville, FL in 1992 (if anyone has seen this car, please let us know so we can forward it to Bill- Ed.)

The Daytona retains its original fender tag and broadcast sheet and Bill managed to discover the numbers matching 18-spline 4-speed for the car. He tells us that his plan is to start on the restoration later this year once he gets his current project, a 1970 Charger R/T SE V-Code 4-speed restoration assembled. It will undergo a complete rotisserie restoration at a very high level using every NOS part he possibly can along with NOS 15” Kelsey-Hayes “Recall wheels.” We can’t wait to see it!

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Cody Krueger

Car Feature Editor – cody.krueger@shawgroupmedia.com Since the age of 4, Cody has been obsessed with everything Mopar. On Christmas of 1998, Cody's parents gave him a rusty '69 Charger shell that his father saved from a field. Cody's garage still features that '69 Charger as well as the additions of a '70 Challenger R/T, '71 Super Bee, '73 Road Runner, '73 Duster, '08 Challenger SRT8 and a '13 Ram 3500. Cody can truly and proudly say that he is a true Mopar nut in love with all types of Mopars!

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