Phil Harrison isn’t quite ready to mention his big, white Chevrolet in the same breath as death and taxes. But it’s close.
No matter where he goes, the Cedar Springs, Mich., resident can be pretty secure in knowing that he will be the only one to show up in an ultra-rare 1955 Chevrolet One-Fifty ambulance.
“There is not another ’55 Chevy [One-Fifty] ambulance in existence that we know of,” says Harrison. “There are a few ’56 and ’57 Chevys. But we’ve been to Carlisle and all the big meets… It’s been to Springfield, Ill., Minneapolis, Charlotte, Nashville a couple of times … We’ve been all over with it. We’ve looked for one, and I’m thinking that if somebody out there had one, they would have notified me. I would, if I had one!”
Phil and his wife, Sue, were just looking for a conversation piece to take to car shows when he came across the unusual stretched Chevrolet back in 1989. Phil didn’t know at the time quite how rare the car was, but he knew he’d never seen another one, and might never get a chance to buy one again.
“I subscribe to Old Cars Weekly and this was advertised in the magazine. It was out in Littleton, Colo.,” Harrison said. “I think I called the guy and told him I was seriously interested and I wanted some pictures and wanted an honest description. You know, I’m 1,200 miles away, so I couldn’t just come and look at it … Then I think the day after Thanksgiving I got a Polaroid picture of it in the mail. So when my son got his Christmas break, I took the trailer out and we drove out to see it.
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