John Buffum 1st Porsche?

[Pesch]

While looking for information about a car a friend and I bought some time ago I came across this picture from a 1966 newspaper article:



Could it be the 1st 911 of John Buffum?
Well story says it's one of them at least.

So the story is:
My friend and I were speaking about building a FIA rally car for historical events for quite a while, dreaming of Historic Monte Carlo, Le Mans and the likes (we are in France).
One morning my friend sent me a link for an ad for a 66 911 in fair condition and price. After a few hours he get the VIN and it appeared that the car was actually a 65 built MY 66 thus a perfect base for our dream.
So after one night of reflexion, we decided to buy it, 50/50 as none of us actually had the budget for it... Sealing the deal was quite a story as well as my friend was in France, myself working in Korea and the car in California...

Quickly, we made the plan to make a “period gentleman driver car”, keeping most of the original appearance but with a fully seam welded shell, a FIA cage and squeezing as much power as we can from a 2.0 FIA legal engine...

Well, that WAS the plan...

Kardex confirmed the Irish Green color and that the car was full of factory options, catacolor, sunroof, full leather, 2 Talbot mirrors, New York radio, 3 points seat-belts to name them. The plan then started to change considering the interesting configuration of the car...

Being in Korea, far away from any of my toys in my garage, I started to spend some time digging the history of the car.
Kardex in hand I started to look for the 1st owner, some John Buttum in Middelbury VT.
After numerous hours of research it appeared that the name wasn’t typed correctly and should have actually been BUFFUM, things became quite obvious as the correct name was handwritten above the typed name...

I then tried my luck shooting an email to his race team and get a quick answer from the man himself:
“Boy that goes back a ways! Happy to talk with you about an old car of mine. I remember it - we had a green and a blue one. One we bought at the factory in Zuffenhausen in the winter of 1966. The other we bought from the Porsche dealer in Burlington Vt. The first one I rolled at a go-kart track .”

Quite an amazing find that the base of our rally car project had a rally legend as 1st owner...

So some more hours of research led me to find the article the 1st picture is extracted from:



In the mean time, the car arrived in my friends garage and he found traces of the mounting holes for the hood driving lights. Here's the beast waiting to be stripped:



As for now, considering the history of the car, and everything we learnt about these late 65 MY66 cars, the challenge of restoring the car to a full original condition became more interesting for us.

Our plan of building a FIA car is still on and will restart once our finances recover and when the opportunity to find a beaten up base show up.

We will keep you posted and hope that you'll enjoy the thread.

[Chuck Miller]

Congrats and very interesting....

Our friend and contributor Rick Cabell will be no doubt be looking in on this thread, he's a big Buffum fan, and has a restoration shop near Stowe VT........

Cheers and good luck,
cm

[Pesch]

Thanks Chuck, this 911 never cease to amaze us.
My friend Lucas the co-owner will soon post some fresher pictures of it.

Some more newspaper clips from 1966 (67 for the last one) for now:

[Pesch]

And here's the car after few days of work during last vacation:



Played a bit with a chisel and a blow torch, some body man has been generous with the filler...
However, nothing really bad and minimal rust.

[Rick Cabell]

I would have loved to find that car. Yes, Jon is a legend. Any idea where the car has been between then and where it is today. Can I assume this was the green one? Or was it the blue one that has had a color change? That dealership is now VW. It is about a mile down the road from me. It was McNash Motors back in the 60's-70's.
Wish you the best with your project.

[Pesch]

Thanks Rick,
I must admit that while I've been a huge fan rallye and of group B legend for many years, I didn't knew John Buffum before to find the history of this car.
I may blame it on the fact that I'm from Europe and a bit young to have follow his carreer (34), but upon reading his biography I became a big fan.
This guy is truly a legend and I recommend all rally fan around to read his biography: In like a lamb out like a lion
Unfortunately this biography doesn't mention any Porsche adventure before his participation to Monte Carlo with fake press pass in 1968 (official enrollment in 69).

This one is the green one paint code 6606 and apparently not the one he rolled at the track.
From some research dealer was McNash motors as you mention, I wish I could find some period picture of the dealership.

Unfortunately I know very little of the between the ownership of J. Buffum and ourselves.
I'm trying to track that down but havent found anything conclusive so far, dealer not being of any help by not willing to give any details of previous seller besides the car was in Rutland MA.
Information on the title MD are not of much help as well as dating back from 1977 and untraceable name.
The only thing reliable on the title would be the soundex of MD but my research have been unfruitful as well, if someone can help, here's it is: S-455-144-777-587

From the dates codes on the tyres and the fresh coat of paint, the cas went trough a partial restoration some 15 years ago, and I would believe never ran since then.
Tried to contact body shop around Rutland MA with no success as well.

The hunt is still on, and we still hope to find some more details about it.

[Pesch]

Hello All,
Time for a long overdue update on this project.
As forecasted, the restoration is taking longer than expected as life and other projects from both of us (ci-owners) are taking some time and ressources...
However, the body is now almost done, we are still not yet decided if we paint the exterior before or after reassembly of the suspension bits...
Here are some pictures as said to worth thousands words:

The body has been stopped by high pressure water blasting, here’s one of the only good pictures of the result, we can see the holes for the rally lights on the hood:


The original chalk number has been kept protected all the way from blasting to painting:


And the finished bits:



Lucas the co-owner went through a lot of research to et the finishing right:





Next step will be to give some love to the suspension components, still hesitating between powder coating for durability or some more original finishing...

[72targa]

Will make a GREAT story in the ESSES one day!

[uai]

like!.....

[Pesch]

Thanks guys!
I forgot to mention one thing, John Buffum retrieved pictures of the car from 1966 in his photo albums and sent them to me.
However, courtesy requires me to ask him his consent before posting them on a public place.
Sorry for the teaser ��