Gerald Bartlett's Custom Car

An early photo of the car taken at the 1971 Texas Autorama. Photo from the G. William Jones Collection.

The old custom as it appeared in December of 2020, after being stored away for 40+ years. The body is all steel. Photo courtesy of Geoffrey Hacker.

Bartlett was a custom car show promoter in San Antonio. He was a lifelong friend with Darry and Donna Starbird, who could tell Geoffrey that they knew of the car but didn't know who built it. Photo courtesy of Geoffrey Hacker.

In December of 2020 Geoffrey Hacker of Undiscovered Classics was researching the history of the car, trying to trace its origin. Gerald was a lifelong friend with Darry and Donna Starbird, who could tell Geoffrey that they knew of the car but didn't know who built it. "Gerald bought it in the early 1980s and owned it thru his death in October of this year," Geoffrey told Sondre Kvipt of Kustomrama. Photo courtesy of Geoffrey Hacker.

Photo courtesy of Geoffrey Hacker.

Photo courtesy of Geoffrey Hacker.

Photo courtesy of Geoffrey Hacker.

Lost and Found

Chevrolet Corvair based custom car owned by Gerald Bartlett of San Antonio, Texas. Bartlett was a custom car show promoter in San Antonio.

Mystery Custom

The car is an all-steel custom-bodied Corvair. In December of 2020, it was owned by Geoffrey Hacker of Undiscovered Classics. At the time Geoffrey was researching the history of the car, trying to trace its origin. Gerald was a lifelong friend with Darry and Donna Starbird, who could tell Geoffrey that they knew of the car but didn't know who built it. "Gerald bought it in the early 1980s and owned it thru his death in October of this year," Geoffrey told Sondre Kvipt of Kustomrama. Geoffrey doesn't believe the car went to many shows while Gerald owned it. "The car was most likely built in the late 1960s or early 1970s. If it appeared in car shows, it would have appeared then – and then it disappeared. The car was last painted metallic dark blue with airbrush drawings of space on the side. The car still retains a license plate with the name "Asteroid" on it. It looks like it may have been painted red before the dark blue paint job so it may be known as a different car name before "Asteroid."

Mystery Solved

After running his story in Hemmings, Geoffrey was able to trace the history of the car early in December of 2020. Gerald's ex-wife Linda Bartlett Perez remembered first seeing the car at a car show in Corpus Christi, Texas in 1971. At the time it was white with long shaggy fur interior, bubble gum pink in color. It belonged to a man named Bill Meadow from one of the small suburbs around the Dallas/Ft. Worth area. Linda believed Meadow might have been the original builder. She couldn't remember when Gerald bought it, but she remembered that he immediately set out to make it a futuristic-looking car since it was the time period of the release of the show Battlestar Galactica, which came out 1n 1978. Geoffrey had then already put a team together to do the restoration, and he was planning to have it done by late 2021.