Plymouth Belvedere - The Great Elephant Preserve

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Fast Eddie
Wednesday, November 11 2020
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Merit Pennington's Garage Is Where Some Of The Rarest And Most Amazing Hemi Cars Come To RetireRandy Bolig photographer

Kevin Shaw writer Jul 10, 2006
To call Merit Pennington the caretaker of an elephant graveyard would be misleading. First, the myth of elephant graveyards is only partially true, as aging and terminally ill pachyderms have been known to deviate from the herd to find new sources of water for nourishment, not to journey to some predestined animal resting place. Secondly, we're not talking about the four-legged, 10,000-pound mammal, but rather the legendary Chrysler-built street and race engine that powered so many of America's most iconic musclecars from 1964 to 1971. moreover, Merit's monster elephants are far from dead or dying as they're regularly fired up with all 426 ci roaring on a frequent basis. Merit's enormous collection of Hemi- and big-block-powered Mopars is so wide that a complete issue of our magazine could easily be dedicated just to it. Editor Bolig and this author went to Merit's paddock, where we were hard pressed to choose just two examples from his outstanding American muscle collection, which includes an A-Code '6911/42 440 Six-Barrel Road Runner, a '68 Hemi four-speed Charger R/T, a '68 Hemi GTX four-speed, a nearly finished '68 Hemi Super Stock Dart clone, a '69 Hemi four-speed Coronet, a '70 440 Six-Pack Coronet R/T, a '66 Hemi four-speed Satellite, a '72 383 Demon, and a series of Hemi-powered Road Runners (almost complete from '68 to '71). We picked two of the most striking cars-these gorgeous Hemi-powered, four-speed Plymouth Belvedere IIs.

All but the aforementioned SS/A Dart are either restorations or untouched survivors of the strictest sense. Years ago, the exclusive Corvette society-Bloomington Gold-copyrighted the word "Survivor," stating that a true Survivor would be judged according to its originality, and awarded for levels of preservation and patina. Cars would be marked down for new carpet, rubber hoses, paint, interior surfaces, and so on. Though most Mopar enthusiasts couldn't give a flying leap about what the Corvette "elite" does, Merit does take into account the levels of pride that other automotive conservationists take to keep these awesome machines preserved and on the road. But Merit is no stuffy collector. With a taste for big-block Mopar power, Merit enjoys nothing more than seeing these machines howl when the pedal is mashed into the floor. Nothing is quite like it. His collection exceeds the boundaries of his Clearwater, Florida, home and backyard shop. He has a handful of cars in all different levels of restoration throughout several states.

As a teenager, Merit's daily driver was the 383-powered '69 Charger. The Charger would survive under Merit's lead-foot for less than a year before the block was blown open. Unfortunately, while serving in the Navy in 1981, Merit suffered a near-fatal accident that permanently landed him in an automated wheelchair. extensive rehabilitation has allowed him limited use of his upper body. Moving south to the Sunshine State in 1989, Merit regularly accompanied his brother Jerry McDaniel, assistant general manager of a Chrysler dealership, to a local tire shop to pass the time. Talking as car guys do, Merit was put in touch with another 383-powered '69 Charger. The Charger was purchased, and the powerplant was quickly transformed from a two-barrel big-block slug into a fierce low-deck powerhouse. Merit wanted the reciprocating assembly as light as possible, so 440 aluminum rods were modified to allow proper pin height. Factory 516 heads were angle cut to take large diameter Chevrolet valves that are so tight in the closed chamber that they nearly touch. But it wasn't until a '68 GTX crossed his path that Merit got the real Hemi four-speed bug.