April Corvette History

• April 8, 1989:  The SCCA Corvette Challenge race series begins its second season, at the Dallas Grand Prix, in Texas.



• April 18, 1958:  The Sting Ray makes its debut at the President's Cup Race at Maryland's Marlboro Raceway.  The car is Bill Mitchell's personal vehicle for style testing of the Corvette.  Richard Thompson races it to fourth place.  The car was made from the last Corvette SS mule chassis, and given a new body by Bill Mitchell and Larry Shinoda.



• April 21, 1996:  Zora Arkus-Duntov dies at age 86, in Grosse Pointe, Michigan.



• April 25, 1992:  Chevrolet General Manager Jim Perkins announces at the Corvette Wind and Thunder meeting that there is a plan for a 1996 Corvette, but with no radical changes.



• April 28, 1995:  The last ZR-1 Corvette rolls off the assembly line.  During its six year lifetime, 6939 ZR-1 Corvettes were built.  Chevrolet general manager Jim Perkins and Chief Corvette Engineer Dave McLellan deliver the car to the National Corvette Museum.



• April 30, 2000:  Dave Hill, Chief Engineer of Corvette, unveils the 2001 Z06 model Corvette, with new 385 HP LS6 engine.



• April, 1965:  The Mako Shark II (project XP-830), formerly called the Mako Shark, makes its debut appearance at the New York International Auto Show.  The non-running full-size model cost nearly US$3 million to create.



• April, 1970:  Chevrolet unveils the experimental mid-engined XP-895 Corvette at the New York Auto Show.  The car is the restyled XP-882 prototype.



• April, 1994:  General Motors holds a marketing clinic in Los Angeles, to ascertain how well the new 1997 model Corvette might sell.  60% of the clinic attendees say they would buy the Corvette over the competition.

Corvette history compiled by Ken Pollson.