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Elvis
Sports Car Collection - 1974 Pantera - Car Elvis Shot
Cadillac Cars,
Sport
Cars and
Limousines were Elvis' lifelong passion
Elvis Presley sold the 1971 De Tomaso Pantera
Sport
Car
in
1976
It went through a number of owners. In 1981 the car was purchased for $2 million
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The
Pantera was the idea of an
Argentinian racing driver, the
fiery Alejandro de Tomaso. He
settled in Modena, Italy, in the
1950s, with American wife Isabelle
Haskell, also a racing driver, to
form their race-car-building
concern in 1959.
De Tomaso produced a string of
sports racers and F2 cars, and
then they dipped their toes into
production-car waters, using
primarily Ford engines.
Their first model was the central
spine-chassised Vallelunga, then
the Giugiaro-designed Mangusta,
which the mid-engine Pantera
superceded in 1971. Designed by
Tom Tjaarda, engineered by
Gianpaolo Dallara and powered by
Ford’s 351 Cleveland V8, a
relative of the Mustang Boss 302,
the Pantera was imported into the
United States from 1971 until 1974
and sold at Lincoln dealerships.
It was called by one magazine an
“exciting, but an unfinished
product”.
1975
Yellow Pantera Sports Car - Elvis
Cadillacs
Elvis shot this yellow Pantera with his personal firearm during a
temperamental outburst when he lost patience because the car would not
start. The car sustained several bullets. One into the tire, one in the
driver-side door and the last bullet went through the steering wheel.
Elvis bought
this Pantera for $2,400 in 1974 for his girlfriend, actress
Linda Thompson. Although its mid-engine configuration
qualified it an 'exotic car' for its potent Ford engine.
Elvis driving his 1975 Yellow Pantera
The undaunted, the yellow Pantera, did start up immediately on the
second try. It takes more than three bullets to stop a Pantera! When
Pantera buyer saw this car in the collection of the owner of Fritts
Ford, Riverside, California, it had at least one bullet hole in the door
was repaired - only bullet wound in the steering wheel remains. Elvis Gun Collection
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