To celebrate Father’s Day, we did something a little special today. We went to the Shelby Mustang Heritage Center and enjoyed their free guided tour. The museum is not technically on the main drag but is located just off of Las Vegas Blvd. just south of the Las Vegas sign which by the way is another exciting thing to see for free on the Strip. Recently they added a small parking lot so you can get out and take your picture in front of the world famous sign. There is usually a short line but it goes pretty quickly.
During the tour, we found out that Mr. Shelby was a chicken farmer and started racing as a fluke when his friend, who was a racecar driver, asked him to fill in and drive for him for one race. From that moment on, he was hooked. After he retired early from racing in 1960 due to health issues, he started making race cars. The guide told us the story of how Shelby originally took his sales pitch to GM but they weren’t interested, because they already had their Corvette. So he went down the street to Ford, and when Lee Iococca heard that he had something that could beat the Chevrolet Corvette, he was sold.
The tour guide stated that Carroll Shelby was always trying to make his cars even faster. He also stated that he had cars available for sale if anyone was interested to talk to him after the tour was over.
When the tour guide popped the hood and showed us the motor of the Shelby 1000, all of the guys were crowding in to get a good picture of that engine.
There were about 25 people on our tour that started at 10:30 am. When we headed out to the production area, almost every one of the approximately 20 production bays had a car being built or remodeled. This is where it was extremely hard to hear what he was saying unless you were directly in front of him, so several of us left and went back inside to sit down on the bench to wait. When I sat down and looked at my watch, I was shocked that he had captivated my attention for 1 hour and 45 minutes!
While I was sitting on the bench, that is when I noticed that they were filming live for Drivers Talk Radio right there in the showroom while everyone else was in the production area.
When the tour was over at about 12:30 pm, we looked around the retail gift shop at all of the t-shirts, hats, and souvenirs they had for sale. You can even order custom Shelby car parts such as struts, clutch plates, and superchargers for conversions.
Even though my husband was there once before, he said it was a different experience. He said it was another tour guide and some of the cars in the showroom were new because some are on loan and some are for sale. The first tour guide was older and actually knew Carroll Shelby and talked about his personal conversations with him. The second tour guide was filled with interesting facts and figures about the chronological history of each and every one of the specific cars down to the year, make, model, and the specific conversations and/or controversies around that specific car, how and why it was made the way it was made. I didn’t actually count them but I think there were probably about 30 cars in that showroom and he talked about every single one of them.
I’m no expert when it comes to cars, but I really appreciated this tour because my first car was a silver blue 1975 Mustang Mach 1 V-8 hatchback and I loved it!
So anyone who is a car nut of any age will enjoy this experience, and it doesn’t have to be just a one-time occasion either. They have tours every day, but if you happen to go at a time when they are not giving a guided tour, you can still learn an abundant amount of informative facts just from what is written on the walls of the showroom. This is a remarkable place to take the entire family on your next vacation to Las Vegas. This would also be a fascinating place to take students for an educational history lesson. Definitely a must see on your list of free things to do on the Strip!
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