Hey guys. Im new to the Forum. My name is Mike Scalera and I'm from Staten Island, NY and I am trying to find my dad's 69 Cutlass. He recently passed away and i came across some of his old pictures of the car. I know how much he loved it and I want to get it back in the family. My only issue is that i do not have the vin #. I do have the license plate as well as his drivers license #. The car was originally light blue with white stripes and he sold it in the early to mid 80's. Is there any chance of me finding the car with only this info on the car also if anyone has any lede about where the car may be please pm me. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

- Mike

 

Try and find old insurance papers that may have listed the vin, or contact his insurance company during that period and see if they have they records.

 

Your chances of finding this car after nearly 30 years is practically zero. The car could be anywhere in the country by now, and it's entirely possible that it's no longer on the road at all and has been recycled into someone's washing machine by now.

Having the license plate number that was on the car when your father owned it won't do any good unless your state is one in which the license plate stays with the car as it is sold and the car has not left the state. Since you apparently currently have the license plate in your possession, you don't live in one of these states.

Having the VIN will only help if someone who has a car like your father's and happens to see your interest and then goes to compare his VIN to yours actually does this. There is no centralized database of VIN's that you can search. Car registration records are kept on a state-by-state basis, and most don't keep records this old. Even if they did, privacy laws often prevent them from releasing information.

Your best bet, in my opinion, is to look in your father's records to see if you can turn up the name and any contact information about the person the car was sold to, assuming the car was sold privately and not traded in at a dealership. Then try to locate and contact that person and go from there. Again, after so many years, even if you do have the person's name, finding him or her might be difficult or impossible. If the person was older in the mid-80s, it's possible they could be dead by now.

This is actually a task for a private detective, if you want to spend that kind of money and had any leads for the detective to start with.

I do wish you well on this. It would be cool to find your father's car. Maybe you'll get lucky.

 

Thank you for the quick replies and your input. I want to know if it is at all possible to find the vin through the dmv using his license # or ss# also i have a detective and a few police officers in the family who said that they would run the vin if i can find it.

 

The only way to know for sure is to call them and ask. But my guess is no. Back in the 80s, records like this were often kept on paper, not digitized as they are now. Those papers have likely long been thrown away.

Let us know what you find out.

 

Sorry, Mike, there's no way the NYS DMV will still have any of this stuff, at least not in a way that they could ever find it.

Ask your relatives in the PD: When you go for your Investigation, you have to list every car you ever owned, its license plate number, VIN, insurer, and insurance policy number. Your Investigator gives you a way to contact DMV and get all of that information if you didn't think to write it down when you were a teenager, so, in theory, the DMV still has it somewhere, BUT I would bet money that over the period of time we're talking about, it's all gone.

Besides, any car sold on SI had probably been junked, had its VIN resold, been stolen when it didn't really exist, had the insurance paid, then "recovered," stolen again, and paid again, before the VIN was finally laid to rest.

Accept that you'll never find it, then go on to try to do something easier, like make the traffic move faster than 20mph on the BQE on a weekend.

- Eric

 

My problem with me recording info on the car is i wasnt around then I am 21 years old. My dad had bought the car when he was 17. Knowing him there has to be some records somewhere he usually was pretty good with keeping old files and papers. Believe me if i had ever been around the car i would have a record of the cars info for myself

 

There are 2 chances of your finding your dads old car, slim and none. Why not find one similar and duplicate your dads car.

 

That's the other option if nothing turns up.

 

Can they run my VIN number and tell me who owned my car years back?

Best of luck, I would suggest trying to find any old insurance paper work, or contacting his insurance company and asking them. The registry has never been helpful in times like this, I'm sure they aren't going to now.

 

I just called the DMV. They told me the records they have do not go back that far and they can not release a vin # to me because it is not my property. Im gonna go through some old records to see if i can find anything. Hopefully they weren't shredded after he passed.

 

Not surprising. Privacy laws and policies are very much more strict than they were in decades past.

I'm curious. Even if you find the car's VIN in some old paperwork, how much good would it really do you? The DMV probably wouldn't tell you anything for the same reason they won't now--it's not your car. The only other use for it would be if you start checking or have checked every '69 Cutlass you come across. Good luck with that!

 

i have a few police officers and detectives in the family that could help me out if i do come across the vin.

 

They won't find it.

Google "Don Quixote."

- Eric

 

I don't get it. I googled this, and I didn't find any mention that Don Quixote ever asked a DMV office to trace a VIN and failed or called up the police department and asked for their help.

 

Read farther.

Seems he then asked his brother in law's sister's husband, who's in NYPD Intel on the antiterrorist squad, and when that didn't work searched through every paper in every relative's house he could get into, then went to Albany to check the DMV computer himself, and then bought a bulldozer and started digging up Fresh Kills.

You just couldn't stop this guy.

- Eric

 

I can't help but get the feeling im being made fun of. And i know that chances are slim and none (closer to none) but trying can't hurt.

 

Never hurts to try (or to ask, so long as her boyfriend's not around), but don't let it become an obsession.

- Eric

 

Yea i got you on that. Ill see if anything turns up. If not ill just buy a different one. Ill see if i can get some pics of the car up later on.

 

If you find the vin you can at least find a similar car ie 442 maybe ? good luck and x2 on asking the insurance company he used. cheerio

 

Good luck.

I would start digging. I was cleaning out an old dresser that my mom gave me when I bought my house last fall, and in there I found paperwork to my parents 1981 Relaint K, which was totaled by a Drunk Driver in March 1988.

Besides, even if you find the car, it could have been flooded in Sandy, or completely restored and the owner either won't sell it, or wants way more than it's value.

A stab in the dark, but if you find the VIN, I would go to local car shows and look at the VIN on ALL the 69's there. If it's still alive, it may not still be blue

 

I hope you find it. Hopefully, its current owner uses this forum, has all the old paperwork that came with their car, and recognizes it was sold in the 80s in NY. You really never know, so I think it's worth a shot. If you do find the vin #, post it just in case. Can you also post the pics you found of your dad w/ his car? I bet they're pretty cool.

 

...and has taught pigs to fly, too!!

The odds of this happening are so small that you would need an electron microscope to see them. However, as you say, it doesn't hurt to post the info. But without the car's VIN, even if the person who has the car (assuming anyone does) uses this forum, there is no guarantee that he would recognize his car as the one being talked about here.

Actually, I would be kind of curious to know if the person who does own the car would reveal himself. I'm not sure I would, depending on the circumstances. This may be a very heartwarming story and all to this point, but if the OP ever does find the car, it seems only natural that his next step will be to try to acquire it. Perhaps the current owner doesn't want to sell, doesn't want to be pestered to do so, and figures to let sleeping dogs lie. You never know.

 

image.jpg

Heres a pic of the car in September of '82.

 

In all honesty, if someone did own the car i would not expect them to want to sell it. I understand all the work that goes into these cars (not to mention money). Although i would love to find it and buy it, if the owner does not wish th sell it to me i would settle for just knowing where it is, what kind of shape its in and what it looks like now.

 

Good-looking car. Is the photo really that out of focus, or is it just the scan?

 

The photo is old and its pretty fuzzy. I just used my phone to upload.

 

Is that Wolfe's Pond?

- Eric

 

No its Westerleigh.

 

Ah. Saw the parking stripes and the white building.
Memory's not perfect after so many years.

In Westerleigh, with the parking stripes and the white garage, I'm thinking there was a small park-like area off Watchogue Road near a church, or maybe near Prohibition Park, but I'm a bit rusty.

- Eric

 

Here in NJ, back in 2007, I was able to get motor vehicle information for a 1987 Buick Lesabre T-Type I bought new. I did NOT have the VIN, only the make, model, year and of course my own info. and approx time frame I owned it. I believe the cost was something like 20 or 25 bucks. Not sure how far back they go, or if NY state offers similar info., but I would not dismiss the possibility out of hand as some here have done.

ON EDIT:

From: http://www.dmv.ny.gov/abstract.htm#RECORDS

I found the following (DPPA may not apply in this case, since it is your father's car you are inquiring about):

Vehicle Ownership History

The DMV normally does not provide a history of the ownership or the mileage of a vehicle. The Driver's Privacy Protection Act (DPPA) protects the personal information that is listed on DMV records. To request a vehicle ownership history, you must certify that you have a DPPA permissible use for the information.

A NYS record only shows ownership history for NYS, not other US states. The record does not include odometer readings from each annual vehicle inspection. The record does not indicate if the vehicle was in an accident.

There are private companies that can use DMV records and other sources to search vehicle ownership history. These companies normally remove the personal information from a record to comply with the DPPA. You can search the Internet for these companies.