Mustangs and Myths (Part 4)

I loved to race Hot Wheels when I was a kid. My chipped and faded red Ferrari was the fastest. Up until it encountered its unfortunate end at the bottom of a chemically winterized pool, that is. My second fastest? A 1968 Shelby GT500, of course.

"What's a Shelby GT500?"

"What do you mean 'what's a Shelby GT500?' It's a Shelby! The best damn car that ever was aside from the AC Cobra."

Dad had loved the AC Cobra since its inception, and he proudly displayed a die-cast model on our mantel.

"Oh. Why do some of them say 'KR' on the side?" (I always tried read the new Hot Wheels boxes carefully, selecting only the best vehicles for my expertly engineered high-speed race track featuring three loops and a perilous jump over a legion of miniature G.I. Joes. If the KR lettering would be a hindrance to its speed, I would need to choose differently.)

"The KR stands for 'King of the Road.'"

"It's the road king?"

"No, no, boy. It's King of the Road. Not road king. What's wrong with you? Road king..."

"So was it even better than the normal Shelby?"

"Ain't much that was 'normal' about those, but sure. In fact, I think the only one faster than the KR was the 'Super Snake.'"

Snakes were, of course, the coolest creatures of the animal kingdom next to dragons, the T-Rex, and and Mecha-Godzilla. But a super snake? I imagined a giant cobra, twenty stories tall, laying waste to New York City as Carrol Shelby looked on, writing a name in his little black book with a knowing smile.

"Wow!"

"Damn right, 'wow.' Those were the most incredible cars ever built in the 60s."

I remember finding it odd that there wasn't much more elaboration than this, no story about a friend of a friend that owned a famed "Super Snake," or "Road King," no no news headline that came to mind about someone else driving one. Well, other than Mr. Cosby himself, of course:



"Did you ever drive one?"

"Drive one? Hell, son, I've never even seen one."