In the heyday of the muscle car, the Plymouth and Dodge machines being assembled in Chrysler Corporation factories went down the line accompanied by what’s called a “broadcast sheet,” a multi-coloured piece of paper with a series of codes printed on it to let the auto-workers know which engine, paint, and other options were to be fitted to the car. When the car was just about finished being built and the sheet had served its purpose, that scrap of paper was commonly stuffed inside a seat, stuck under the carpet, or taped behind the dashboard, if it wasn’t thrown away.
If only those line workers had any idea how desirable that piece of scrap would become. Fast-forward through the 1990s, and most of these once-common cars have become collectibles. As a result, fanatics who favour “Mopar” muscle cars get positively giddy when they’re restoring, say, a clapped-out, motor-less 1969 Dodge Charger and find that broadcast sheet tucked under the springs of the back-seat cushions. Behold! A paper key that reveals what colour the trim was new, what powertrain it originally came with, or whether it had a deluxe options package, or air-conditioning.
Fifty-plus years on, any broadcast sheet that hasn’t been eaten by mice, consumed by mold, or otherwise disintegrated has almost certainly already been retrieved from its hiding spot under its car’s upholstery, and perhaps laminated or otherwise preserved by the car’s collector-owner.
So when Southern Ontario-based enthusiasts Angelo Riccio, Jeff Cabot, and Todd Savage came across a 29,426-mile 1971 Plymouth ’Cuda in a Hamilton storage locker late September 2024 and found out it’d been stored there since the disco era, they got to partake in a tradition that very, very few people have over the past decade: looking for an untouched broadcast sheet carelessly crammed beneath the car’s back seat by a Chrysler employee, and finding it.
The pride-and-joy Plymouth gets parked
The ’Cuda in question was purchased new by a Dofasco steel mill employee, Michael Kotur, from Brant Chrysler Plymouth Limited in Burlington, Ontario. Kotur, a car and hunting enthusiast, had fallen in love with the model, and so snapped up this one, with the hot 340-cubic-inch V8 and Torqueflite automatic transmission. The FJ6-code Sassy Grass Green paint, an extra-cost ‘High Impact’ hue, was set off nicely by a set of black “billboard” stripes, plastered over the rear fenders by the dealership; it’s believed Brant Chrysler Plymouth installed the accessory trunk-lid luggage rack, as well.
Kotur himself fitted the other modifications you’ll notice in these photos: a set of air shocks, some way-cool Cragar mag wheels, and an overly loud awooga!-style horn under the hood. (These were all common tweaks made to muscle cars in the ’70s, save maybe that last one.)
The ’Cuda became Kotur’s baby, driven only by himself and his wife, and stored in the off-season to spare it from Southern Ontario’s heavily salted winter roads. His only child, Amanda, relays one story her mother had told her, of being five months’ pregnant and in sudden need of some groceries one snowy Burlington day. When she asked Kotur to borrow the Plymouth for the trip some miles down the road, he forbade it: “take the bus,” he told her.
In 1975, Kotur suffered from a traumatic brain injury that took away his ability to ever drive again. He decided to stow his pride-and-joy Plymouth on his father’s farm long-term; the risk of damage from moisture or other environmental hazards led him to ensure this was done the right way.
That meant draining all the fluids from the ‘Cuda, applying several heavy layers of undercoating all over the chassis and in the trunk and engine bay, and even painting the front and rear lower valances in a protective black finish. Around 1979 or 1980, it was towed from the farm to a U-Haul storage locker. It wouldn’t move again until 2024.
1971 Plymouth ‘Cuda: American muscle-car icon
What the Kotur family was sitting on in that storage locker was one relatively rare and desirable car. The third generation of Plymouth’s Barracuda launched in model year 1970, and saw sales totals climb from about 32,000 in ’69; to almost 49,000. Those figures dropped by two-thirds for ’71, though, and so ’Cudas of that year – the abbreviation started as a nickname used by customers, but became an official designation for the higher-performance trims of the Barracuda – are not all that common.
Hardtop examples with the H-code 275-horsepower 340-cubic-inch V8, like Kotur’s, number about 3,200; with the automatic transmission, you’re looking at about 2,000 cars. However, the car has become something of an icon in the decades since — pop-culture cache from the ’71 being featured in shows like Nash Bridges, or movies like John Wick: Chapter 4, certainly helps. But the ’Cuda already loomed large in muscle-car circles even before those star-car appearances.
Chalk that up to its incredible proportions, which some might call the epitome of long-hood, short-deck muscle-car design. Coupled to a host of one-year-only styling cues – a set of sporty “gills” cut into the front fenders, quad headlamps flanking a six-opening grille, and no-nonsense four-unit taillights – the looks of the ’71 Plymouth ‘Cuda really can’t be beat. An array of powerful engine options, topped off by the legendary 425-hp 426-cube Hemi, just sealed the deal.
It all adds up to demand far outstripping supply, resulting in the ’71 ’Cuda being one of the most valuable muscle cars on the market today. In 2002, a ’71 convertible became the first American muscle car to auction for more than US$1 million; the record price for a ’Cuda now stands at US$3.85 million, nabbed at a sale held in 2014.
50 years later, the ‘Cuda returns to the road
It only made sense, then, that when the Kotur family moved Michael into long-term care earlier this year and came face to face with all the expenses that entailed, his ’71 ’Cuda was among the assets they needed to liquidate to cover those costs. Daughter Amanda quietly put the Plymouth up for sale this fall; it was then that muscle-car collector Angelo Riccio and enthusiast Todd Savage came across the ’Cuda for the first time.
They weren’t the only interested party, of course, but as offers on the car approached six figures, it was Riccio who eventually came out on top. The construction magnate has an ample collection of some of the rarest and most significant muscle cars, especially Mopars, and when Savage impressed upon him the rarity of a “barn find” ’Cuda in the condition Kotur’s car was in, he had to have it.
What they had stumbled upon was a car with just 29,426 miles on its odometer, and still (mostly) wearing its original paint. Extracting the Plymouth from the storage locker revealed condensation marks on the concrete floor from where the exhaust had hung down below the car—that’s how long it’d been there. The rubber wrapped around the Cragar mags – one of the front tires was an original factory Goodyear F70-14, the other three were period aftermarket – had obviously flat-spotted, but still rolled freely.
Kotur had also left a number of relics in the trunk and interior, including his hunting jacket, complete with a 1973 Ontario permit stuck to it; several car-cleaning products and tools; and, to Riccio’s amusement, a couple of sticks of Double-Mint gum in the console, in green wrappers that just about match the Sassy Grass paint.
When muscle-car restoration and preservation expert Jeff Cabot removed the rear seat from the ’Cuda, he and Riccio also found that piece of paper you’ll likely no longer find under any other ‘Cuda’s upholstery: the original broadcast sheet. (Cabot has already made a reproduction of the sheet, and returned that copy to the same location between the seat springs.)
The car went from the storage unit via trailer to Cabot’s shop less than 10 kilometres away; he quickly gave the acrylic-enamel finish a sympathetic detailing, revealing near-perfect-condition paint beneath the decades of dust. The shine on the Sassy Grass Green was impeccable, but of course, its being like-new meant it also wore the orange peel, paint runs, and poor leadwork these cars did, well, when new. Keep in mind, again, that in ’71, these cars were rushed down the line like any other mass-produced appliance.
What lies ahead for Cabot, Savage, and Riccio is painstaking hours of removing, by hand, the several heavy layers of undercoating that Kotur had had applied—it’s that coating that kept the ’Cuda from rusting, but that now curses the effort to bring the car back to original spec while preserving as much of the factory finishes as possible.
The other thing in store for this ’71 Plymouth ’Cuda is, at some point, a ride for Kotur’s daughter Amanda, who in the ’70s was too young to remember ever seeing the car on the road. Her wait will soon be over; after 50 years of slumber, this barn-find ’Cuda is about to put pavement under tire once more.
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