For years we’ve heard rumors about Pontiac Motor Division’s secret stash of vehicles warehoused somewhere in Michigan. Occasionally a story leaks out with dark, grainy photos that were supposedly taken at the storage facility. Well, this is one of those stories!

On a recent visit to Pontiac Historic Services, we actually found part of the long-rumored collection. For obvious reasons, the powers-that-be asked us not to disclose the location(s) of the cars, but they did allow us to roam around and photograph much of what we saw. Needless to say, we had a great time pulling back car covers to see what treasures awaited underneath. The collection is actually housed in two separate, secret locations. In some cases our hosts would show us vehicles but not allow us to photograph them, but those instances were rare. The only downside to seeing all these cars (and trucks) is realizing that many of them will probably never see the light of day again. It seems to be a tremendous waste, but such is the life of one-off and experimental vehicles. The standard practice at most car companies is to destroy these types of cars when their usefulness as show vehicles or design studies is finished. Pontiac/GMC Division deserves high praise for going through all the expense and trouble of keeping the vehicles around.

This hood ornament and crest graces the front of the very first Pontiac ever built, a 1926 model, which is still owned by the division.

Arguably Pontiac’s most famous model, the GTO, is represented in this collection by this silver ‘64 2-door sedan. There’s a great story associated with this car. The original owner bought and drove it for years and years. When he could no longer drive, he wrote Pontiac a letter asking the division if they would be interested in buying the car back from him. Pontiac bought the car, restored it (using many Year One parts, by the way), and uses it for promotional purposes. What did Pontiac pay for the Goat? One dollar....

Pontiac has done a good job of restoring and occasionally displaying some of the more historic models. Their silver ‘64 GTO sees a fair amount of duty, as does their white ‘65 Catalina 2+2. The 1989 20th Anniversary Trans Am Pace Car that’s making its rounds this year as part of the Trans Am 30th Anniversary celebration came from this collection. It was saved since it was actually one of the cars that paced the Indy 500 in 1989. Look closely at the car and you’ll notice the flashing lights are still attached - and functional, by the way.

Not all the vehicles saved were concept cars and prototypes. There are a number of very early production cars and trucks in storage, along with some that wore special paint or had other unusual characteristics but were otherwise production-spec examples. Another neat fact about the stored vehicles is that virtually all of them are in running order. Since they do sit covered most of the time, flat tires and dead batteries are common, but they’re otherwise ready to go.

When Pontiac - or any manufacturer for that matter - builds prototypes or test cars, they get these ID tags instead of standard VINs. Among other things, these tags mean the vehicles are exempt from federal safety and emissions standards. How do we get a few of those?

We want to thank Jim Mattison of PHS, along with the people who run the two facilities where the cars and trucks are located (you know who you are) for giving us the opportunity to roam through their buildings, pull car covers, disrupt their business routines and generally make nuisances of ourselves.