1965 Plymouth Barracuda # 43 Jr. Car Richard Petty Drag Raced

This 1965 Plymouth Barracuda, nicknamed 43 Jr. after Richard Petty’s drag racing days, carries an ownership history few restored muscle cars can match. One viewer’s own childhood memory of hearing the car fire up in a small Virginia parking lot fills in a chapter the car’s current owners, brothers Rich and Ron George, could only partly document themselves. Now restored at Richard Petty’s own garage and displayed at his museum, the story comes full circle. Watch the full history.

A viewer left a comment on this video that reads less like internet feedback and more like a witness statement. As a teenager, he says, he used to hear this exact car fire up almost every evening from half a mile away, then watch its owner give it one quick blast across a small-town grocery store parking lot before locking up for the night. That owner bought the car directly from Richard Petty’s team after Petty walked away from drag racing to focus on NASCAR. Decades later, that same car is sitting in a museum bearing Petty’s name. Here’s how it got there.

The Car Richard Petty Drove Before NASCAR Called Him Back

Before Richard Petty became the King of NASCAR stock car racing almost exclusively, he spent time drag racing, and car number 43 Jr., a nod to his famous NASCAR number 43, was part of that chapter. This 1965 Plymouth Barracuda carries that connection directly in its nickname and in its documented ownership history. Petty’s decision to step away from drag racing and refocus entirely on NASCAR is a well-known turning point in his career, but the cars he left behind from that period rarely get the same attention as his NASCAR machines. Documentation like that, tying a specific surviving car directly to a specific chapter of a driver’s career, is exactly what separates genuine automotive history from a good story with no proof behind it. This Barracuda is a direct, driveable link to a part of Petty’s career most fans never think about.

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A Grocery Store Owner’s Parking Lot Ritual

One commenter described watching this exact car nearly every evening as a teenager in Atkins, Virginia. According to that account, a local grocery store owner named Howard Parks bought the Barracuda directly after Petty quit drag racing, and made a habit of firing it up after closing the store for the night, giving it one quick blast across the parking lot before heading home. The commenter, who lived roughly half a mile away, says he could hear the engine note carry that whole distance. It is the kind of small-town detail that never makes it into an auction listing, but it captures exactly what this car’s life actually looked like for years after it left Petty’s team.

From Howard Parks to the George Brothers

At some point after its time with Howard Parks, the Barracuda passed to brothers Rich and Ron George, the current owners featured in this video. Ron bought the car more than twenty years before this filming and, by his own account, left it sitting in a garage for a significant stretch of that ownership rather than restoring it immediately. That kind of long pause between acquisition and restoration is common with cars carrying real provenance; owners often wait for the right resources, the right shop, or simply the right moment before committing to a full restoration of a car they already understand is historically significant.

Restored Where It All Began: Richard Petty’s Garage

When the George brothers finally committed to restoring the car, they sent it to the one place with the most direct connection to its history: Richard Petty’s own garage. Having the team most closely associated with the car’s original provenance handle its restoration is not a small detail. That kind of full-circle restoration is rare enough that it is worth noting on its own, regardless of whose name is on the car’s history. It means the finished car reflects direct institutional knowledge of exactly what 43 Jr. looked like and ran like during its time with Petty’s operation, rather than a restoration shop’s best guess based on period photographs alone.

Two Brothers, One Childhood Obsession

Rich and Ron George’s connection to Mopar cars traces back to their father, who got both brothers interested in driving Chrysler products from a young age. That shared history is part of why this particular car ended up with two family owners working together rather than one collector buying it outright. Both brothers bought their own Barracudas once they were old enough to drive, following the pattern their father had set, and Ron’s decision to hold onto this specific car for decades before restoring it reflects a family relationship to Mopar cars that goes back generations rather than a single collector’s individual interest.

Why ’43 Jr.’ Matters More Than a Numbers-Matching Car

Plenty of surviving 1965 Barracudas can claim numbers-matching originality. Far fewer can claim a documented ownership chain running from Richard Petty’s drag racing operation to a small-town Virginia grocery store owner to two brothers who restored it at Petty’s own garage decades later. Provenance like this is what separates a nicely restored Barracuda from one that museum curators actively want to display. That kind of continuous, verifiable history is difficult to fabricate and even harder to find, which is exactly why this Barracuda draws attention at a major show like the Muscle Car and Corvette Nationals rather than blending in among the many other well-restored Mopars on the field.

On Display at the Richard Petty Museum

The car’s current home is the Richard Petty Museum, a fitting endpoint for a car that started its documented life directly under Petty’s own team. Getting there took a path few restored muscle cars follow: a legendary racer’s early drag program, a grocery store owner’s evening ritual in small-town Virginia, a family of Mopar loyalists holding onto it for decades, and finally, a restoration completed by the people with the deepest possible connection to its history. Few cars at any car show can trace a line that complete from first owner to museum display.

Why Eyewitness Comments Matter as Much as Paperwork

Restoration paperwork and title history can confirm a car’s basic ownership chain, but they rarely capture what a car’s daily existence actually looked like decades ago. The Atkins, Virginia commenter’s memory does exactly that, filling in a gap that no bill of sale ever could: the sound the Barracuda made every evening, the specific ritual of one quick parking-lot blast before closing up shop, and the half-mile radius where a curious teenager could still hear it. For a car with history this well-documented, that kind of firsthand account adds something a restoration shop alone cannot provide. No restoration shop, however skilled, could have reconstructed that memory on its own. It exists only because someone happened to be listening, half a mile away, decades before anyone thought to write it down.

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