Page 178 - Experience Magazine Winter 2023

REUNITED AT LAST

BARRETT-JACKSON’S OPERATIONS MANAGER FINDS HIS HIGH SCHOOL RIDE

As Operations Manager for The
World’s Greatest Collector Car
Auctions, Tom Jarvi – who recently
celebrated his 15th year with
Barrett-Jackson – spends countless
hours in front of a computer,
meticulously creating computer-
aided design (CAD) drawings of
the company’s massive auction sites
around the country. He is usually
one of the first to arrive on-site for
each event, as he supervises the
move-in and setup of the auction
office, the TV compound and more.
Like so many members of the Barrett-
Jackson team, Tom is a “car guy” at Over the course of the next year, ‘That is my car!’”
heart. He inherited the passion when Tom and his dad brought the car
he was a small child growing up in back to life. It received an eye- Tom made a few phone calls and,
Minnesota and spending a lot of time catching gold paint job, with a incredibly, was able to determine
with his car-loving grandfather. But it beautiful matching gold interior. without a doubt that it was indeed his
was Tom’s father, also a car buff, who beloved GTX – and it was still owned
got his son his first set of wheels. Shortly after the restoration was by the same man who purchased it
complete, Tom decided to attend a from Tom’s dad 35 years earlier. He
“I got home from high school one music school in northern Michigan. had built up the engine to a 508ci
day,” Tom recalls, “and my dad said, While he was away, his father took stroker, but otherwise the car was in
‘Hey – do you want to go see your the GTX for a spin for the first time. the same shape as the day Tom and
car? I just bought you something.’” “Something happened,” recalls his dad had restored it.
The two headed for a garage behind Tom. “I think my dad thought I’d
an apartment complex. The car’s probably kill myself in that car, After more than three decades, the
owner came out and opened the because of how fast it was.” Much to GTX now happily resides in Tom’s
door to reveal a multicolored vehicle his dismay, his father sold the GTX. garage, reunited with the 1966
covered in primer and no paint. “I felt like my soul had been ripped Oldsmobile Toronado that once
The teenager was understandably out,” Tom admits. belonged to his late brother Dan –
crestfallen. “It looked like a beater,” two stunning testaments to a family
he said. “I was a little disappointed Fast-forward to the fall of 2022. of “car guys.”
when I saw the state it was in, and I Tom happened to be online, and “It has been extremely emotional,”
had no idea what the car even was.” something told him to go on Tom admits. “I never really got a
Hemmings.com. “I put in 1968
Turns out it was a 1968 Plymouth Plymouth GTX like I did probably chance to know the car before, not
GTX with a 440ci Super Commando once or twice a week, just to see if fully. Car people have that visceral
engine and an automatic console I could find a picture of something feeling of hitting the gas and feeling
shifter. Tom’s father reassured his son: close to what I had,” he said. “And the torque, and the smell and the
“We’re going to restore it, and it’ll be this car pops up from Unique power – the uniqueness of each
great when it’s done.” individual car. It gets in your blood.”
Classic Motorcars in Mankato,
Minnesota. I looked at it and said, – Barbara Toombs

178 BARRETT-JACKSON EXPERIENCE WINTER 2023