ST. GEORGE — It's a common story: fame, followed by a reversal and recovery.
In this case, however, the central figure is a car. A Utah race car.
Fame came to the Mormon Meteor III in the 1940s. What followed was years of abuse under ownership of the state of Utah. Now, back in the care of Marv Jenkins, son of the deceased original owner Ab Jenkins, the car has undergone an amazing recovery.
In 1992, Motor Trend Magazine listed the Mormon Meteor III as the fourth most valuable car ever built.
Today, because of apathy on the part of the state, it sits in a cramped two-car garage in St. George.
In 1943, Ab Jenkins sold the Mormon Meteor III to the state for $1 with a simple proper-care agreement stating that the car would be maintained and protected while in the state's custody.
For years the car sat in a glass enclosure in the Capitol.
In 1971, state officials decided to place the car in the 24th of July parade. But when the parade ended, no one from the state was there to claim the car. Uncertain of what to do, the trucking company hired to pull the car in the parade dumped it in a wash bay on the company parking lot.
"I got a call in November from a friend asking me if I knew where the Mormon Meteor III was," said Marv Jenkins, who was living in Texas. "I said the Capitol. He said it wasn't. I immediately flew to Salt Lake City. I found it at the trucking company, and it was enough to make me cry."
The car had been vandalized. A Duesenberg clock, one of only 485 placed in Duesenberg cars, was stolen, along with a tachometer, headlights and many other parts. Worse, the car had been left unprotected and water leaked into the oil case, engine and transmission, which was built from a magnesium alloy. The water ate through the magnesium like an acid. Body parts were rusted and in some cases were dented and damaged.
To compound problems, it was discovered that all of the spare parts given to the state in the 1943 exchange — carburetors, tires, magnetos, wheels — had been stolen.
"Those were the only wheels in existence. I finally tracked down four in a home in West Valley. When I called, the man demanded $10,000. I tried to get the state involved, but it wouldn't do a thing. I finally worked out an arrangement where Dixie College was willing to give the man a certificate of donation for the $10,000 if he would give the wheels to the school. The state didn't lift a finger to help, not a finger," said Jenkins.
When the Mormon Meteor III was returned to the Capitol, it was removed from the glass case and encircled by a single strand of rope. Later it was surrounded by a short piece of glass, but it was left accessible to the public and was vandalized. Gum wrappers and cigarette butts were found in the exhausts, initials were carved in the tires, marbles were dropped in the radiator and more parts, including wing nuts, oil and radiator caps, were stolen.
At this point the Jenkins family began proceedings to reclaim the car. At first the state was willing to relinquish the title. "Then it found out what the car was worth (one estimate places the value at more than $5 million) and they made a 180-degree turn. I've had nothing but grief ever since," Jenkins said.
The state and the Jenkins family continued to negotiate through 1989, when the Capitol underwent remodeling.
In 1991, Jenkins signed a new agreement that gave the family ownership and in which he agreed to restore the car. Over a period of two years, he put in more than 4,300 hours replacing, removing, cleaning, restoring and painting the exterior of the car. Eventually, he would put in an additional 2,500 hours restoring the engine and transmission.
Financial restitution from the state, in the meantime, was slow, insufficient and in some cases unpaid, even though there was an agreement that "all cost of restoration will be paid by the State of Utah subject to being approved through existing administrative procedures."
After running into several dead-ends, Jenkins was able to get a private audience with then-Gov. Norm Bangerter.
"Once I got to talk to Gov. Bangerter, and was able to show him what had transpired, he said to me, 'Marv, what can we do to make things right.' From that point on things started to happen. Gov. Bangerter was great. Things were happening," Jenkins said. This included a new agreement that ownership be returned to the Jenkins family but that the state would retain display rights with a permanent display in the Capitol.
When power shifted to Gov. Mike Leavitt, however, the brakes were applied.
Plans for a permanent display were tabled. The temporary display, which the Jenkins family called "totally inadequate," was to be the car's new home. "They told me the car wasn't worth anything better," Jenkins said.
Charlie Johnson, former chief of staff for Leavitt, said that it was unfair to say no one on the Leavitt staff helped with the car. "A lot of people helped," Johnson said, but he was unable to cite specifics.
Since 1996, Jenkins has tried repeatedly to meet with Leavitt after attorneys representing the governor said the state would not pay for damages done to the car while in the state's care but that the governor would help secure private funding.
In 1998, a third agreement — an amendment to the second — was signed. This one, among other things, relieved the state of any financial responsibility and reaffirmed the state's willingness to properly display the car.
"It took several years for the state to break the first agreement, two years for them to break the second and in a matter of months they broke the third. I've had it. I don't trust anything they say," Jenkins said.
"If Gov. Leavitt had met with me, for just 15 minutes, there's no doubt in my mind that the car would be on display in the Capitol right now. It's what my father wanted. Now I've stopped trying."
David Abbott (Ab) Jenkins II was born in Spanish Fork in 1883. His first races involved wagons pulled by goats down the streets of Salt Lake City. His first introduction to the Bonneville Salt Flats came in 1910 when he rode a motorcycle down the "bumpy" railroad tracks between Salt Lake City and Wendover.
At a time when America was caught up in daring feats, fast cars and the jitterbug, Jenkins became an icon for early auto racing.
Coincidentally, his first race developed from a bet that he could beat a commuter train over this same route. Jenkins beat the train by five minutes. A year later he made a cross-country run from San Francisco to New York in 86 hours and 20 minutes. He made the run two more times, each time shaving off hours.
Jenkins would go on to set more world speed records than any man in history. A dozen times he set 24-hour endurance/speed records, driving the entire race by himself.
One of his more cherished records came in 1940, when the then-mayor of Salt Lake City broke all the world circular records from one to 3,868.14 miles in a 24-hour race in his newly designed Mormon Meteor III. His one-hour record was 182.51 mph, his 24-hour average was 161.18. It would take American and foreign car makers more than 50 years to break Jenkins' 24-hour average.
His final records came in 1956, when at age 73, Jenkins and his son, Marv, broke 26 American and world records on the salt flats in a Pontiac averaging 118.375 mph. He died a month later. A year later the Pontiac was renamed the "Bonneville."
Jenkins' first record attempt on the salt was in 1932 driving a Pierce-Arrow. In 1935, he jumped into a Duesenberg that would later be named the Mormon Meteor I. A few years later the car would be fitted with a Curtis Conqueror airplane engine. This would become the Mormon Meteor II.
The combination of car and engine, however, never came together.
In 1938, Augie Duesenberg designed the Mormon Meteor III. It was the last car the famous auto engineer built. The airplane engine was placed in the new car, and the old car was restored to Mormon Meteor I. That car is owned by a collector in Alabama who reportedly turned down $3.5 million for it.
Mormon Meteor III would go on to become one of the most successful cars to ever race.
Its last record run was in 1950, when at the age of 67, Jenkins removed the car from its case in the Capitol and turned a top speed of 199.19 mph. Marv Jenkins, who would eventually put more miles on the car than his father, raced it at more than 209 mph.
After working more than 7,000 hours to restore the aging marvel, Marv Jenkins drove the car for the first time in more than 50 years on an old drag strip outside St. George a month ago. Concerns about the 50-year-old tires, however, cut his test short.
After fabricating new tires, Jenkins will run for a second time Wednesday on the oval track at Rocky Mountain Raceway. He also is entertaining invitations to take the car to England and Germany and drive it on the track at the Indianapolis 500.
At one point Utah had full ownership of the car. For years it was the most popular attraction in the Capitol. Even today, visitors still ask about it.
Bangerter called the car a "true historical treasure, and I think it would be well worth a few thousands dollars on behalf of the state to get it back on display. I did everything I could at the time. I stopped by (St. George) several times to see the car. It's truly magnificent."
Jenkins said the lack of response from the Leavitt administration only confirms what it's taken him 57 years to find out: The state is not willing to be a responsible guardian.
"I may agree to show the car for special occasions now and then, but I won't let them have the car and go through all this again," he said.
"All my dad ever wanted was for people, especially the kids, to see the car. That's all I've ever wanted."
E-MAIL: grass@desnews.com