Pontiac Lives: Tire-smokin' GTOs and Trans Ams set for SoCal auction

It's been almost a year since General Motors announced the end of the road for Pontiac. While the century-old brand has now joined Oldsmobile, Plymouth and a long list of other iconic makes in the automotive afterlife, the collector market remains more alive than ever. A lineup of 27 classic Pontiacs, including 17 GTOs, will cross the auction block in June.

The performance-oriented machines, many of which are from the brand's glory days of the 1960s--when Pontiac rivaled Chevrolet and Ford as one of the top sellers in the nation--will be featured at RM Auctions' Classic Muscle & Modern Performance event on June 19 in San Diego.

For powerful Pontiacs, it has to start with the GTO. And 17 of them from a private collection will be hawked, including two spotlight 1969 models. They're Judges--or rather the Judge--dishing out 366 hp from 400-cubic-inch Ram Air III V8s. RM says 6,725 hardtops and 108 convertibles were built for 1969. Judge trim added only several hundred dollars to the price tag 41 years ago, but now both of these examples could fetch six-figures at the auction, RM estimates.

RM Auctions
This GTO Judge was "rated" at 366 hp from a 400-cubic-inch V8. Sping the tires and guess how much it really has.

There is also a '65 GTO coupe colored Tiger Gold and convertibles from '65 and '70.

Muscle-car fans will be revved up for Firebird Trans Ams to be sold from the personal collection of Pontiac ad man Jim Wangers. His offerings include a 1969 model joined by the anniversary years of '79, '89 and '99.

In addition to all of this Pontiac panache, 26 Chevrolet Corvettes, seven Chevelles, six Ford Mustangs and a Ford GT will cross the block at the sale, which has about 100 cars.

By Greg Migliore