Callaway Automobiles introduced right this moment that founder Ely Reeves Callaway III handed away on Tuesday, July 11 at his dwelling in Newport Seashore, California. His reason for loss of life is claimed to be “from accidents sustained after a fall.” He was 75.
The son of Ely Callaway Jr., the founding father of Callaway Golf, Reeves Callaway initially wished to turn out to be a race automobile driver. However when that didn’t work out, he turned a racing teacher on the Bob Bondurant racing college. Whereas working at Bondurant, he developed an aftermarket turbocharger package for the BMW 3 Sequence and managed to get Automotive and Driver to assessment it.
Whereas he initially ran Callaway Automobiles out of his storage, the constructive assessment from Automotive and Driver led him to open Callaway Automobiles’ first headquarters close to the place he was residing in Previous Lyme, Connecticut. Over the following a number of a long time, he would go on to change BMW, Alfa Romeo, Aston Martin, Land Rover, Mazda and Common Motors merchandise. However he’s arguably finest recognized for his work on a number of generations of Chevrolet Corvettes.
Callaway had a detailed relationship with GM, which allowed him to promote his automobiles by means of Chevrolet sellers. In 1989, a Callaway Twin Turbo Corvette, generally known as the Sledgehammer, made 880 hp and 772 lb-ft of torque. Within the palms of John Lingenfelter, it set a manufacturing top-speed document of 254.76 mph. That document would stand for 21 years when Bugatti managed to hit 267.85 mph within the Veyron Tremendous Sport.
From there, Callaway obtained into racing however continued to change Corvettes, together with fashions with customized our bodies such because the Callaway C12 and the C16. Callaway nonetheless modifies Corvettes right this moment, in addition to Camaros, Silverados, Suburbans, Tahoes, Sierras, Yukons and Escalades.
In a press release, his son Peter Reeves Callaway stated:
Because of Reeves’ visionary entrepreneurial spirit, Callaway Automobiles will proceed to innovate and develop within the twenty first century, impressed by his distinctive, extraordinary imaginative and prescient, and by his private instance of integrity, resourcefulness, and management as our founder. Dad’s ardour for making superbly designed and crafted machines may be seen in each mission, and we stay dedicated to executing to the very best requirements, in true Callaway style. He was not often discovered doing something aside from working in direction of the following milestone for the corporate. He was a charismatic chief with a humorousness that we’ll all keep in mind by means of varied “Reeves-isms”. I really feel lucky to have grown up working with him and the corporate.
