The Funksonian

Kenn Funk Rides the Mopar Tidal Wave

Words: Roger Meiners

Kenn Funk says his collection has a mind of its own. The car hobby can be like that if you give it its head. It carries you along … like a tidal wave. One car leads to another and then another and you never know exactly where it will lead.

For Kenn Funk, it started with a 1969 Road Runner when he was in high school in Glenview, Ill. He was 14 years old and hung with an older group because he liked cars and they had them. But his interest started even earlier. “I always loved cars, even as a little kid,” he said. “I’d wait for Wide World of Sports and every once in a while there would be a Winston Cup race or something and I would just be glued to the tube. My interest is from way, way back.”

He got a ride in that Road Runner at high school and, when the driver pulled a big hole shot it was like the earthquake that set it all in motion. He was hooked for life. Not just on cars, but on Road Runners. It looks to be a forever thing. He has three 1969 Road Runners now.

But we are getting ahead of ourselves.

After high school, Kenn went out to California—to Hollywood—and got into acting. He met his wife that way. They were both in the business. But they decided to get out and move to the suburbs to raise a family. Then the car thing came back. Kenn looked around for something to buy and he settled on—you guessed it—a 1969 Road Runner four-speed.

That was the start, and then things evolved. Twenty years later there are a bunch of cars in his 9,800-square-foot warehouse and shop in Pasadena. Kenn restored all of them with his own hands—everything but paint and body, which he farms out. “I disassemble, bag and tag everything and then slowly put it all back together.” Where does he get parts? He occasionally orders “leaf springs, torsion bars and little stuff” from West Oaks Chrysler-Dodge in Thousand Oaks, Calif. “You can get a lot of stuff from Mopar Performance,” he says.

At first the car thing was just a hobby, but it took off six or seven years ago when prices started skyrocketing. He was never a dealer, and isn’t now, but in the normal course of driving cars, showing them, and just being seen, the offers come. If the price is right, the car is sold and another is found to replace it. Kenn tended to buy cars that needed fixing up and so his garage was and is a very active hands-on one-man enterprise, except for a wonderful period of time when his father, a retired machinist, started coming around two or three days a week to help. Growing up, Kenn learned about all things mechanical from him. “He taught me mechanics,” says Kenn, gratefully.

“He’s 84 now, and I’m lucky if he comes in once a month. I come into this place sometimes and I look around and I don’t know which way to turn (he has seven projects going). When he was here it was two guys … and we got a lot done. It was a great time,” he said. “And, afterward we’d go out for a couple of beers and do a lot of talking—something we didn’t do much of in the ‘60s.” You can sense the feeling.

When asked which is his favorite car, Kenn hesitates. “It’s either the ’69 or ’71 Road Runner,” he says tentatively, thinking about it. “Let’s just say Road Runners … But, I love the Charger [his 1966 HEMI Charger, the one that was originally sold by Mr. Norm’s Grand-Spaulding Dodge]. On further thought, he confirms the Road Runner choice. “Even though I have had a ton of ’69s and still have a bunch, the ’71 is incredible and I’ve only had one, and it’s not drivable, so I have never even driven a ’71 Road Runner. But I can at least look at it every day.” He says the ’71 is the one he would have ordered if he had the opportunity when they were new. He ticks off the features; “Black with a four-speed, 4.10 Dana and a white strobe stripe.” And a HEMI engine. He projects that the car will be finished in 2010 or 2011. “It’s horrifying to try to estimate the time,” he says.

When asked if he ever takes the cars to the drag strip, Kenn answers in the negative, but then drops a small bomb; “I have been doing some road racing,” he says. It seems that he has a few vintage NASCAR cars. The Dodge in the bunch is an ’02 Petty Enterprises Dodge. The No. 43 car that was driven by John Andretti under Cheerios sponsorship. But this particular car has the one-off Pop Secret livery for the Pop Secret 400 at Rockingham. Kenn competes on tracks such as Daytona; Watkins Glen, N.Y. and Road America, Wis. He has been on the podium at Daytona.

He also has a ’95 Dodge Avenger IROC car that he acquired through Frederick Chrysler Jeep Dodge in Boardman, Ohio. The car was driven by Al Unser, Jr., in two races. The first race was at Daytona. Unser led 22 laps, but Dale Earnhardt Sr. put him into the wall on the last lap and went on to win the race. The car was rebuilt and re-bodied in time for the last race of the season at Michigan International Speedway. This time Unser put Dale Sr. into the fence and won the race. It seems that “Avenger” is a good name for the car.

Funk has a massive enterprise going in Pasadena, with the seven cars under restoration, three of them ’69 Road Runners. And then there are two cars being done by his older sons. Will he pass the torch to the next generation? That’s a question many car people get. One can hope, but it’s up to the kids.

“I have a ten-year-old who is a little more into this than my other children, so maybe he’s the one who will carry on the tradition,” says Funk with a little hope in his voice.