One of the fun things that come with living in the Bowling Green area is the link to the Chevrolet Corvette. GM can try to hide their mules all they want but sooner or later, it’s a little city in Western Kentucky that starts to see the fruits of the labor. Seeing C7 Corvettes roaming the streets months before the cars were actually out and about for the public was the highlight of some of my early times in Kentucky back when my wife and I were dating. I’d be out there for the summer and sure enough, there would be the random spotting as we ran errands in town. Well, with the C8 Corvette rumor mill on fire, with mules being spotted that actually give credit to the Holy Grail of Vette rumors, the mid-engine layout, it’s amazing how little you actually see right now. Doesn’t hurt that GM has locked down the Bowling Green Assembly Plant as if Fort Knox borrowed some shop space for a couple of years, or that every last Team Corvette member we see doesn’t have anything to say regarding any future plans of any kind. Yeah, it’s coming, all right.

With that in mind, we wanted to look back at the last major generational change the Corvette had that really had an impact on the path that America’s sports car was taking: the C4. With the long-in-the-tooth C3 really showing it’s age (and it’s platform, which rooted to the C2 and 1963, acting it’s age) the C4 had to be something special to keep the flame alive. GM had spent tons of cash converting an old Chrysler air-conditioning plant into the Corvette’s new home and the public waited with baited breath as the C4 gestation took place. There was no 1983 year vehicles to the public, only mules…and only one lives on in the National Corvette Museum. But when these cars rolled out, they were going to take the country by storm. Check out an early look that MotorWeek got, including some early sketches and some of the early mockups for the car that would be coming out to win over America once again for the 1980s! Here’s hoping that the C8 hype can have the same kind of impact!