Save The Manuals!!

Car and Driver magazine is starting a campaign called "Save the Manuals". They did this because most modern cars are automatics, and don't even have a stick-shift option. This has spread to Audis, and even Ferarris. It's relevant here, because stick-shift musclecars are getting rarer than they were originally, and it's musclecar enthusiasts who are committing this genocide! Popular Hot Rodding featured a 1969 SS396 Chevelle on the cover. In the article it said-the car was a numbers-matching 4-speed model. It now has a Turbo 400 Automatic, and a gear vendors overdrive. Car Craft had a "Classic Muscle " Shootout a while back. They rounded up 4 people who owned an LS6 Chevelle, a 440/Six-Pack Road Runner, a Ram Air IV GTO and a 428 CJ Mustang, and were willing to let the magazine drag-test them. The GTO was originally a 4-speed car, but the owner "Restored it the way he would have ordered it." With an automatic!. Muscle Car Reviews Pure Stock Drag Champion a few years ago was a 1969 SS396 Nova with a Turbo 400, that was-You guessed it, originally a 4-speed model!! The jerk converted it, because the auto would be easier to launch at the drags with street tires! Mopar owners are not immune. Mopar Muscle magazine featured a 1970 440/4-speed GTX that they were putting a four-speed automatic overdrive in. In the same issue, they featured a 73 340 Duster "that was originally a four-speed car" Is this getting old yet?- That the owner had swapped in a 408 stroker and a 727 Torqueflite. You want to talk real blasphemy? Another mag featured a 70 340 Challenger that they not only converted to a slushbox, they used a GM 4L60E! I don't understand this at all. If you want a musclecar with an automatic, then buy one. They are certainly more plentiful and therefore, usually substantially cheaper than their manual counterparts. I know that automatics make better drag racers. Again, then buy a car factory equipped with one. Or if you must build one, then surely you can find a Non-SS Chevelle, or Nova, or a Tempest/ Lemans or Satellite or Duster/Dart or whatever that has an automatic in it to begin with. Swap in a 500 inch stroker with Nitrous, a modern Fuel-injected motor, whatever you want, because no one cares about it anyway. But don't take a rare ultra-desirable car and make it less desirable!!  That's like the old racist Italian joke- An Italian kid won a Gold Medal at the Olympics, and his father was so proud that he had it Bronzed!!  Please, join me and Car and Driver, and stop this horrific slaughter!!  Mastermind