Frank Cate Ford was located at 9499 Highway 99, Elk Grove, California. The dealership was about 15 miles from Sacramento, California.
"Fords cost less in Elk Grove" was their motto. I haven't found any records to identify the GT500 KR convertible in the photograph.
Frank Cate Ford sold a total of 39 Shelbys. This picture is from one of Cate's advertisements.
It should have been called the dealership of interesting Shelbys.
Most of the Shelbys the dealership sold were 1968 and 1969 models.
1968 Car # 18 was sold new by Cate. It left the dealership in December 1967.
Mr. Liska provided the Cate stationary. If you can believe this, people have actually taken documents from the website and created fake letters.
Every piece of documentation has been slightly altered to prevent this type of fraud.
1968 Car # 181 is a former SAAC national champion.
The Sacramento Bee is a great place to look for advertisements from Cate Ford.
The nice thing about
many of the California newspapers is they often list the vehicle's serial number, like this one from car # 340.
Car # 1503 started out at Shelby Engineering and somewhere along the way ended up with a sunroof! So far, the missing
piece of iron clad documentation is still missing.
Here's the advertisement selling the car as a former Ford executive car. It's not clear how Cate ended up with these cars.
Making contact with Shelby Club Registrar, Vinny Liska, might enable you to score some microfish records.
I have some personal knowledge of # 2446. It was the only Royal Maroon and saddle convertible built. The rumor is it was specially
built for Shelby's wife, but I seriously doubt that story.
The car was repaired in June of 1968. The car started out in Michigan at Ford Motor.
That included "frame rail damage". The car is described as "Wild Cherry". I believe that is what Mercury
called Royal Maroon.
This advertisement from The Sacramento Bee indicates the car was actually a retail sale. This ad is from August 1969.
While the story could still be true, it needs documentation.
Car # 2789 has its original owner's manual with the Frank Cate stamping inside.
This lime green fastback is # 3495 and it looks great!
Here is a a statement of some of Cate's activities with Shelby.
This white GT500 KR was loaned to Leonard Oil Company. Its number is 3614.
February of 1969 and Cate was still trying to sell cars # 2125, # 2421 and # 2789. The 1969 models were already on the showroom floor.
Cate sold just eight 1969 Shelbys and just two 1970 models.
This is 1969 # 1350. Silver Jade is a great color. I think Cate might have one of the highest survival rates for their cars.
Frank Cate Ford would become Dan Marks Ford in the 1970s.
If you have anything from Frank Cate Ford, please feel free to share it.