Star Wars Mysteries: The 1977 Celica

Last December, you probably saw a commercial for the Nissan Rogue: "Rogue One" Edition. In one such commercial, Nissan claimed this to be the only Star Wars themed car made by a manufacturer. Cynical, I quickly looked up other cars. Besides several fan-made creations of varying skill, I found exactly 1 example of a Star Wars-branded car made straight from a manufacturer. Only, "found" is the wrong word.
The 1977 Star Wars Toyota Celica was a 1/1 production made to promote the release of A New Hope. A raffle was set up, and the 1st place prize was the car (2nd place is a vacation to Club Med, 3rd place is A New Hope on an 8mm reel) . Delphi Auto Designs was hired by Toyota to make the artwork and decals that appeared on the Celica, and it appeared in several promotional pictures.
At the end of 1977, the raffle completed, but the company handling the car had a series of bizarre incidents occur. The primary investor in Delphi was arrested for smuggling. Another employee is kidnapped. Another employee is killed. Somewhere in between this, the raffle is over and the car disappears. No record is kept of who wins the Celica.
As of today, no one knows where it ended up. It has been lost for 39 years. Even if it is not rusted apart in a scrap yard, there is virtually no way of identifying it, since the decal artwork was prone to fading quickly, and the VIN number records were lost as Delphi imploded in the wake of several scandals.

Speed Hunters Try and track down Star Wars Celica
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