GIRARD, Ohio (WKBN) — If you’ve been to a car show or meet in the Valley, chances are you’ve seen a pink Mustang in the mix. The Barbie-pink car turns heads wherever Lucia Martuccio drives it.
Her dad restored the car from bare metal for her over a decade ago — a big job for any guy — let alone someone who was blind.
“I had told my dad I wanted a Mustang, but it had to be pink and I wanted the top to come down,” Martuccio said.
That was Lucia Martuccio’s dream as a 5-year-old in the 80s. At the time, her dad was working on restoring a ’65 fastback for her brother.
Her father, Sam Martuccio, was blinded in an accident before Lucia was born.
“For most people, this would be a fun little project but for my dad, this was really something to overcome,” Martuccio said.
She forgot about her pink-Mustang fantasy for over 20 years, until 2008 when her father approached her.
“He came up to me and he said, do you still want it pink? And I cried,” Martuccio said.
She named her 1966 Mustang GT Convertible “Mustang Sammy” after her dad.
It took him two years to restore the car and it was done just in time for her 30th birthday in 2010. He restored it from bare metal through his sense of touch and with the help of his friends.
“He was just so good at, you know, being able to feel something. I could be driving the car. He could be in the car and he would say, you know, pull over. Something doesn’t sound right,” Martuccio said.
In the years since the car has been restored, she’s taken it to dozens of meets, and even though her father passed away earlier this year, she says the car makes her feel like he’s always with her.
“I think it’s harder now because he passed. He knew that this was going to be the last car that he would restore.”
She says she loves seeing little girls run up to her and gush over the car, and she always lets them take pictures.
“I want them to have something special because I was given something so special,” Martuccio said.
To the Martuccios, cars are promises, and Sam Marticcio never forgot a promise — even if it took decades to realize them –like buying his wife a Thunderbird to replace the one they had to sell decades before and giving his daughter the car of her 5-year-old dreams.
