The full detailed story of the man and the cars which have firmly assigned the name of De Tomaso to the world's automotive establishment.
Wallace Alfred Wyss was born in Detroit, in the Henry Ford hospital. His father , a Swiss immigrant, was a worker on the Ford assembly line somewhat earlier. Wyss grew up in the "musclecar" era, only blocks from Woodward Ave. and could hear drag racers peeling out on Woodward from his house. His first career was in advertising copywriting , working on the Chevrolet account where he wrote ads for Corvettes and Camaros, Chevelles and Novas. His first book was published in 1977, Shelby's Wildlife: the Cobras and the Mustangs which sold 50,000 copies during its 17 years in print.
He says he happened upon becoming the chronicler of Shelby-American quite by accident. "Back in the '60s, I was walking along a street in downtown Detroit when a lady turned a corner in a bright red 427 Cobra, sliding sideways in a full drift, with great balls of fire popping out of the side exhausts, frightening a nearby mounted policeman's horse. She pulled up to me and asked "Which way is Cobo Hall? (the convention center)." I replied "If you give me a ride, I will show you where it is." I jumped in and she drove off at 140 mph. It turned out later that she was a race driver employed by Shelby as his Cobra Caravan toured the U.S. A few years later when the owner of Motorbooks Int. asked me who he could hire to write about the Cobra, I volunteered, and have done three books on Shelby and Cobras since." Wyss later began a long association with Iconografix Inc., doing many pictorial books including Ford GT40 Photo Archive with Brian Winer, and Porsche 356 Photo Archive. His newest books from Iconografix are SHELBY The Man, The Cars, The Legend and COBRA and SHELBY MUSTANG Photo Archive. He also self-published, with Al Axelrod and Brian Winer, the instant collectible, a limited edition book entitled Ford GT40 and the New Ford GT. An accomplished fine artist specializing in collector cars, his work, in the form of oil paintings, made its debut in a Carmel CA gallery in 2007 and will be the subject of a feature in an April 2010 issue of Hemmings Classic Car magazine. Limited edition prints of his originals work are available from www.Albaco.com and www.woodiesofcarmel.com. Wyss, who for a short time was a cowboy on the Bitteroot range in Montana, lives part time on his ranch, Cobra Ranch, in the picturesque village of Mendocino in N. California and also in S. California, where he is involved in breeding thoroughbred race horses
