Mr. Mark Aquino, Classic Car Whisperer

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Mark Aquino was born and raised in Santa Maria, California. He is number 10 out of 11 brothers and sisters. Mark grew up in a rough neighborhood and by having so many brothers, knew stuff he shouldn’t have at an early age. He started working on engines at 8 years old and fondly remembers the dangers of experimenting. “We use to work on engines and let them bounce around on the sidewalk. That wasn’t very safe. We were kids and that’s what kids do. Back then you could get away with a lot.” Mark is infamous in his town and was known as being a “radster” who always had cars. By age 13, Mark already had a collection of cars (1966 Chevelle SuperSport 396 4-speed, 1968 Nova 396 4-speed) that lined his father’s drive-way. In fact, at age 20, he had 21 moving violations. He had to go to court to beg the judge to keep his driver’s license! The judge had looked at the ticket which showed the speed and type of car Mark was driving and said, “Son, you don’t have the maturity to be driving the cars that you do! My advice to you is to sell them!”

And that’s exactly what he did. He began to buy, sell and restore 1960-70 American Muscle Cars. The rest is history.