AUTO BIOGRAPHY: Miller a collector — and rebuilder — of Mustangs

Bob Miller has been interested in Mustangs since youth.

Miller, of Peru, bought his first, a bronze metallic 1967 Mustang, at age 16 from his mother.

He’s had a Mustang every step of his life since and currently has six between himself and his wife, Lisa.

“They’re all a little bit different,” Miller said. “They all have their pluses and minuses. I like all of them.”

It’s a hobby that was ingrained through spending many hours working on cars with his father, a Ford mechanic, in their driveway.

While Miller doesn’t have a favorite vehicle, there is one that took a number of years to put together and called on many of the skills his father instilled in him all those years ago.

When looking over the 1968 Mustang in his garage, he takes pride in knowing that the car was built pretty much from the ground up.

The vehicle didn’t leave the garage for three years as Miller sought parts and basically reconstructed the entire car from the interior to the paint.

“Some of them fight you every step of the way, and that one seemed to,” Miller said. “But it was worth it when it was done.”

Miller takes the vehicle as well as the others he owns on trips every year with his wife, who has purchased some Mustangs of her own. The pair travel across the country and have received awards from multiple car shows and are members of the Illinois Valley Stampede car club.

He's proud of the friends he's met through the hobby as well as the many places he and his wife have seen with their vehicles.

“We haven’t been in the same car on vacation in over 10 years,” Miller laughed.