1966 Pontiac GTO ‘Monkeemobile’ No. 3
Dean Jeffries transformed two 1966 Pontiac GTO convertibles into customized vehicles for NBC’s television series The Monkees within a compressed four-week timeline.
Working alongside Dick Dean, Jeffries created wildly modified machinery featuring split two-piece windshields, touring car convertible tops, exaggerated fender extensions, and dramatic bodywork that stretched the appearance while maintaining stock wheelbases.
A third example emerged during the show’s ongoing popularity, built later as a faithful promotional replica rather than as one of Jeffries’s original pair, and was subsequently maintained within George Barris’s promotional vehicle collection for traveling appearances.
Pontiac had supplied base-specification GTOs with 389-cubic-inch V8 engines and two-speed automatic transmissions for the original cars, and Jeffries initially installed functional superchargers that proved difficult to manage for on-camera work.
Distinctive features included rectangular Cibie-style headlights sourced from a European application, oversized taillights, side-exit exhaust pipes, chrome Cragar wheels, and guitar-shaped gold leaf graphics bearing the band’s name.
Interior accommodations expanded beyond standard GTO configuration with four bucket seats plus an additional third-row bench positioned where the trunk originally resided, alongside a theatrical rear-mounted drag parachute.
The original supercharger installations on the first Monkeemobiles were replaced with dummy GMC 6-71 blowers atop stock Pontiac Tri-Power carburetors after the functional versions created safety and drivability concerns for filming; No. 3 was constructed with the nonfunctional blower layout from the outset.
These custom Pontiacs became promotional fixtures, with Model Products Corporation securing exclusive rights to produce model kits that ultimately sold on the order of seven million copies.
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