Brief History About Shelby
Shelby American was founded in 1962 in the USA by Carroll Shelby.
Carroll Shelby was a racing driver and a pioneer of performance cars for both road cars and racing cars and is most famous for the Cobra car, with Shelby Cobras having a chassis number CSX (see separate entry for AC Cobra).
Most Shelby cars are Ford and Dodge based, although the Series 1 was built from the ground up. Despite using the Shelby name the Daytona Cobra Coupe MK2’s are not built by Shelby, but by Superformance, however after a lawsuit was made against Superformance by Shelby, an agreement was made between the two companies for Superformance to be able to build them and that the Shelby name be used. Also a company called Unique Performance was licensed to build Shelby Mustangs between 2002-2007, until Shelby pulled the plug on the licence due to bad customer feedback.
A name change took place in 2003 to Carroll Shelby International, Inc. A subsidiary company was also setup called Shelby Automobiles, which was later renamed to Shelby American in 2009. Carroll Shelby sadly passed away in 2012, but Shelby American as a company carries on. There is also a Shelby museum at their Las Vegas location.
