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About Us
Murray King
Owner & Founder of Kustom King
Unknowingly, I first met Murray King back in the late 50's at his house in Calder (NW Edmonton). I was kicking around with his older brother Ken, who had this neat channeled 32 Ford Cabriolet. Ken and I had gone to different schools, but I guess it was the car thing that had got us hooked up.
The King garage was much like mine, his dad was a trucker and enjoyed old cars. Like my parents garage, there was always some old car activity going on in the back alley of the house. I remember there always being young kids hanging around the King garage, but I never really paid much attention to them. They were always pesky little kids, and were always managing to get in our way as we were working on our hot rods. As it turned out years later, one of them was Murray King!
After high school, Ken and I went different directions, pursuing our various interests. Ken moving the Red Deer, Alberta, where his untimely death in 1977, would take him from us.
I never saw that channeled Cabriolet for several years, until one day, while going through the small town of Spruce Grove, I spotted this BIG black cowboy hat driving a channeled 32 Cabriolet! Under the hat sat one Murray King, staring ahead at the next light, seemingly deep in thought about something or other, then leaving the light when it turned green, like the hounds of hells were on his tail!
This Cabriolet appeared to be powered by a large block engine, and judging by the way it left the light, had but two throttle pistons, one right on, and the other right off! It didn't occur to me that this was the same car I used to race back in the 50's. It looked different somehow!
I remember thinking that some cowboy had built this channeled hot rod with this big engine, the way he was driving it, was hell bent on wearing it out or breaking it, real quick!
A couple of months later I got to meet the driver, sans hat and realized we'd sorta met years before. I was a beardless youth with a hot rod, and he was just a snot nosed kid with a penchant to own a hot rod. Turns out he inherited the deuce from his brother Ken, and it was probably this car that inspired Murray to start collecting a bit more "old tin" as he got older, and could afford to do so!
Murray's original vocation was in cabinet making and wood working, with his little company doing commercial renovations for various companies. As he got more proficient at this, he started bidding jobs for companies that were national in scope, which meant he eventually had to take his renovation business on the road. After completing some of these jobs, he would often end up at the other end of the nation, with his crew and some empty trailers, and not wanting to come home empty handed, he started contracting various car collectors and owners, and buying cars from them. Loading them up in his trailers, he would head home to Spruce Grove with his new finds. It wasn't long before he had over 650 vehicles in his company yard in Spruce Grove! People started knocking on his door, many wanting to buy parts, other inquiring if he could do some work for them on their cars.
Our boy saw the opportunity to expand the woodworking business into something he
really enjoyed doing. In a few short years, Kustom King was born, and a new chapter
in his life was to begin! Over the years, he would acquire some mighty fine metal
forming equipment, some machine shop goodies, (including a couple CNC machines),
and a competent, well-
In 2008, he closed a deal with Pete Chapouris, President of So-
Murray, his wife Danea, and daughter Jennifer, have all been staunch supporters of River Run activities, the past decade or so, with Murray being one of the founding members of the Grove Cruise.
I spotted the old channeled deuce sitting in the back of Murray's shop, quietly awaiting
to be resurrected once again. Murray plans to install a new So-
I guess the only thing missing after it's completed, is that cowboy hat!
Old Wolfy,
Bob Cantin
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