Pro Street. It’s the hot rodding trend that refuses to die, especially among the Bow-Tie faithful. Chevy enthusiasts adopted the Pro Street look from day one and 50 years later, they’re still building cars in that style.

The timelessness of the 1955 Chevrolet 210 is apparent from this side angle. Every line is perfectly thought out. (Photo by Brian Wagner)

What is it about Pro Street that has caused its popularity to actually outlast the appeal of NHRA Pro Stock, the class that spawned it? Today’s Pro Stocks are fuel injected, so tall hood scoops needed to clear tunnel ram intakes are a thing of the past. Gone too is any semblance to an actual street car.

But Pro Street, with tubbed rears, skinny front tires and projectiles through the hood? It endures.

Pro Touring came about in the early part of the new millennium, but it never caught on the way Pro Street did. Remember the IMSA look in the late ’70s/early ’80s, where the style was road-racey cars with wide fenders all around?

Bone-stock muscle car restorations were all the rage in the ’80s and ’90s, but in the end many people started adding simple (or sometimes complex) modifications.

Yet Pro Street continues. When Chris Dalton built this ’55 210, he originally thought it would be a drag-only car. This changed when he realized that he wanted to drive it more than once a week.

Perhaps this is the perfect compromise. The drag look with the ability to hunt for Mustangs, coffee and ice cream.

The Power

Sticking up through the hood is a Dart-built 540 cube Rat with a Callies crank, Brodix heads and a massive 8-71 blower topped with a pair of 750 cfm Quick Fuel carbs. On the dyno, it made 1,000 horsepower and 950 lb-ft of torque, so it is has the muscle to back up the looks.

Backing it is a Powerglide with a 3,200-rpm stall B&M converter sending the power to a 9-inch Ford rear. The fuel system is from Holley from stem to stern.

A ladder bar back-half suspension from Competition Engineering with QA1 coilovers makes up the rear suspension, while a ’68 Camaro front clip was adapted to work up front.

Esthetically Speaking

Chris did all the paint and bodywork himself. In fact, he said he did everything on the 210 except the interior and the engine/trans. The Candy Red paint is a total custom mix has 32 grams of pearl mixed in with it.

The finished product is stunning, and you’d never know how bad it was when the project began. The car (originally a six-cylinder model) had been stored in a barn for 20 years before he purchased it 40 years ago. He described it as a basket case.

“I traded a ’68 Chevelle Pro Street body for it,” said Chris, “and it’s been a money pit ever since.”

The fuel cell holds the dead dinosaurs for the Chevy Rat engine up front. (Photo by Brian Wagner)

This is Chris’ favorite body style, so that was probably what kept him going with the build over the better part of four decades.

“I always wanted to do a car at this level,” Chris explained. “It just took a while to get it to that. It’s been a challenge.”

His favorite part of the Pro Street build was just doing the work—body, paint, fabrication.

Remarkably, it has been 70 years since the ’55 Chevy and the small-block engine were introduced and the hot rodding world has not been the same since.

From what we can gather, enthusiasts will still be building them for another seven decades — and a lot of them will be Pro Street builds.