For years I imagined what it would be like to own an original Nova 9C1 police car. In November 2022, that chance finally showed up in the California desert. Sitting under the sun was a 1978 4-door Nova 9C1, painted an awful green, rough around the edges, but still running. The body was solid, but the interior had taken a beating — a destroyed dash, torn seats, baked plastic. Even so, it was undeniably a real GM police-package car. It was savable.

These cars matter. Out of the 13,800 Nova 9C1s built between 1975 and 1978, only 28 are known to survive today. Many are unaccounted for. Finding one is rare. Saving one is even rarer.

After hauling the car back to New Hampshire, the next step was figuring out what I actually had. A request to the GM Heritage Archives confirmed it: this car was purchased under the GM–LA County Sheriff’s Department contract. That contract was historic. LA County helped test the Nova against other police cars of its era, and the 9C1 came out on top. The department ordered 222 units in 1975. Records also showed this particular car retired in 1981 before being sold at auction.

Restoration was the next question, and I knew I couldn’t take it on alone. In late 2022, I found Brian James of Three Rivers Wrench. His attention to detail on his own 4th-gen Nova impressed me enough to reach out. After months of planning, the full restoration officially began in April 2023.

From day one, the goal was clear: bring the car back to its original LA County configuration. Along the way, we made a decision that gave the project a deeper purpose — dedicating the restoration to Deputy Walter Hannan, Jr., a Los Angeles County Sheriff’s deputy who lost his life while responding to a call in a 1978 Nova 9C1. His partner, retired Deputy Ernie Archuleta, survived the crash but was forced to retire due to his injuries.

The restoration touched every inch of the car — electrical, mechanical, cosmetic. Every system was rebuilt, repaired, or replaced with new. Three Rivers Wrench handled the work with precision, and I sourced rare parts through the Nova community, parts cars, Facebook Marketplace, and countless other channels. Specialists handled the upholstery, windshield, graphics, sandblasting, and emergency-equipment installs.

By September 2025, the car rolled out fully restored. A forgotten LA County patrol car — once sunbaked and nearly lost to time — came back as a living piece of GM and law-enforcement history.

The 1978 Nova 9C1 represented GM’s answer to rising police-fleet costs after the 1973 oil embargo. It delivered a compact platform with serious capability: a 350 ci engine, F41 suspension, and heavy-duty components engineered for daily patrol work.

Today, the car stands not only as a rare survivor, but as a tribute — to the Nova legacy, to the collectors who preserve it, and to the deputies who drove these cars in service.