A large crowd of more than 50 automobile enthusiasts gathered behind Lance Miller’s home on Bryn Mawr Road in Carlisle Thursday evening and waited with big eyes, large cameras and baited breath in front of a garage door that opened as “The Odyssey” theme song was played on a smartphone.

As smoke from a machine cleared and the doors reached the top, people rushed in, filling the two-door garage and getting as many photos of the 1960 Briggs Cunningham’s No. 1 Le Mans Corvette race car as possible.

Lance Miller of Carlisle, co-owner of Carlisle Events, unveiled the legendary vehicle find that he and his friends spent almost 20 years looking for.

The event was held on the eve of the opening of this year’s Corvettes at Carlisle car show, which runs today through Sunday at the Carlisle Fairgrounds.

How they found No. 1

Four numbers – 3535 – the car’s vehicle identification number is what led Chip Miller to the treasured find.

“It all started with a dream, my dad hunted and hunted for it,” said Lance Miller about his father.

Before he died, Chip Miller was on a mission to find class-winning No. 3 Corvette. He later acquired it and restored it.

Miller wasn’t done; he wanted to find No. 1, if it was still out there despite many thoughts of it in a junk yard.

Friend and fellow car enthusiast Kevin Mackay researched and found the VIN for the No. 1 car and worked on tracking down the car to Florida.

“He went door-to-door in search of the No. 1,”said Lance Miller.

Mackay spent most of his life searching for the car. “The Corvettes were my kids.”

“When I got the call (about finding the car) it was an O-M-G moment,” Mackay said.

Holding back tears and describing the moment he learned that the search was over, he highlighted what was important.

“It isn’t about the money, it’s about the history — bringing it back to life,” said Mackay.

He got the call that the 3535 was found while dressing for an event. “I was sure Lance was joking when he told me,” Mackay said.

While Mackay had been hunting for the vehicle, it was sitting in a storage warehouse owned by Rick Carr’s family.

After the death of his father, Carr found the vehicle among many others stored there and used Google search engine to find information on the unique car.

“My father would be extremely proud of this moment,” said Carr during the unveiling last night.

He joked that the car had been somewhat of a pain to deal with since it was almost impossible to move.

“I got a call from my cousin who is a car nut — we are all car nuts,” he said.

Carr’s cousin asked to buy it, but it really needed a lot of work, according to Carr. They went to check the VIN to see what year the vehicle was made in, which is also a difficult mission since it’s on the frame of the car, he said.

During the search, Carr found Larry Berman’s website, www.BriggsCunningham.com, which listed the missing car’s VIN. That number, 3535, matched the one on Carr’s vehicle.

Berman said he started the website in 2004 as a hobby because he had been a lover of the Corvettes all his life.

He spoke during the unveiling and gave a brief history of how the famous Cunningham cars were lost after the race in 1960.

He said the three cars were decommissioned and put back together and sold as low-mileage 1960 Corvettes.

“We don’t have the history from 1960 through the years as the cars changed owners many times over,” said Berman.

When Berman started the website, he contacted Lance Miller and requested the VIN to post online.

No. 1’s VIN was listed on the site for eight years before Berman was contacted on June 20 of this year by Carr.

Negotiations didn’t take long and once the deal was made, it was only a month before the car ownership was turned over to Lance Miller.

Miller owned the car for two days, then sold it to an anonymous buyer who plans to restore it before revealing who they are, he said.

“I already have No. 3 restored, so I don’t need it,” he said.

The No. 2 Corvette is owned by California car collector Bruce Meyer.