Tom Panei of Butler bought his first car, this Fiat Spider, when he was 16. He and his father worked together to get the car roadworthy. Panei, now 47, plans to never get rid of it.

Ever wonder what happened to your first car? Perhaps you sold it for some much-needed cash or traded it in for something more reliable.

Tom Panei knows what happened with his.

The Butler artist and musician bought his first car — a 1976 Fiat Spider — when he was 16, and never sold it. Never plans to either.

“It's worth more to me than anyone would ever pay for it,” he said. “I've had people offer, but I just can't get rid of it.”

Panei, 47, found it sitting in knee-high grass along a road in Saxonburg. And though his father advised him against the decision, Panei, a rebellious teenager, bought it anyway for about $500.

“It was one of those things I saw ... and was like 'Wow, I want that,'” he explained.

They put a new battery in the car, and Panei drove the neglected car to its new home despite evidence of many problems.

A junior in high school at the time, Panei wanted to drive the Fiat to prom the next year.

While his father may not have spent his own cash on the clunker, he did agree to work alongside his son to fix it. Panei came home one day to see that his father had even taken the initiative to rewire the car since it was known for electrical problems.

“My dad and I basically took my whole car apart,” Panei said.

Then they had it repainted, changing the color from bold red to sleek black.

But it wasn't quite road-ready yet in March or April 1987, only a few months before his senior prom.

“I didn't know if it'd be done in time,” Panei said.

Fortunately, it was. He attended that year's prom and the next year's as well.

His car served him well for years. He remembers driving it consistently to McDonald's, where he worked for some time. After his shifts, he'd put the roof down, find some friends, and drive around thinking they were “cool.”

He entered it in a Butler High School car show in 1987, where he won second place. And though he's taken it to a few other car shows since then, it doesn't bother him that it never won another award.

“I never had it as a show car. Never wanted it to be,” he said. “I didn't baby it.”As of now, the Fiat has 93,000 miles, it's out of inspection, and Panei knows the car's brakes need some work before he gets it back on the road.“That's when people sell them, when they start sitting around,” Panei said. “[But] I vowed never to get rid of it. I've kept it this long.”Panei has been married to his wife, Stacy for nearly a decade. The couple has one son, Luca, who is nearly 2 years old, but already loves cars — plastic toy ones for now.But when Luca turns 16, Panei hopes to give him the 1976 Fiat Spider as his birthday gift.

After buying it for $500, said Tom Panei, “My dad and I basically took my whole car apart.”