Gerald Lee Roush, 68: The "Dear Abby" of the vintage Ferrari world

Gerald Roushwas the man to contact if you became stricken with Ferrari Fever.

He could tell you specifics about vintage models, former owners, whether the vehicles had been repainted and other details about their maintenance after they left the showroom.

David Seibert of  Sandy Springs met Mr. Roush when the car expert worked in the parts department at FAF Motorcars Inc., a shuttered business that was located in Tucker.  FAF was the place to go if you needed parts for the Italian sports cars.

And Mr. Roush, known for his meticulous research, was a go-to guy.

"He pretty much knew them all by serial number," said Mr. Seibert, the historian for Ferrari North America Inc. "He was keeping records at that time, and was pretty much the expert as to what each car was and whose hands it had passed through."

Mr. Roush took interest in Ferraris after seeing one on the cover of  a 1958 sports car magazine. He was smitten. While in college, he began collecting information about individual cars based on serial numbers.

He was teaching history at Abraham Baldwin College when he started the Ferrari Market Letter in 1974, which publishes to this day. It carries a front-page article about a certain car or collector along with classified ads about vehicles for sale gleaned from publications across the country. Information that appeared in his decades-old data base was golden to car collectors and others across the country.

No wonder a 1997 Wall Street Journal article called Mr. Roush the "Dear Abby of the vintage Ferrari world."

On Friday, Gerald Lee Roush of  Lilburn died from complications of a heart attack at Budd Terrace at Wesley Woods. He was 68. A memorial service will be 11 a.m. Saturday in the Snellville chapel of Tom M. Wages Funeral Service.

Mr. Roush grew up in Walsenburg, Colo., Tulsa, Chicago and Birmingham. He earned bachelor's and master's degrees in history at Auburn University. He started writing the newsletter on the side at Abraham Baldwin.

In 1976, he quit teaching to work at  Tucker's FAF and to devote more time to the newsletter. Today, the biweekly print and online newsletter boasts nearly 5,000 subscribers. He and Carol Jane Whitley Roush, his wife of 40 years, compiled the publication in their home.

Mr. Roush was a consultant whose clients included lawyers, law enforcement officers, car dealers, investors and collectors.  He  judged prestigious car events, too.

"He was the king of Ferrari VIN numbers and history," said Courtney Bennett, an Atlanta car hobbyist. "He was not so much one to peg values to cars, but he could tell you the whole life of the car after it left the Ferrari factory."

Mr. Roush had little patience for those with a low Ferrari IQ. However, he was upfront about the vehicles.

And, yes, Mr. Roush owned a couple of Ferraris in his early days, but he sold them. That made him more reputable among clients because he didn't have a vested interest in the cars, according to a 1997 article in the Wall Street Journal.

"They don't really make good investments," he told the Wall Street Journal.

Despite the price-tag, they "are just old cars," he said.

Survivors other than his wife include a son, Christopher Stirling Roush of Chapel Hill, N.C., a daughter, Catherine Roush Taralloof  Suwanee; a sister, Elouise Roush Chapmanof  Fairhope, Ala.; and three grandchildren.