Monday, October 10, 2011

A relaxing day at Hotrodtoberfest

“A little get-together of all people interested in custom cars, trucks, and bikes, original muscle cars, or anything with a motor.”

That was printed on the glossy, color promotional card for the 2011 Hotrodtoberfest, held in the White Oak Commercial Center parking lot in Gladstone over the weekend. That seems like a pretty decent description. This isn’t going to go down as one of the most epic gatherings in the history of car shows, but there were enough things around there to hold your attention.

The event was hosted by Moody’s Hot Rod Shop in Kansas City, Mo. I don’t really know much about them, except their webpage is under construction, and their Facebook page hasn’t had a new post in almost a year.

I might know them better if I was a local drag racing insider, though. Their Facebook page has some pictures of some drag cars that they appear to take responsibility for, and some of those very cars were lined up at the show this weekend.

Some people obviously are very familiar with them, because there was a nice selection of cars on display for this event. Many of them, like the candy-apple red ’53 Ford, the flamed red and white ’55 Chevy, or the bright lime green ’40 Ford coupe, are regulars at car shows all over the area.

Others, like a brown ’76 Impala sedan, some of the later-model cars, or the unfinished projects, don’t seem to turn up as often.

My favorite car there was probably a ’38 Ford sedan. The paper in the window said it had a flathead under the hood, and it was for sale for $15,000. The body and paint was resplendent in its natural “patina” that everyone seems to want. Mainly, I just liked the stance and overall condition. And those old wide-five Ford wheels are always pretty cool. There were a couple of things I would have changed (those gargantic exhaust pipes would have to go immediately), but overall it had some real possibilities.

There was also an original-looking ’36 Plymouth coupe there. If you look at the top of this page, there’s a ’37 Plymouth coupe very similar to that parked at my granddad’s used car lot. So with that alone, it’d be hard not to give that car a shout-out. But it was a nice car, too. And as much as I like hot rods and customized cars, these straight originals are getting harder to find all the time.

They couldn’t have had a better day for this. It was, oh, 79-degrees and sunny out there. The Bob Harvey Band was doing a little concert, and they weren’t nearly as offensive as some live car show entertainment tends to be. I didn’t see any fights break out or anything like that. In all, I think the people who put this together had to be pleased with the way things turned out.

And even though it wasn’t a massive turnout, it was still strong enough that I managed to take more than 100 photos. And, as usual, you can check them out in the slideshow below.


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