The Checkered Flag Falls on the Corvette Reunion & Back to the Bricks Show
By Rick Tavel© All Rights reserved
While the largest one day automotive event in the country
was taking place on Woodward Avenue in the suburbs of Detroit, an equally
impressive event was taking place sixty miles to the north in Flint, Michigan,
a city rich in automotive history. The
spectacular Back to the Bricks car
show and the Corvette Reunion
welcomed a huge throng of automobile enthusiasts, including Mark Reuss,
President of General Motors of North America.
Reuss was one of the featured speakers at the unveiling of a bronze
statue honoring William “Billy” Durant, founder of General Motors. Durant’s statue will join David Buick and
Louis Chevrolet on the brick plaza of downtown Flint. Most of downtown Flint was closed to
accommodate the thousands of cars and crowd of spectators, estimated at over a
half million, along the streets of the historic city.
Back to the Bricks Event kicks off in Flint, AKA Vehicle City |
Cars of every type began lining the downtown streets at 6
AM, Saturday morning, August 17th to be a part of 9th Annual Back to the Bricks car show and the 4th Annual Corvette Reunion. There were several thousand cars and trucks
being shown, including classic, muscle, restomod, sports and race cars and if
you are an automobile enthusiast there was plenty to keep you occupied. Even the world famous drag racing team “The
Ramchargers” were there with some of their vintage drag mopars. The show has become so large that it is
difficult to see all the cars in a full day.
Al Hatch Founder of Bricks Event |
Durant Statue |
Reuss President of GM NA |
One of the favorite parts of the Bricks event is the Corvette
Reunion which drew in excess of 600 Corvettes from all parts of the US and
Canada. Appropriately, the Corvette
Reunion takes place in the birthplace of the Corvette; Flint is where the first
Corvettes were produced. Corvettes of
every generation were represented from outstanding restorations to wild customs
and restomods. The chairman of the event
since its inception four years ago is Gary Drago, well-known, life-long
Corvette enthusiast. With the help of
the Flint Corvette clubs, Drago and the committee have grown and organized this
event into one of, if not the largest all-Corvette event in Michigan; an
impressive accomplishment in light of the hundreds of Corvettes that come from
all over the world to cruise the legendary Woodward strip just sixty miles
south the very same day. Both the Corvette Reunion committee and the Back to the Bricks committee
impressively organized this huge event so there was few traffic back-ups which
has been a complaint of pat events.
There was plenty of parking for both those showing their cars and
spectators.
A few of the Vettes on display at the Corvette Reunion |
The Corvette Reunion,
though a part of the Back to the Bricks
show, is actually a separate event organized and managed within the larger car
show. As a result there are some
differences between the larger Bricks
car show and the Corvette Reunion. Though there is no charge to simply show your
car in either the Bricks or Reunion, however, in the Corvette show
you can register and pay a fee to have your car judged in a competition. Awards are given in various categories from
“Best in Show” to “Farthest Traveled”
the trophies are mounted on Bricks commemorating the historic brick paved
Saginaw Street, the main street in downtown Flint which is now historically
protected.
The Corvette Reunion requires several
streets in the downtown to be able to accommodate all the Corvettes that travel from as far
away as California to be a part of the event.
The National Corvette Museum is also on hand offering merchandise and
information on the museum. Each year the event has grown by approximately a
hundred Corvettes and this year was no exception.
Anthony Bowling's "Personalized" Corvette |
One of the hallmarks of the Reunion is the broad spectrum of Corvettes being displayed from
award winning classic Corvettes to customized cars. The show has one of the largest assortment of
“personalized” Corvettes in any show.
Flint’s “TrendSetta Corvette Club” has an impressive representation of
some of the finest “personalized” Corvettes that can be found anywhere. According to Anthony Bowling, president of the
club and a co founder of the event, the outstanding
“personalized” cars from his club have been invited to display their cars all
over the country. The former president
of the Rainbow Corvette Club, Bowling is also the founder of the appropriately
named, Trendsetta Corvette Club. From
the impressive workmanship and design in several of the club member’s cars,
they are truly a trendsetting club. Anthony’s white Corvette with Lambo doors is
an outstanding representation of the cars in the club.
Steve Stone's 500,000+ mile 1963 Stingray |
Packing light is a requirement his wife has mastered especially for their once a year trip to the Boundary Waters, which means they take a 22-foot canoe along as well. Though he has owned the car its entire life he did put the car up for sale when he was drafted back in 1965. He thought he was going to end up in Viet Nam so he wanted to make sure that if anything happened to him he would not leave his parents stuck paying off the loan on the car which they had cosigned. However, the planets must have been aligned because he could not find a buyer, did not go to Nam and took that as an omen to keep the car. Now he said he’d never part with the car and couldn’t picture driving anything else. While showing me his picture and document album of the car, he expressed his feelings towards the well used Corvette, “I won’t take anything for it, not even if I were offered a new C7.”
Karyciak's Duntov Award Winning 1962 |
The Campbell's 1956 and 1957 Corvettes |
replacement engine than repair the original. But luckily the
seller still had the original engine and sold it to Jerry along with the
car. That began Jerry’s fourteen year
quest to find the correct factory parts for the car. Finally after compiling the correct parts he
was able to start his restoration in 1992 which lasted for three years. Now Jerry drives the car everywhere and said
the only time it has ever been on a trailer was on a trip to California where
he received the Duntov Award. He
recently drove the C1 to Hampton, Virginia, for the NCRS convention. The beautiful Honduras Maroon coupe is an
exemplary example of the last year of a first generation car.
Jaclowski 1966 Sunfire Yellow barnfind |
It’s always exciting to hear a story about a “barn find,”
especially a Corvette. Bruce Jackowski
found his 1966 Sunfire Yellow convertible in a barn in Michigan in 2006. He is the fourth owner of the car which was
delivered to the dealer in January 1966.
Bruce discovered the car in a barn where it had been sitting for over
fifteen years. To get the car running
Bruce had to rebuild most of the mechanicals, drop the tank and clean it and
replace several hoses and lines. He was
surprised when he discovered in the same barn hidden from sight the original
hard top for the car. When delivered
originally the car had been painted Trophy Blue but had been repainted Sunfire
Yellow several years before it had been parked in the barn. Bruce decided to keep the Sunfire Yellow
paint as found, which is still in good condition.
Larry Courtney's Corvette Central Sponsored C5 |
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