President s Pit Stop...

Transcription

1 President s Pit Stop... By Dan Nicewander I used to subscribe to multiple magazines only to see them sit from month to month with my inability to find the time to read all of them. Mustang Monthly, Hemmings Muscle Machines, and Muscle Car Review were a few of my favorites, and I had looked forward to their arrival in the mailbox for years. I didn t want to let a subscription laps as then I wouldn t have a string of consecutive issues...and who wants an incomplete collection right? How dare I think that I could break this habbit! It wasn t expensive, and at some point I d have time to catch up and read all of those back issues. Well, I finally concluded that there was simply no way I would ever go back and read all of those back issues, so I let them all lapse except one Muscle Car Review. I can hear the gasps from our SWMMC members now Dan let Mustang Monthly laps?!? SWMMC Monthly The Official Newsletter of the Southwest Metro Mustang Club The Twin Cities Mustang Club Of America Chapter June, 2017 INSIDE THIS ISSUE President s Pit Stop 1-2 New Member Welcome 3 Iowa Cruise Summary 3-4 All Ford Show Summary 4 Upcoming 2017 Cruises 5 Upcoming 2017 Shows 5 Charity Update PL Auto Tech 6 Things That Make You Smile 7 Member s Rides 7 Upcoming Grand National Show Northern Star National Show 8 Other Mustang Activities 8-9 Want Ads Club Calendar 10 Your Club Leadership Team 10 In The Trunk 11 MCR, is when I get all the way to the very end of each month s issue, after all the fun reading through the articles and looking at the pictures, when I don t want it to end there s one last single page article to satisfy that last itch for something to read as I prepare to wait a whole month for the next issue. MCR titles it The Last Page, and they ve had it since late But how it came to be is an interesting story! To really understand that story, I have to tell you about one of my all time favorie car activities Hot Rod Magazine s Power Tour (which is coming up in a couple of weeks!). If you re not familiar with Power Tour, it s an organized cruise where car lovers of all kinds drive a week long pre-planned route throughout the United States. It began in 1995 when Hot Rod staff members decided to take some of their project cars on a cross-country drive from Los Angeles, California to Norwalk, Ohio. Hundreds of people participated along the way and seven participants even made the entire journey. When I finally said I d only subscribe to one magazine, it came down to which one I enjoyed reading most. And I had found that after Mustang Monthly fired Donald Farr as editor and converted back to exclusively covering first generation Mustangs a couple of years ago, it just wasn t as good of a magazine as it once was (to me). Don t get me wrong, it s still a fun magazine to read, but it wasn t nearly as interesting to me as MCR was with their broad coverage of all things muscle cars. There s plenty of Mustangs in their issues, but there are also many other types of cars that I enjoy which they talk about. We also have a vintage Mopar in our stable next to our Mustangs so it seemed OK to let MM lapse and focus on a broader magazine anyway. But the kicker for me, and one of the things I like most about The next year they decided to repeat it and had an even greater turn out. And since its inception, this event has continued to gain in popularity and is now one of the most anticipated automotive events each year. It is held in late May or early June and covers over a thousand miles. In recent years, the tour has evolved to become essentially a continuous trek around the United States that begins near the location it ended the previous year. Each stop is combined with events or activities that vary as much as the participants themselves. There are autocross events, drag races, a show every night at the destination city, and lunch stop activities along the way. One of the coolest parts is going through these tiny little towns along the backroads route, where some have Main Streets that are only a few blocks long. Well, more Apple Ford Shakopee Sponsors the SWMMC 1624 Weston Court Shakopee, MN often than not the whole town comes out to welcome the

2 Page 2 June 2017 thousands of cars which parade through their little hamlet. One of the years that we were on PT, I remember one of the towns having a bakery along Main Street. They placed an employee out in front of their store with a massive box of donuts and a sign that simply read donuts for donuts. All you had to do is chirp your tires and they d give everyone in the car a free donut! Very fun Drew Harden, the current editor of MCR, was on staff at Hot Rod and was instrumental in coming up with the idea of Power Tour back in Drew left Hot Rod shortly after that and by 2008 he was looking to give it a go again. But he wanted to experience the tour from the participant s point of view. How had things changed in the 13 years since he kicked off an event which had become one of the largest automotive cruise events in the world? So in his words, he wanted to see if anyone would want his sweaty butt to sit in their nice car for the day. In exchange, he would write about each car in an article called The Magnificant Six. One car for each of the 6 legs to the tour that year. A couple of months later he penned his article and each of the 6 cars and their owners were given a spread with pictures in MCR. Out of the dozens of applicants he received, we were honored that he chose our 1965 Mustang Fastback for the 3 rd day from Lincoln Nebraska to Des Moinse Iowa. We were elated to get this opportunity and pleased to find out that he really didn t sweat that much! He did our photo shoot next to an old brick building on the Lincoln fair grounds, and during our ride to Iowa together he asked the interview questions. One of the things that Drew was also really good at was taking all of the cool action shots along the route for the article. So as we were driving he d not only be taking notes but he d ask me to manuever to get the ultimate road pictures. He might tell me to move more to the center of the road, move towards the side of the road, move up 3 cars in position of the train we were in, ok hold it right there! Then click click click he d take some shots that were really increadible. He certainly had a knack and skill for getting the very best picture out of what looked to me as just a bunch of cool cars driving down the road. But along the way, Drew also wanted feedback on how we, as MCR readers, saw his magazine. What did we like and not? What could they improve upon, and what should they not mess up? I told him one of the things that I didn t like about MCR was that when you got about 3 pages from the end, the only thing left was advertising and it left me feeling a bit cheated. It was like the ending was not really at the back of the magazine at all, but rather somewhere a few pages short of that. So I d read to that point and and then put the magazine aside, not even thumbing through the last few ads. Why not instead, put something of interest right at the very end, so it felt like more of a reward for completing it? That last little taste before you had to wait another whole month to read MCR. Kind of like the last sip of coffee at the end of desert, or turning that last bolt or screw on a car project. There would be a bit of final satisfaction in it at that point. He thought this was a really interesting idea and it wasn t something he had previously considered. Low and behold, 3 months later The Last Word shows up in MCR! If you re still with me, this was a long story to say I thought that we d try something like that with our newsletter as well. So in this issue we re starting something that I m calling In The Trunk (if you have a better name I m all ears!). In The Trunk is the last thing you ll see in the newsletter each month and will be made up of articles from somewhere around the world that should have general appeal to our Mustang membership. Just like after you ve finished a cruise or a show and are unpacking your Mustang in the garage where you check for things in the trunk, this is something for that last little minute before you put away the SWMMC Newsletter and call it a day. I hope you enjoy reading In The Trunk, and I encourage you to send me things you find that might fit into this sort of column! Dan

3 Page 3 June 2017 Welcome to Our New Members! Brian Blumberg New Prague 1998 Cobra and 1993 GT Convertible Frank Maroni Farmington 1965 Coupe Ruth Ann M Maple Grove 2007 Mustang GT Roger and Libby Parras St Peter 2015 Mustang GT Ross and Carol Ragan Shakopee 2014 V6 Convertible Ron Weinzier Belle Plaine 2017 Mustang GT Jeffrey and Jeannie Weiss Costa Mesa, California! 68 Coupe, 69 GT Convert, 15 Anniversary Edition set up for wedding later that day. We also found the welcoming folks from the Unique Mustang Club led by Rusty Daniels. While milling around the facility a ballroom expert/tour guide took the group into the backentrance room/stage entrance waiting room. He had many great stories and the walls, and ceiling, were covered with signatures and messages from Iowa Cruise Summary By Pete Schmidt The club s May 6th cruise was a trek to Clear Lake IA. The weather was great for a cruise that included 14 cars and 22 people. Making our way to Clear Lake after the second rally point in Lakeville was many of the bands that have played the Surf since Personally, I saw ZZ Top, Elton John, Foghat, and John Mellencamp. The room was the last room that saw Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper before their plane crash in easy and relatively quick. We arrived at the Surf Ballroom on schedule to find nine Mustangs from the Unique Mustang Club lined up in the parking lot. We wondered around the outside of the Surf Ballroom and found that we could indeed go inside to view the venue and the vast memorabilia collection. The room itself was Our group drove about a half mile to The Other Place for lunch. The food was good as was the company. After lunch, a few folks went to the plane crash site while most head to Mason City s Music Man Square. The facility includes a neat museum dedicated to Meredith and the movie The Music Man. A re-creation of the movie set is indoors and the 1920 s preserved home of Meredith is available to tour. The group was split in two and given tours of the home and facility. Around 3:30 folks were ready to head back to their respective homes. Rusty made mention of the annual car show in Clear Lake and the cruise around the lake

4 Page 4 June 2017 as well as his club s annual show in Des Moines on August 20th. It was cool to make new Mustang had quite a few cars, we weren t able to award all of trophies. We want to thank all those who helped put the show together and those that helped Saturday and friends and we thought meeting up again in the future would be fun. The SWMMC did have a casualty on the way home. About ten miles North of Albert Lea Jay and Lois Bickford lost their serpentine belt due to a bad alternator pulley. After a bit of calling and false starts on repairs, their pony was towed to Owatonna Ford for repairs. All is well with their Mustang now. Sunday moving cars. All of this help really made the show go smoothly. A special thank you to Trooper Mitchell Johnson from Minnesota State All Ford Show Summary By Mike and Beth Fredrickson Patrol for braving the elements. And finally, we also thank all the companies and organizations that contributed to the show. Especially to Apple Ford Shakopee for their sponsorship and support. For a list of all car show sponsors, visit our website and click on "Partners" and check out the pictures on We had a great show on May 21 st with 46 registered cars and about 50 spectators for the show despite the drizzling rain! While the weather didn't cooperate, all who showed up had a great Shutterfly (thanks Anthony Sagat!). We hope to see you on July 22nd for the Mustang and Ponies Show at Canterbury Park. It s shaping up to be a great show and one that you won t want to miss! time. The boy scouts served donuts and coffee along with hamburgers and hotdogs. With the weather turning against us, and even though we

5 Page 5 June 2017 Upcoming 2017 Cruise Schedule: Jun 11 Albertville/Rogers, MN to tour Vescio s Customizing with side trip to Albertville Outlet Mall if desired Jun 24 Airfest & Autorama, Menomonie, WI July 22 nd 3 rd Annual Mustangs & Ponies All Mustang Show at Canterbury Jul 29 Fountain City, WI to tour Elmer s Auto and Toy Museum August 19 th - 3 rd Annual American Muscle Car Show at AutoMotorPlex in Chanhassen Aug 6 BBQ lunch at the Hoisington s Aug 12 Austin, MN to tour Spam Museum and/or Forestville Caves Sep 16 New Ulm, MN Tour Schell s Brewery Oct 8 Ellsworth WI, Vino in the Valley winery If you have some input on these or other cruises, please contact Dan at dan.nicewander@gmail.com 2017 SWMMC Car Show Schedule: If you can help at any of our shows please contact our Show Directors Mike and Beth Fredrickson at freddie0105@hotmail.com September 10 th - 9/11 Remembrance & Honor Car Show at Lowe s Coon Rapids

6 Page 6 June 2017 Charity Update PLHS Auto Tech Our club work with Prior Lake High School as our charity partner is continuing to mature. Last month we coordinated and held our first Tech Talk where we partnered with Apple Auto Group. AAG brought in their Body Shop manager and one of their lead technicians who walked through what types of positions are available for someone interested in not only their auto body area, but other skills as well. Their tech brought a banged-up fender which had various states of repair done to it along for a demonstration which the students were quite interested in. After the talk, we discussed the club with several of the students who have interest in hobby cars, with one of them having a Mustang! We encouraged that group to think about our upcoming All Ford show and TWO of them showed up! What an encouragement to have them come to the show, one with a Mustang and one with a vintage Ford truck. Additionally, the students produced our All Ford show trophies (they turned out VERY nice!) and our student produced wall banner for the club is proudly hanging in the PLHS AT Shop! Finally, we ll be participating in the first SWMMC PLHS scholarship award Tuesday June 6 th. The committee will be awarding this to the student at the PLHS Awards Ceremony where we ll get to be on stage to talk a bit about our club, why we re working with PLHS AT, and how we chose our student.

7 Page 7 June 2017 Things That Make You Smile Member s Rides This month s Member s Rides comes from Members Ron and Cindi Broekemeier. We joined SWMMC in 2014 when we attended our very first SWMMC car show at Apple Ford, Shakopee. We were hooked! Our enthusiasm for Mustangs started with our black 2008 Ford Mustang GT, and then last year we got the bug to buy a convertible and stumbled upon a ruby red 2015 Ford Mustang GT, a convertible with the 50th Anniversary edition package. What many of us feel! Ummm what?!? We enjoy participating in the Summer cruises, social events and spending time with fellow Mustang enthusiasts. Ron has enjoyed his position as club Secretary, and helping the club grow. For the past 2 years we ve enjoyed hosting the annual SWMMC Holiday party. From Maple Grove, our family consists of 3 grown daughters, age 25 and twins who are 20, plus a Mini-Schnauzer dog, and 2 cats. In addition to enjoying SWMMC events, we enjoy traveling locally and international, trying new restaurants, and spending time at our cabin in Maple Lake, MN. We look forward to seeing everyone on the cruises this summer! If you would like to have your ride published in our newsletter, please send me a short write up and a picture or two! Dan dan.nicewander@gmail.com SOOOO me!

8 Page 8 June 2017 Upcoming Grand National Show Just a reminder that The Mustang Club of Kansas City is hosting a Grand National Mustang Club of America show August 25-27, 2017 in Overland Park Kansas similar to what we will do in This would be a great way for any of us to experience a national show, and we encourage you to attend. Some of us will be driving our Mustangs and others are just driving down to make a weekend out of it to attend and help out at the show without our Mustang. This is the closest MCA show for 2017, and as of this writing they have over 460 Mustangs registered for their event! If you re planning on going, let Pete know at tk421tk421@mchsi.com so we can get together as a group at the show. See the following link for more info: mustangclubofgreaterkc.com/activities/2017- mca-grand-national/ or Facebook at facebook.com/2017mcagrandnational/ 2019 Northern Star National Mustang Show We have a very limited number of preview t-shirts that we ve had made which are now available for $15 each on a first come basis. Contact Pete if you re interested. Our show committees are meeting, and they have started to plan some highlevel details. One of the interesting things we re learning from other National shows is the quantity of trailers that we will have to deal with. Kansas City for example has over 140 trailers that they will need to find parking for. This is something our parking committee is beginning to work through. shows in Would you like to get involved? We can use any and all talents! Contact the NSNMS Chairman Pete Schmidt at tk421tk421@mchsi.com if you can help, or just to find out more information. Other Upcoming Activities UMRSAAC All Ford Show is Sunday, June 4 th. This is a huge opportunity for our club to be recognized as a national entity, and quite the honor to be doing one of the 3-4 national MCA

9 Page 9 June 2017 Hot Rod Power Tour is June 10 th through the 16 th. Contact Dan at dan.nicewander@gmail.com if you d like some background or find more information at: Want Ads FOR SALE: SWMMC Club T-Shirts! While you might not buy a used car from this handsome young man, you can in fact trust him to carry only the highest quality of club t-shirts! He ll have these at all of our club events including our monthly meetings, or you can contact Pete directly to reserve yours now at tk421tk421@mchsi.com Back To The 50 s is June 23 rd to 25 th. See FOR SALE: Vintage Jag! Vintage 1973 E-Type Jaguar Coupe, ~56,000 miles, V12!!!, Automatic. $39,500. This is a great looking vehicle that looks fast just sitting there! Contact Randy at Have something that has to do with Mustangs or other cars to sell, trade or give away? Shoot me the information and we ll get it into the newsletter. Dan at dan.nicewander@gmail.com

10 Page 10 May 2017 SWMMC 2017 Calendar Your 2017 Club Leadership Team President - Dan Nicewander dan.nicewander@gmail.com Vice President - Chuck Buchanan cbuchanan51@hotmail.com Treasurer - David Kronk djkronk@gmail.com Secretary - Ron Broekemeier buzzrwb@yahoo.com MCA Reg Dir and NSNMS Chair - Pete Schmidt tk421tk421@mchsi.com Show Directors - Mike and Beth Fredrickson freddie0105@hotmail.com Cruise Directors It s a team effort this year by Rich Herpers, Dan Nicewander, Pete Schmidt, Mike Stearns, and Steve Sommer (contact Dan with any questions or comments) Content Design Jeff Mattson mattson93@yahoo.com

11 Page 11 June 2017 In The Trunk Interesting Mustang Tid-Bits By Jerry Heasley, May 17, 2017, Photos By: Bob Perkins Did you know there was a Mustang TV? I didn t say a word. I just bought it. I didn t go into details. At the price I was paying, I didn t want to bring up anything that might clue him in that it was a unique piece, John Skavlem says. But how many people have ever seen one? Even less common, you don t find many people who ever actually watched a TV show while inside of a moving Mustang? John had owned one that he used to display in his 1966 Mustang at car shows, playing the TV for all to see. So he recognized the old Philco set right away. The dials are up top and the little screen is down below. I knew right away what it was. But most people, I would say, would not recognize that this TV went in a Mustang, unless they were Ford people from the 60s. According to John, the old set was not working but was in cosmetically pretty damn good condition. His first thought was to contact his longtime friend Bob Perkins in Wisconsin. The same person he had sold his old Mustang TV set to years ago. Health issues prevent John from traveling now, so he packed up the treasure and Although, John, who recently reached his 88th birthday, may have sold his large collection of vintage Mustang parts several years ago because he just got old, he still keeps his eyes open. During fall 2016, while perusing the contents of a secondhand electronics store in his hometown of Cincinnati, John felt a familiar jolt of shipped it to Bob. As you probably know, Bob writes the Resto Roundup column in Mustang Monthly and has an enormous collection of Mustang parts and paraphernalia, including an N.O.S. Mustang TV set in its original box with additional extras. Mustang mania when he spied a portable television set on a shelf. This old set is a sad sight to most consumers today, but it s a treasure to people like John. This wasn t just any TV. This TV came right out of a 1966 Mustang accessories catalog. Many people will not recall this accessory, but Ford did offer a 9-inch all-transistorized Philco car and home TV. Bob assessed the TV set s value and is sending a check to his old friend, no negotiations required. That s shows how much trust the two have in each other. He snapped photos of John s old set, as well as photos of the N.O.S. set he has with the extras, and sent them to us. It started in 1966 and lasted until about 1968, Bob says. It s probably the most off-the-wall accessory ever made for a Mustang. Do I like it as much as a brand-new Cobra 2x4 set up in the box? No, but to the real true Rotunda accessory nut job, [a Mustang TV set] is probably the ultimate accessory.