A 1973 Chevy Impala leans during the Downtown Arlington Classic Car Show on Sept. 26 at Vandergriff Town Center.
As the morning light dawned on a cool day, vintage cars slowly arrived in parking lots and began to line the streets surrounding the Vandergriff Building downtown.
Attendees of the fifth annual Downtown Arlington Classic Car Show stepped back in time to the days when these old cars were new.
Across the tracks, next to the Rotary Dream Park, a crowd moved from car to car, admiring the paint, the style, the age. Cars from the 1920s through the 1980s were on display, from Fords to Volkswagens.
Garret Martin, vice president of the Downtown Arlington Management Corp., said the event was made possible by its sponsors, who had booths set up between the cars. Texas Trust, the Arlington Public Library, the National Medal of Honor Museum and others were present.
“There’s something about old classic cars that touches the soul,” Martin said.
He said events like this are important because they bring the community together.
“To see that community come together in Arlington, it just feels like the right time, right place,” Martin said.
Irving, Texas, resident Jo Graves, 76, said her husband bought her car, a 1968 Ford Torino Cobra, a year before she met him.
The first-time attendee said the green vehicle was her daily car until 1974, when they purchased another vehicle. The Torino Cobra sat in their backyard for decades until they restored it in 2014.
Graves said she used to come to car shows with her husband, who now has dementia and cannot attend. She still goes, taking the vehicle to car shows once a month.
Graves drives the car to make sure it continues to run. She said older cars like hers have souls.
“My husband used to call it The Snake because of the little insignias,” Graves said.
Fort Worth resident Bill Ancona, 76, brought his 1948 Ford F3 mail truck for his second year attending the car show. The truck was built in Pennsylvania and was used to transport mail in Lubbock, Texas, he said. After acquiring the car, it took him about a year to restore it.
The copper-rusted mail truck stood out against the shiny reds and blues of many of the other restored cars at the show.
“It’s great for people to come and reminisce with the cars that they grew up with and whatnot. It draws that kind of crowd; they get nostalgic,” he said.
A bright red Jaguar stood out against the rest, right in front of the train tracks downtown.
Arlington resident Clark Kirby, 77, was the owner of the 1965 Jaguar XK-E and is a previous winner for best in show.
In the ’60s, the torpedo-style car was praised by Enzo Ferrari, who stated it was “the most beautiful car ever made,” Kirby said.
The car passed through the hands of many owners since its production in 1965 in England; it saw the roads of Liverpool, New York City and Pensacola, Florida. It was eventually bought by Kirby in California in 2016.
At 11 a.m., a train passed the Rotary Dream Park on the tracks. The locomotive engineer pressed down on the horn, blanketing the music and sounds in a loud blare. Several rapid horns sounded as it passed the cars and the Vandergriff Town Center.
Plano, Texas, resident Jeff Farrell, 74, brought a 1975 Bricklin SV-1 to the car show. The precursor to the DeLorean stood out, finished in a bright melon orange with doors lifted high into the air.
Produced by Bricklin Corporation, only 3,000 models were made between 1974 and 1976, he said, with only around 200 of the 1975s drivable today.
Farrell said that back in the ’70s, one of his friends had a Bricklin, which started his knowledge and love for the car. He said he used to help his friend fix the car.
Later, when he saw the car at a local auction, he decided to buy it. Fifteen years later, much has been done to restore it, he said.
He said he had to purchase a second Bricklin because the frame was rusting. In Tucson, Arizona, he found a 1975 that had a bad body and interior, but the underneath was “beautiful,” he said.
“We kind of took the two cars and put them together,” Farrell said.
The restoration process was also an opportunity to bond with his child Harrison, he said.
“I tried to get Harrison into the garage when I was working on things, hand me wrenches and this and that,” he said. “It was always nice to be able to do that.”
Now, Farrell takes the vehicle to car shows two or three times a year and takes it to Bricklin International Owners Club meetups, where he’s made the acquaintance of many, including Malcolm Bricklin, whose family created the car.
“It’s helped my dad and I bond a lot, and we spent a lot of time and effort into this, and it’s just a beautiful car and I love it to death,” Arlington resident Harrison Farrell, 21, said.
Cars displayed included:
1923 Ford T-Bucket
1938 Ford 1.5 Ton Truck
1940 Ford Truck
1960 Volkswagen Deluxe Single Cab Pickup
1977 Camaro Z28
1980 MGB Roadster
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