Model As On The Lincoln In Joliet, Illinois

[RoadDog]

This past weekend, I drove to Joliet, cruising the Lincoln for part of the way. Unfortunately, there is a huge building boom going on in this area as Chicago continues its expansion in all directions. There is much road construction and traffic all the way from Plainfield to Joliet. I did see one interesting business that only sells Corvettes in Plainfield along the way and will have to get back to check it out.

 

I was to man the Lincoln Highway table at the MARC (Model A Restorers Club) annual convention. About 360 people attended despite the unseasonable cool weather (it snowed three days earlier). I counted about 40 various Model As in the parling lot. This year's theme was "Meet Me at the Crossroads" which certainly fits Joliet. Not only does the Lincoln run through it, but also Route 66, US-52, and US-6. Also, I-80 and I-55 serve the area and that is not even mentioning the railroads and canals.

 

I followed a Model A into the parking lot of the Holiday Inn by I-80. I found our Lincoln Highway table down a long hall near the hospitality room. Illinois LH President Wayne Silvius had been at the table the day before and had left two boxes of LHA Forums, key chains, and pens.

 

During the course of the day, I talked to about 25 people. They had the opportunity to take self-guided tours along 66 and the Lincoln Highway. I told them that both roads are very well marked in Illinois, some of the best signage anywhere.

 

Some of the conversations:

 

One man said he'd had a Model A as a youth and had gotten back into them in 1985.

 

A couple from Joliet talked about the city's huge growth and the downtown renaissance. Not only the old Rialto Theater, but the new museum which features the Lincoln Highway and Route 66, as well as downtown murals and lots of sculpture.

 

One man said that he and a group of Model Aers had recently toured a section of LH.

 

I gave Forums to two men from Maple Park (on LH east of Dekalb) and St. Charles. They were unaware of the organization and seemed interested.

 

Another Model A owner said his vehicle had originally been owned by a person in Grand Rapids, Iowa. He had owned it since 1974 and had driven it from his home in Princeton, NJ, to Grand Rapids. A real Lincoln Highway Model A.

 

A man from Plainfield, Il., said he could hit a gold ball from his house to the LH. He likes to drive the old farm roads, a fast disappearing commodity around Joliet. He didn't know about the unpaved stretch of the Lincoln by Ashton, Il., and will check it out this summer.

 

I can tell you one thing. I don't know how Wayne got those boxes all the way to the table, but those Forums were HEAVY!!!!

 

Keep on Down that Two Lane Highway. --RoadDog

 

This day in automotive history- April 18th, 1906- The fire resulting from the San Francisco Earthquake destroyed the production facilties of the new Sunset Auto Company. Production never resumed.

[roadmaven]

Sounds like a fine 2-lane weekend. My dad's an "A-er" himself, as he's got a '29 Town Sedan and a '31 Tudor. The '31 is quite the story. He originally bought it in 1960 and put it into storage, as he had now where to put it at the time. It never ran, and looked like it belonged in a junkyard. For the longest time I remember mom & dad paid a little old lady $5 a month to store it. Fastforward to 1986 after my mom passed away, dad built himself a garage and brought the '31 home....where it continued to sit for another 10 years! One of my brothers and I finally convinced him it was time to start on it (he was retired 3 years and needed something to do after restoring the '29 he bought in '92), so he took it apart and rebuilt it from ground-up. Now he's got himself an award winner. It's hard to know the history of the '31, but when he bought it in '60, it was black and had old-style Phillips 66 shields on both doors, so at some point in its life it served as a P-66 company car of some sort. Who knows, maybe it once carried around Frank Phillips. Ahh, we'll never know!