Aug. 2 — The Mistress in the garage

Car show displays products of late nights and patient spouses

Susan Schell / of the Herald

The crowd lined the entrance to the Puyallup fairgrounds in the early morning light, straining their necks to get a glimpse of the beauties parading by.

Roadsters, muscle cars and vintage classics rolled proudly through the gates, sporting blinding whitewalls, custom pin striping and “don’t sneeze on it or I’ll kill you” paint jobs.

There were enough automobiles at the 20th anniversary of the Goodguys Pacific Northwest Nationals classic car and hot rod show last weekend to please just about every car buff imaginable. But underneath, some of these babes had undergone some extensive plastic surgery. It was a pretty good bet that each gleaming model had hours of labor and some serious bucks stacked behind her. If they could talk, each one could probably tell tales of late nights in the garage, global searches for parts and one very patient spouse.

“My wife calls this ‘the mistress in the garage’ because I spend more time with it than I do with her,” joked Don Blakely, whose 1941 Chevy pickup took three and a half years to restore. “I found it here in town in a dentist’s garage. It had been sitting there for about 10 years. It was in bad shape, but it was all there. His wife was doing cartwheels when I took it away.”

Blakely completely rewired the car and moved the gas tank from under the front seat to the back near the bumper. The car has now been in the family for 17 years. He has pictures of his son posing by the Chevy with prom dates two years in a row.

Cars often end up as photo album nostalgia, symbols of eras of one’s life. Some search for years to find their “mistresses;” others are uncovered in a moment of serendipity.

Mel and Pattie Pleas had no idea they were constantly passing their dream car on the way to their favorite restaurant.

“We drove by it for about four or five years,” Mel said. “It was sitting in a bunch of junk surrounded by old, old farm equipment. You could just see the curve of the very top of it. Boy was I surprised when I found out it was a Caddie.”

What they originally thought was a Chevy turned out to be a 1941 ’62 series Cadillac Coupe. The Pleases bought the car for $1,500, restored it and painted it a gorgeous “dark cherry,” a deep, rich brown that glints with reddish highlights in the sun. The Coupe has since traveled about the Pacific Northwest, delighting its owners and picking up awards at shows here and there. The Caddie took home three trophies from Abbotsford, B.C., and won Best In Show in Polson, Mont.

Dennis Felt, on the other hand, had been searching high and low for his Oldsmobile before stumbling upon one in Spanaway.

“You know how hard it is to find a two-door hard top like this?” he said, patting the roof of his resplendent green 1953 Olds. “I had one in 1960, but a gal hit me and totaled it. Since then I had been looking for one for years.”

Ironically, he spotted his prize while heading to a car show.

“I was driving through Spanaway going to Harold LeMay’s car show. I passed this car lot and saw a glint of green. Sure enough, it was a ’53 Olds. It was the oldest one he had and it was exactly what I wanted. It had been sitting since 1991. I made a deal right there and bought it.”

Felt’s Super 88 holiday hardtop required little modification.

“Everything underneath is intact,” he said. “It’s all original.”

Felt takes out the original title to the car.

“This is a Washington car,” he said. “It was shipped to a dealer in Seattle and has never been out of the state.”

Felt did replace the upholstery with leather.

“This is real cow,” he said. “If I’m going to drive I want some comfort.”

Richard Greiner brought his red 1950 Crosley hotshot from Yakima to try to sell it at the Goodguys show. He found it in Spokane’s Little Nickel and embarked on what turned out to be a very long restoration job.

“It was all rusted out,” he said. “I had to rebuild everything, even the panels.”

Greiner said the Crosley was manufactured in Cincinnati and was considered America’s first economy car, but the company went out of business in 1952.

“When I drive it, people stop me all the time and ask where it was made. ‘Europe? Asia?’ They didn’t know they made cars in Cincinnati at that time.”

Greiner’s good friend did body work and the pair worked on the Crosley in Greiner’s garage every Wednesday and Friday night for 15 years. It was hard work but a lot of fun.

“The point wasn’t to just bang it out,” Greiner said. “Sometimes we would work, sometimes we wouldn’t. My wife is a very patient woman. It was a labor of lunacy.”

The Crosley is up for sale because the Greiners bought another car and were running out of space.

Richard Johnson said he would never part with his 1932 two-door Ford sedan.

“My wife keeps asking how much money is in this car, but there’s no amount of cash I’d sell this car for. It’s a keeper.”

Johnson’s was one of 14 cars represented at the show by Grafitti Vintage Car Club in Lakewood. He picked up the body for the sedan in Montana in 1988 and pieced it together until 2003. He replaced the engine, installed a TCI chassis and refurbished the upholstery, but more importantly, Johnson seems to have found the key to keeping a partner happy when one gets completely enraptured with a machine.

“My wife feels like she’s a part of all this,” he said. “I let her pick out the color.”

The Goodguys event played host to more than 2,000 car enthusiasts this year.

Reach reporter Susan Schell at 253-841-2481 ext. 315 or by e-mail at susan.schell@puyallupherald.com.