All sizes — and the weather— a perfect fit for Lions Club Car Show

OREGON — They came in all sizes, shapes, and colors — a perfect fit for car and truck enthusiasts on a picture-perfect day at Oregon Park East.

The Oregon Lions Club’s Annual Father’s Day Car Show drew a 155 vehicles on Sunday, marking a new record in recent years.

“”It’s a record for us,” said Ron Arneson, who organized this year’s show with Doug Aken. “We had some cars here today that I had never seen before.”

With temperatures in the 80s and sunny skies with zero threat of rain, Mother Nature provided the perfect “car showing weather”.

“We want this weather every year,” said Aken, smiling.

Oliver Sosa, 3, of Oregon, walked by Tony Loding’s “Wild Thing” a super-charged 1967 Chevy Camaro pro street entry.

Sosa was dwarfed by the Camaro’s 496 Big Block GMC engine as he walked by it with his mom and day, but he was more concerned about the car’s purple paint job and white wispy streaks that he decided were ghosts.

“It’s got monster eyes,” Sosa said. “It’s too scary to go in there.”

Next to Wild Thing was a 1971 Chevy pick up truck with matching Shasta camping trailer owned by Pat Brown and Dan Rusk of Pecatonica.

“I bought the truck last September to match the camper which I found in Florida,” said Brown. “I had to redo the whole camper inside and it took me the whole summer. I waited to paint it until I found the right truck so I could match the paint.”

Down the row, Alan Wagner’s diminutive 1959 Berkley Roadster was nestled in between two muscle cars.

“It’s 10′ long, 4′ wide and only weighs 740 pounds,” said Wagner who has owned the car for 22 years.

“It had a British motorcycle engine in it originally, but it was a 2-cycle engine that ran on a mixture of gas and oil so I put in a 1986 Honda Rebel engine in it,” he said. “It only holds 6 gallons of gas, but I’ve gotten up to 75 mph gallon, but that is running under 50 mph.”

Herb Olujic of Mt. Morris, was busy cleaning the windshield of his 1962 Impala SS. “It’s pretty much original except for one paint job,” he said. “I’ve owned it 10 years. I bought it at the Hampshire car show. It originally came from Texas and I am its third owner.”

Ron Kunstman, 73, of Lindenwood brought his 1954 Chevy Bel Air to the show.

He has owned the car for 15 years and one of his first cars was a 1955 Chevy. “It was a lot like this one,” he said.

A sign, located below the front license plate said “No riders, except brunettes, blondes, and redheads”.

“Now at my age, anyone with gray hair is OK too,” he said chuckling.

The Lions Club also served a pancake breakfast in the morning and then pork chops and bratwurst in the afternoon.

Earleen Hinton

Earleen Hinton

Earleen creates content and oversees production of 8 community weeklies. She has worked for Shaw Newspapers since 1985.