After our great day on Saturday with the car show and silent auction raising over $2300 we were pumped up and ready to roll toward New York and the Syracuse Nationals. Sunday morning we gathered at the daily driver's meeting and discussed among other things the threat of some morning showers on our way to Knoxville. Boy were we wrong. The threat of showers quickly turned into a very major downpour that we stayed under for the entire 3 hour drive to Knoxville. The planned route was I-75 but rather than do battle with the semis on the interstate I checked my trusty atlas and found that Route 11 ran parallel with I-75 so I jumped off and ran up the four lane to Knoxville. Street Rodder Associate Publisher John Barkley and Senior Editor Ron Ceridono battled the elements in the Roadster Ute bodied all steel 1934 Ford Phaeton that Ron has been driving around the country all summer long. Equipped with high tech foul weather gear, John and Ron arrived in Knoxville just slightly damp.
As we arrived at Barillaro Speed Emporium the rain began to subside. Many local folks had turned out to greet us and the smell of chickens on the grill filled the air. Things were definitely looking better. Jim Barillaro and his sons Mike and Jim have just recently opened the shop but none of them are strangers to the car hobby and performance industry. Father Jim was a very successful drag racer in the New England area in the 1970's and is now one of the nation's authorities on building SOHC Ford racing engines. Sons Mike and Jim have both spent time working at Lokar Performance Products after the family's move from Connecticut. Jim Sr owns two of Jack Christman's famous Comet funny cars from the 70's and they are also in the middle of a restoration project of historical significance. They are working on the 1932 roadster that Edsel Ford had specially fabricated in 1932 as his personal showpiece. It was a very cool stop at Barillaro Speed Emporium and we were sent on our way to the sound of a nitro burning 1970's funny car filling the air. The skies turned blue and life was good again on the Tour.
We arrived in Mooresville NC about 6:30. More Road Tourians joined the group in North Carolina Sunday evening. I had been able to speak to Alex Beam, the owner of the Memory Lane Antique Auto Museum in Mooresville and his graciously volunteered to have a special opening of the museum just for us on Sunday evening. What an incredible place! The front of the museum is a large gift shop filled with all sorts of car related and historic racing related items. As you walk into the museum area itself you are overwhelmed with the amount of cars and collectibles that fill the rooms. Row after row of vintage race cars, antique cars, racing collectibles, soap box derby items and toys are mind boggling. I have seen quit a few auto museums in my travels and Memory Lane ranks right up there for it's size and range of items on display.
Monday morning the skies had cleared and we had a big day ahead. Our first sop in the morning was at Detroit Speed and Engineering in Mooresville. Stacy and Kyle Tucker had relocated to Mooresville from their home in Detroit a few years ago. They have become known in the industry for their high quality suspension components for Camaros. They recently completed an early Camaro for Dale Earnhart Jr and have begun work on another Camaro for Kyle Busch. While we were visiting they were completing a brake upgrade on a Camaro for Rick Hendricks. They just introduced a line of components for Chevelles. The quality of their products and production techniques was evident as we toured their facility. They even took time out of their busy schedule to help one of the Road Tourians replace a starter in their ride so that they could continue on the Tour. Thanks Stacy and Kyle, for a great visit to your shop.
After our stop at Detroit Speed and Engineering we headed northeast toward Randleman NC and our scheduled visit to the Victory Junction Gang Camp. We were all very excited to see the camp and give them the money we had raised on Saturday. We made the drive to Randleman in a few hours and it was a beautiful trip with perfect weather. We were early for our scheduled 1:30 visit at the camp so we stopped at the Richard Petty Museum in Randleman and also had a great lunch at a local diner. The museum had many of Richard Petty's cars on display. It was amazing to see his seven NASCAR Championship rings and realize how incredible that feat was to accomplish.
By 1:30 it was time to head to the Victory Junction Gang Camp facilities. I had been working with Melanie Spencer at the camp to arrange our visit. There are no public tours of the facilities while campers are on site but special provisions had been set up for us to visit during a rest period for the campers. We were actually able to drive our cars into the main camp area and it is a truly amazing facility. I had seen pictures but until you are standing in the middle of it all you do not realize the incredible accomplishment that has been achieved through the work and generosity of so many people. We were joined at the camp by two more street rodders and they added to our donation and the total came to $2520. When I handed Melanie the money she looked at me and said that $2500 represented the amount needed to have a child visit the camp for a week. We had not realized the significance of our efforts until that moment. Because of the generosity of the companies and folks involved in our car show and auction at Coker Tire one more child can enjoy a week at this beautiful facility. It was quite a feeling.
It has been a great week so far on the Coker Tire Tour. We will visit the Harley - Davidson production facility in York on Tuesday and spend Weds morning at Posies shop and Wednesday evening in Binghamton, NY at a Harley and Hot Rod get together at Southern Tier Harley-Davidson. We are getting close to Syracuse but still have plenty to do and see before we arrive at the Syracuse Nationals this weekend. Stay tuned, I will keep you posted.