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The WPC Club,
Inc. 
Plymouth, Dodge, Fargo, DeSoto,
Chrysler, Imperial, Maxwell, Chalmers,
Jeep and Eagle & related
Automobiles. All Mopar / All Years /
All Models
2015 Annual National Meet, July 21-25, 2015 Springfield, Illinois -
pictures and story below
This meet was a first for the WPC Club, a
national meet hosted by a region outside the region. Our Northern Illinois
Region has hosted national meets for over thirty years in the Chicagoland area, proving to be excellent hosts, and
when not hosting most of their members are at our other meets all over the
country. So when asked if they would consider doing a meet at Springfield
they said yes. And once again they did an excellent job.
The meet began on Monday, July 20 with
registration on the 12th floor of the Crowne
Plaza hotel giving a great overview of the Springfield area and the Mopar parking area below. By Tuesday there were quite a
few familiar faces ready to start touring and swapping Mopar
stories.
The first tour was by bus, approximately 150
miles up 1-55 to Pontiac, Illinois. In Pontiac we were met by the official
welcome committee, the mayor, who told us about the town and its many
museums. Two were directly across the street from the Court House, the gold
museum and the Pontiac Car Museum. The museum displays about 20 Pontiacs
from 1926 through the mid- 1980s along with much Pontiac memorabilia and a
great archive of Pontiac literature. Man y then headed to the gold museum
to leam how gold is made into sheets for gold
leaf and other uses. We then boarded a tram to tour the town and see its
many old advertising signs restored on the facades of the buildings. On
this tour we stopped at an artist's gallery to see his artwork then headed
to a great lunch. After lunch we headed to the Route 66 Museum to the story
of Route 66 in Illinois. Among the artifacts was a Mopar
can from the 1950s.
Wednesday saw the group drive to New Salem
State Park where Abraham Lincoln lived and worked before he embarked on a
law career and became a legislator. After lunch the group drove to downtown
Springfield to the Lincoln Presidential Museum and Library. Two things that
really stood out at the museum were the map that showed the ebb and flow of
the Civil War along with the mounting death toll and the room with the Lincoln
casket on display, which was very emotional.
Thursday saw the group head to a tour of the
Caterpillar plant at Decatur, Illinois. The plant primarily manufactures
equipment for the mining industry. The equipment is of a very large scale
and left many breathless.
On Thursday evening we had our membership
briefing on the state of the club and the remaining activities for the week
and learned about our 2016 meet in Maine.
On Friday we boarded two buses and toured
Springfield including the Lincoln Home, Old State Capitol, Lincoln's Tomb,
and the World War II, Korean and Vietnam War Memorials. The home is the
only home the Lincoln's ever owned and recently has been restored. We were
in Springfield 150 years after the President was assassinated and returned
to his home for good. After the tour we reconvened at the hotel for a
parking lot swap meet where many fine parts changed hands, hopefully
resulting in new Mopars hitting the streets soon.
Saturday saw the members get their cars ready for
the show, getting pictures taken, placed on the field and we had rain. It
didn't rain very long then the judging continued. We were testing a new
voting system which worked well and should help with the vote tabulation at
future meets. Saturday evening saw us gather in one of the hotels ballrooms
for fine food and the awarding of trophies. The class winners are pictured
here along with the more major trophy winners.
Long Distance Awards were presented to: Brian
Owens and his 1937 Dodge driven 844 miles from Ontario to the meet; Mike Bonadonna and his 1965 Plymouth driven 1,010 miles from
Florida; and Woody and Sandy Hummer and their 2010 Dodge Journey. The Hard
Luck Award went to R. Michael Noe for issues with his 1973 Chrysler New Yorker.
The Dr. David George Briant
Award for the Spirit of the Meet went to Guy Morice
for his hard work on behalf of the WPC Club. The Lee lacocca
Award was awarded to Ron Glowen for his tireless
work on behalf of the WPC Club at the national level.
As always a national meet requires the help of
many hands to make it look like it is easy. The members of the Northern
Illinois Region and especially our meet host John and Vida Knab for their tireless efforts, the members of the
national board for all the help the provided and last but not least the
members of the WPC Club who decided to spend their summer vacations with
us, it was so nice to see you again. Now it is on to Maine in 2016.
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If you
are a Facebook user,
you can see more photos of the meet events on our club facebook page.
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