Destinations: The Hot-Rod Evangelist

Patrick C. Paternie

10/01/2006

By and large, most new cars don’t excite the senses," says Gary Meadors, president of Goodguys. "You can’t take them apart, fondle them, and then put them back together like a hot rod," he explains. "You can install a stereo or TV, but not much else."

By new cars, Meadors means vehicles produced after 1972, the year in which automakers began making more technologically complex cars to satisfy government regulations.

A 1961 Chevy (top photo) and early ’50s Lincoln (bottom photo) cruise the show’s Main Street to see and be seen by the crowd. (Click images to enlarge)

Meadors, who grew up in the ’50s "dragging Main Street" in the central California valley farm town of Dinuba, built his first hot rod at age 14. He lowered the suspension of his 1947 Plymouth coupe by cutting a few coils out of the springs, added moon hubcaps, a louvered hood, and a scalloped paint job, and drove fast enough to earn himself the nickname the Dinuba Kid. Today, he jokingly calls himself the "Billy Graham of hot-rodding."

At least 70,000 hot-rodders belong to his flock, formally known as the Goodguys Rod & Custom Association. Meadors founded Goodguys in 1983 to host hot-rod car shows and vintage drag racing events. Today, Goodguys annually hosts about 25 events in 15 states. One of its oldest events is also its largest; the Goodguys PPG Nationals in Columbus, Ohio, draws more than 6,000 hot rods, customs, classics, and trucks, each from 1972 or earlier. The March vintage drag race at the Famoso Raceway in Bakersfield, Calif., features more than 500 participants, 1,500 hot rods and customs, and 50,000 spectators.

A 1955 Buick sports lakes pipes side exhausts and a lowrider attitude. (Click image to enlarge)

Last spring, when Goodguys held the Del Mar Nationals at the venerable fairgrounds near San Diego, I witnessed how Meadors practiced what he preached. He insisted on meeting me at the gate so we could cruise down the show’s main drag, just like the attendees in their custom cars and hot rods.

Meadors arrived in the perfect cruiser: a pristine 1957 DeSoto hardtop coupe with a white-and-lipstick-red interior. Long, low, and wide, the car was equipped with a push-button automatic transmission, original Hemi engine, real wire wheels, and the de rigueur Chrysler Forward Look swooping tail fins.

The Del Mar Nationals includes a special exhibit of Southern California surf woodies, such as this rare 1947 Oldsmobile. (Click image to enlarge)

Navigating the big DeSoto up and down the aisles of the event, Meadors scoped out the details on various cars and occasionally stopped to chat up the owners of cars that especially caught his eye. It was easy to see why the hot-rod crowd flocks to his events. Besides being the original Goodguy, Meadors is a real car guy. He gave up a successful career as a sales manager in a large corporation for the hot-rod lifestyle. It is a family affair that, in addition to his wife, Marilyn, includes one of their two sons, Marc, who is a vice president in the Goodguys organization."Hot-rodding is just what we did," Marc says about the family trips where everyone piled into the chopped 1932 Ford two-door sedan and set off for various hot-rod shows across the country. "Our neighbors went boating or drove their RVs, but we just got in the hot rod." That car, which is still in the family, is the basis of the Goodguys logo.

Meadors counts hot-rod legends such as Sam and son Chip Foose, Andy and Roy Brizio, and Boyd Coddington as his friends. Despite his professional standing, he understands that hot-rodding must never lose its appeal to the guy who prefers to build his own car as a personal statement.

Goodguys’ events draw a wide variety of vehicles from professionally built show cars, like this 1936 Ford coupe (top photo) to 1950s-style Mercury and Ford street cruisers (bottom photo). (Click images to enlarge)

"I call this the last frontier of automotive art," Meadors says of the hot-rod hobby. "There are no rules. Our doors are open to everybody from the high rollers to the kid who just paid two grand for his car, and everyone in between."

After spending six hours trooping around the fairgrounds, I agreed. There were woodies and homebuilt hot rods, kids with tattoos that matched the spidery decorations on their primered rat rods, grandfathers driving their grandchildren around in Metalflake T-buckets, muscle cars, pickup trucks, and lead sleds. The full-scale cars had glittery scale-model counterparts shown in the arts and crafts exhibit halls. Wheel and tire manufacturers also displayed their wares, along with the makers of shifters, engine blocks, carburetors, and anything else you could use to build, fix, and paint a hot rod.

For $10, you could have your picture taken in the cockpit of a 192 mph slingshot dragster that was a National Hot Rod Association record holder in the ’60s. Even better, you could sniff the nitromethane fumes from the fuel and listen to the ear-piercing exhaust note when the engine was periodically fired up.

If you see something you like, it may be for sale, like this wicked-looking 1933 Ford coupe. (Click image to enlarge)

Although Meadors’ assertion that the automotive apocalypse occurred in 1972 is debatable, a straight-axle, primered ’55 shoebox Chevy gasser might look pretty good sitting next to a Ferrari F430 in my dream garage.

Goodguys, www.good-guys.com