Dan Knight of Worth wanted to take a ride out to Big Rock Sunday morning in order to spend a day with his dad looking at classic cars and trucks.
“This is our fifth time coming here and, as far as car shows go, it’s up there,” he said at the Big Rock Classic Car Show at Plowman’s Park on Sunday. “I moved back here in 2015 and this has always been a good time. There are always good people, great cars, great turnout, just all around one of the best shows I’ve been to in my 36 years of coming to car shows.”
The event offered hundreds of cars including this year’s featured class of vehicles known as “orphans.”
“These orphans are cars that are not made anymore,” said Barb Baie, a member of the committee that organizes the show each year.
The show began in 2011, a deliberate effort on the part of organizers “as our ZIP code here in Big Rock is 60511.”
“That’s how we got started. We decided we were going to do something to celebrate and we came up with having everybody’s cars and whatever,” Baie said.
“This year is just a shot in the dark with these orphans,” Baie said about this year’s featured class of vehicles. “We’ve done the Chevys and the Fords and the Mopars. These are people that don’t get recognized very often, so we’re going with the orphan cars.”
All cars had to be 25 years old or older to be part of the competition, which Baie said always includes at least 25 categories.
“Things are broken down by the year of production,” she said. “We get people from Minnesota, Iowa, Indiana and one year we had a guy from Texas who came from another show and stopped here. People come to this because of nostalgia and knowing cars aren’t made like this anymore. And another reason we have such a big draw is we don’t charge an entry fee. Everything is donated.”
Money, Baie said, is raised each year from the sale of pork chop and chicken dinners which she said “smell so good we draw a lot of people once they start cooking them.”
The one-day show normally draws about 1,000 to 1,500 people.
Knight’s father, Dan Knight Sr., admitted he “infected his son with this car disease” adding that “somebody has to pass the torch and he is the perfect one to send it too.”
“These cars shows are getting bigger and bigger. We started one in our area years ago with four cars and this year, we had 150,” he said. “This is something that is absolutely going to continue. We’re dealing with history here. These are pieces of art and they’re not going away any time soon.”
Lizzy Warner of Sycamore elected to come to the show because cars “are a moment in time.”
“It’s something that people can bond over throughout long periods of history. Some things stay the same and some things change – it’s nostalgic,” she said of the cars.
“These things are made 20 times better than anything we’ll have nowadays,” she said.
Neo Cardoza, also from Sycamore, said he was fairly new to vintage cars but that “seeing all these cars today, it’s amazing how big of a turnout there is.”
“I have a little mechanical knowledge but I’ve never had the chance to drive a car like this. It’s kind of a bucket list thing. I’d love to,” he said.
Theresa Hughes of Hinkley came with her husband Earl and said that for her vintage trucks are her favorite.
“I’ve always loved old cars. I had an old Mustang and my husband had a used car lot. My brother and grandfather had them too. I loved the way things used to be and if things were that way now it’d be awesome,” she said. “I love old trucks and have always wanted one.”
The couple stopped and looked at a 1949 Ford F-1 pickup truck owned by Jerry Klomsten of Whitehall, Wisconsin, who said he got the truck in 1989.
To date, he has spent $300,000 in restoring it to absolute pristine condition, he said. Most of the work, he said, was done by Midwest Hot Rod in Plainfield.
“I got it from my brother-in-law for $500,” he said. “I drive it to shows all the time. It’s only been on a trailer one time. My wife calls it my red-headed girlfriend, but then I say, ‘How many guys can say they take their girlfriend home with them every night?’”
David Sharos is a freelance reporter for The Beacon-News.
