Ted Barris

If your travels have taken you by the Uxbridge arena Thursday evenings, over the summer, you might have been drawn into the parking lot by the colour, the commotion or just the sheer number of cars. That is, of course, if you could find a spot to park. All summer long the extra daylight, the warm evenings and word-of-mouth, have brought classic-car buffs to the arena by the hundred to show off their prized possessions.

In fact, last Thursday night, I asked one of the organizers of the Cruise-In car show, Rob Holtby, how many exhibiters had driven in.

“Oh, there’re 250 cars here tonight,” he said. “Yes, it’s getting so popular, we’re even outgrowing this space.”

It all began, Holtby told me, about eight years ago, when he and the Living Water Community Church moved from the Testa Building to the former Dominion Auto building on Reach Street. As pastor for the church at the time, Holtby saw the DA’s large parking lot and wondered how to make use of it other than for church parking. That’s when he and a buddy, retired firefighter Bruce Statton, hit on the idea of a weekly drive-in car show to serve the community. Before long their Cruise-In was becoming a Mecca, so to speak, for classic-car buffs.

“They come in from all along the lakeshore – Bowmanville, Oshawa, Pickering and Toronto – and up to Orangeville, Barrie, Newmarket, Aurora, Keswick and Lindsay.”

And when the car buffs aren’t in Uxbridge on Thursday nights, they’re in towns all over southern Ontario virtually every other night of the week. Holtby is, I guess, very much a product of his age. He’s 63, a Boomer, retired and interested in investing his retirement in something that will give him pleasure and introduce him to new people all the time. That’s what the Thursday night Cruise-In has accomplished.

Like his attachment to his sky-blue, 1967 Camaro, Holtby has discovered in eight years that there are a lot of car fanatics out there who take great pleasure in polishing up their sedans, their convertibles, their muscle cars and even their vintage pickup trucks just for an evening’s outing. And there seems to be every make and model, including a featured car of the week. Last Thursday it was a 1961 Metropolitan Nash.

“But what if I don’t know anything about cars?” I asked Holtby.

“You don’t have to know anything about cars,” he said. “Bruce and I love this because people arrive, flip open their car hoods, set up their lawn chairs and share stories. It’s a kind of community.”

Some even arrive early; last Thursday a guy in a Plymouth Valiant pulled into the arena parking lot in the middle of the afternoon, before the volunteers had set up the yellow police tape and pylons. He had the pick of the best spots to set up, sit down and meet whomever happened to set up next to him. A couple of Thursdays ago, I wandered through the show while walking my dog. My eye caught an odd-shaped compact vehicle, one I hadn’t seen since the 1960s. I approached the owner.

“It’s a 1965 Corvair,” he said.

“Right,” I said. “The one Ralph Nader called a death trap.”

Of course, that was absolutely the worst thing to say to the proud owner. And he quickly set me straight on the unique shape of the Corvair, the economy of its rear-engine design, and how much he hated Nader for the bruising his favourite car had taken back in the ’60s. Of course, my Corvair conversation was exactly the kind of moment Holtby and Statton want to happen. Cars bring together people, spark anecdotes and maybe initiate friendships.

“Since we started this,” Holtby said, “people have asked me to conduct marriages, funerals, all kinds of things … just because we have a mutual love of cars.”

At the end of the show – which isn’t a set time, but when the sun goes down – Holtby hands out door prizes courtesy of helpful sponsors in town. Then, he turns things over to Statton for the 50-50 draw. This night the take-home will be over $500 with the other half going to an Uxbridge charity. Finally, like the pastor he is, Holtby thanks everyone for attending. He reminds everybody about upcoming shows they shouldn’t miss and he finishes with a car-show version of a benediction.

“Remember folks,” he says over the PA, “no loud-pedals when you leave. Keep the noise level down. We want folks here in Uxbridge to invite us back, right?”

Somehow I can’t imagine any of the organizers of the Molson Indy cultivating that kind of relationship with the lakeshore area of Toronto. Holtby and Statton and their Cruise-In pals aren’t into high octane, but a higher level of friendship. Not competition, but a community built on fellowship of the four-wheel kind.

(FYI. There are just two more car shows left this summer – tonight and Sept. 12.)