As the summer winds down...

Here is our second featured vehicle from the 1st Annual KJM Car Show.

Nathan B. took some time away from working on his Farmall tractors and his '66 Charger (surely to be featured in next year's show, right?), to bring out his 1991 Ford Mustang GT convertible.

Nathan has owned this white pony for almost ten years, and in that time he has added a sweet sounding exhaust and some steeper rear-end gears. He doesn't mind that automatic shifting the gears for him, especially with 3.73's.



When Nathan bought this low-mile beauty, he knew that only his brother would be wrenching on it. He only takes it out on only the nicest days during the summer.



You see a lot of fox-body mustangs out there, and many would agree that the 1991-93's are the nicest looking. I can only imagine what Nathan plans in the future to make this look, and sound, even better.

And the winners are...

We will be featuring each of the vehicles that made it to the show beginning with this award winner.

The first will be Dave S. from Becker. He brought his 1969 Pontiac GTO. Dave has owned his Goat for over two years. While many muscle car guys are always working on their rides, Dave considers this to be a completed project--more time for something else, right?




This orange beauty has a 400 cubic inch motor, an automatic transmission, and a 3.73 gear rear end. This is a Ram-Air 400 which makes more than 360 horse from the factory.


The only change that Dave made was switching out the 4-speed manual and adding the automatic. He actually drives the car and doesn't care for sitting in traffic with that heavy clutch always pushed in.




Did I mention it was an award winner? This '69 GTO was voted "Kid's Choice" by the twelve and under crowd at the show. I know my oldest daughter liked the car--especially the color.









Here is Dave S. receiving his trophy from Laurel J.






Look for him out and about on the local cruise scene.

Did you notice?

Time for a change. You will see some different things on the top and bottom, and in the middle I guess, of this blog.

The name Minnnesota Muscle Cars and Street Rods has officially changed to Minnesota Muscle Cars, Street Rods, and Cruisers. There are lots of cool rides out there that don't fit into the muscle car or the street rod label, but I think would line up nicely under the cruiser title. Of course this means that we have at least one more trophy to give out next year.

By the way, here was what they looked like:



The Best Street Rod trophy had rods on it instead of muscle cars, but you get the picture.

I have also included two new links at the bottom of the site. One thing I have neglected is sharing more information about what the goals for the show are. One is to celebrate Kenny's life instead of mourning his death. Another is to get more young people, who normally wouldn't be able to go to camp, to be able to afford to go by raising money for a scholarship fund at Camp Lenanon. The Camp Lebanon Blog has updates from the everyday events, and the Camp Lebanon Home is a link to the main site with all the information you could ever need.

I am working on a surprise addition to the site in the near future.

I think your going to like it...

August 15th, 2009...

Mark your calendars now for the 2nd Annual KJM Car Show. That's right ladies and gents. We had so much fun, we are going to do it again, and again, and then again after that. We have some great ideas on how to make it bigger and better than ever.

So, were you there? While it was hard to count as people went in and out, there were about 75-100 guests there looking at the cars/trucks. We had 24 entries up for voting. Everything from a bone-stock Chevy to a John Deere bike were entered.



Next year we will be expanding a few more categories.

I was up getting stuff ready until about 2 am the night before and was up at 6 am the morning of the show getting the final details wrinkle-free. Now we know what works, and what doesn't.



One thing I was surprised at was that I passed out a whole pile of car show fliers over the summer, but the best 'advertising' I did was to put free ads in the local papers in their 'events' section. These brought in almost half the cars to the show.

Well, we have a few more ideas as to how to get more people out and to raise more money for Camp Lebanon ( http://www.camplebanon.org/ ). Go check it out.

Over the next several weeks, the owners who brought out their sweet rides will be featured here on the website. So, check back once or twice a week to learn more about those who made it to the show.

And away we go...

The show is nearly here. It seems only a few days ago when this was nothing but an idea, but here we are--three days away.

The food has been ordered, the signs have been painted, the paperwork has been organized.

So far this week, I have fielded a few calls each day from local hot rodders wanting to know more about the show, where the show exactly is, when the cruise is beginning after the show...

So here is a quick recap.

The show officially runs from 10 am until 2 pm. The show car entrance will be on the south side of the Becker Baptist Church with the guest entrance being on the west side. Signs will point the way from HWY 10 in Becker to the show. Show car registration begins at about 9 am. Voting for the three awards will be closed at 1 pm with a ceremonial presentation at 1:30 pm.

The cruise down to the Anoka River Run will meet back at the church parking lot at about 4 pm and will leave shortly there after.

There will be hot dogs, pop, water, chips, and cookies available for sale--it may end up being the greatest lunch you have ever had!

So, what will I personally be taking to the show? You will see my '85 Suburban trailering my wife's '57 Chevy wagon.




The Burb is a nearly bone-stock cruiser that gets the family to each show and cruise in style. The '57 is a project car my wife picked up last fall. It needs 'some' work, but there isn't much cooler than these old wagons, right?

The one thing no one can control, the weather, still looks good. We go on rain or shine. If there is a tornado, we will move the show to my parents house since tornado's don't strike twice in the same place, right?

Shifting gears and burning rubber,

geoff