Blue Ridge Car Show

Each year about this time the Patrick County Ruritan Club plays host to one of the finest custom and antique car shows in SWVA. It's an event I have seldom missed in years past. Saturday morning I wandered over to the Patrick County High School parking lot to check out this years version. I wasn't able to stay for the whole day, but the few early bird entrants I did check out promised a very good show this year.

Of course there were early Mustangs...














And early Chevys such as this '61 Impala bubble top with a 409 V8...








































But the star of the show, at least by late morning when I had to leave, was this stunning vehicle...


















































Built in 1929, it's hard to believe in less than 25 years it had evolved into this Raymond Loewy design which New York's Museum of Modern Art called "a work of art"...













Yes, I'm being purposely evasive, in order to give you a chance to name the Marque that produced such beautiful automobiles during the second quarter of the 20th century. (For comparison purposes the pink Ford sitting alongside is one year newer than the '54 Commander, which was by then a year old design.) Sadly, Studebaker died a slow painful death in the mid to late Sixties.