The best car show you've never heard of Posted 2010/07/13 @ 8:00 PM By Myles Kornblatt
We already have to back away from the title of this article. It was written for dramatic effect. The Iola Old Car Show is really the best car show WE’VE never heard of…and “we” means the internet.
It is hard to call a show that annually attracts six-figure attendance (120,000 is the turnout number that is casually thrown around) a secret event. But if it doesn’t happen in a major city, the world of internet-based automotive journalism doesn’t seem to show up. The internet isn’t the only one missing out. The somewhat remote town of Iola, Wisconsin isn’t consistently visited by many major automotive magazines…except one.
The Iola Old Car Show was founded by Chet Krause, who also founded Old Cars Weekly and Krause Publishing – all headquartered in Iola. In 1973, Krause wanted to do a little more local publicizing for his magazine. He convinced some friends to bring a few classic cars to an Iola Lion’s Club BBQ, and what started out as 20 cars grew to about 200 by 1975. By the end of the decade, it became its own two-day event that needed its own fair grounds.
Today the annual Iola Old Car Show runs the second week in July from Thursday through Sunday. It offers separate areas for pre-WWII cars, post-WWII cars, modified cars, a “car corral” for selling classic vehicles, concourse quality cars, an area for educational seminars, and the largest automotive swap meet in the Midwest. The total numbers are 2,200 show cars, 4,400 swap spaces, 1,000 corral spaces, and 1,600 camping sites, all spread over 300 acres. So the appearance of the show is at the crossroads of Pebble Beach and Pep Boys, with a little bit of Woodstock.
The size of Iola helps maximize one of the enthusiast’s largest dreams: the Midwestern barn find. The rest of the country imagines the Midwest as an area where everyone has enough property to store a few extra cars rather than get rid of them. While not completely true, the Iola Old Car Show doesn’t help to dispel the myth. Because the show is open to all types of cars and draws such a large crowd, show car diversity is a guarantee. We have never seen a Ford Model T share the same space as a Pontiac Firebird and Volkswagen Karmann Ghia, but at Iola, this was part of the Blue Ribbon feature area.
Because this is in Wisconsin, there is a special affinity for the cars from Nash/AMC. These vehicles were born just a few hours down the road in Kenosha, WI, and while the company has been gone for 25 years, the spirit is alive and well in its home state. Every good car show may get a few of the Kenosha-built cars, but Iola is the closest they get to their own feature event.
A featured area highlight the show’s annual theme. This year it was “Sensational Sixties”, celebrating the cars from the 1960s. There are plenty of cars from this decade in other parts of the show grounds, but the featured area uses immaculate examples to tell a story. This was the time when America built its house on horsepower, but the imports began to chip away at the foundation.
One of the most unique elements in Iola is the educational seminar program. The Team to Learn tent runs programs throughout the entire show teaching automotive education through compelling stories. For example, rather than just talking about automotive restoration, the team from GM’s Futurliner #10 told their story about the rebirth of their unique vehicle.
A musician named Fred Beyer (pictured right) hosts the seminar. Where an emcee may just give a quick introduction and leave, Beyer takes ownership of the event. In between presenters Beyer takes to the piano, reenergizing the crowd with excerpts from his ragtime nightclub act. Beyer actually pulls double duty as a presenter. He is the founder of Hot Rod High, a nationwide program designed to keep high school kids interested in automotive/shop classes. Every year he highlights events from this program.
Iola is inevitably compared to the Antique Automobile Club of America’s (AACA) fall event in Hershey, Pennsylvania. They both offer a flea market, campground, car corral, and show field, and they both draw six-figure crowds. However, Hershey is larger and has the associated AACA museum, but Iola has Midwestern charm.
There is special element to the atmosphere here – a feeling that for those four days everyone is part of the same family. It starts with breakfast when the pancakes will be tossed directly from the griddle to your plate (by request), and continues through the wine and cheese event in the evening (more cheese than wine, this is Wisconsin after all.) There is an immediate sense that we are all related through our passion for cars, and Iola is our family reunion.
The Iola Old Car Show was founded by Chet Krause, who also founded Old Cars Weekly
Because this is in Wisconsin, there is a special affinity for the cars from Nash/AMC. These vehicles were born just a few hours down the road in Kenosha, WI, and while the company has been gone for 25 years, the spirit is alive and well in its home state. Every good car show may get a few of the Kenosha-built cars, but Iola is the closest they get to their own feature event.
A musician named Fred Beyer (pictured right) hosts the seminar. Where an emcee may just give a quick introduction and leave, Beyer takes ownership of the event. In between presenters Beyer takes to the piano, reenergizing the crowd with excerpts from his ragtime nightclub act. Beyer actually pulls double duty as a presenter. He is the founder of Hot Rod High, a nationwide program designed to keep high school kids interested in automotive/shop classes. Every year he highlights events from this program.
