A total of 260 entrants brought their custom, classic and even a few modern cars to the 26th Toledo Cheese Days Car Show on Saturday, July 11.
Aside from the official entries, extra unofficial entries were brought late or parked on the streets surrounding Toledo Middle School, where the show was held.
Organized by the Toledo Lions Club and other local sponsors, it was first held in 2000 and organized by Steve McNew, Ron Smith and the late Jim Williams.
Proceeds from the car show go to help fund not only next year’s car show and other Cheese Days events, but other Toledo Lions Club events throughout the year and the club’s high school scholarship program.
Other events proceeds go toward include the Jim and Penny Lancaster Fishing Derby, the annual school supply drive and food baskets for families during Thanksgiving and Christmas.
To learn more about the Toledo Lions Club, including how to get involved, visit https://toledolionsclub.org/, or follow the club on its Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/ToledoLionsClub.
As for some of the unofficial entries, one that garnered a lot of attention was a 2005 Ford GT which came to the show later and had no placard. The 2005 Ford GT was brought back by the company as an homage to the legendary Ford GT40, which won the 24 hours of LeMans four times in a row from 1966 to 1969.
The Hertz “Rent-A-Racer”
Legendary American race car driver and designer Carroll Shelby had a hand in designing both the GT40 in the 60s and the modern Ford GT, however, it wasn’t the only car on display in Toledo on Saturday that Shelby had a hand in designing.
Also on display was Michael and Ann Messmore's 1966 Shelby Ford Mustang GT 350H. During the 60s when Shelby was trying to help Ford beat Ferrari at LeMans, Ford asked if Shelby’s company, Shelby American, Inc., could also modify and make performance versions of the iconic Ford Mustang. Shelby agreed and both the Shelby Mustang GT 350 and GT 500 Cobras were born.
During that time, a special arrangement was made with around 1,000 of Shelby’s GT 350s to be given to the Hertz rental car company, with Hertz due to return the cars to Ford at the end of their rental lives so Ford could resell them as the GT 350H model, with the H standing for Hertz.
The Messmores’ GT 350H still bears the famous “Hertz Rent-A-Racer” license plate frame, along with the original black and gold paint scheme Hertz had the cars delivered in — and Shelby’s signature on the dashboard.
The zippy Toyota MR2
A resident of the Tri-Cities area, Zachary Huber often visits Toledo and Chehalis as he has family there, and now he’s making the trip in his dream car, a 1987 Toyota MR2.
“I had been looking at getting one, and I saw this one for sale on Facebook,” Huber said. “It was in mint condition, and I said, ‘Damn, I’m gonna have to buy this.’”
Featuring the iconic pop-up headlights from cars in the 80s, the Japanese import is also right-hand drive and powered by a 1.6 liter supercharged inline-4 motor, the biggest engine Toyota offered with the small sports cars.
The engine produces around 128 horsepower, which may not seem like a lot, until you take into account the car itself only weighs around 2,300 pounds.
“It’s like a little go-kart. It’s definitely got that mid- and high-end power, so you can really feel it. It’s really fun,” Huber added.
Though he has upgraded the car’s stereo system, he’s left the rest of the original equipment manufacture parts on it, and intends to maintain it to keep it as original as possible.
Some off-road survivors
While most of the cars on display had no bumps or scratches, Anthony Fenton brought his custom 1985 Toyota SR5 pickup truck along with Dylon Long's custom 1974 Datsun 620 pickup truck, both of which bore the scars of off-roading adventures.
Both trucks are lifted and equipped with massive off-road tires. And Fenton had just returned from some four-by-four adventures near Naches, where his SR5 ended up standing straight up on its rear end.
“We were cruising along and I thought I was going in the right direction, and I definitely was not,” Fenton said. “It started going onto its side, and I just kept driving into it because last time I went up, that’s how I did it, and it just went right up. This time, it just tipped straight back and pointed right up at the sky.”
And though it also was made for off-roading, Rod Reynolds' 1970 International Harvester Scout actually had its own roll-over incident on paved roads.
Reynolds’ son originally spotted the Scout being stored in the barn of a friend’s grandfather in Centralia. While it needed a lot of restoration work as it had been sitting idle in the barn for two decades, they were able to get it running again around eight years ago.
It took a lot of work to get it running again, as before their friend’s grandfather parked it in his barn, the car rolled over after a crash his daughter was involved in.
“A guy with very limited eye-sight — and I actually knew him when he worked for the county — he had a special permit that allowed him to just commute to work,” Reynolds said. “He side-swiped her and just t-boned her in the intersection when she was going to college over on Locust Street.”
The car flipped all the way over and landed back on all four wheels.
“After that they went and parked it in this barn for 20 years, and then my son saw it,” said Reynolds.
With the roof crushed from the roll-over accident, they decided to just remove it entirely and make the Scout a permanent convertible.
“It sits in my garage, and I drive it when the weather’s just right,” Reynolds added.
International Harvester originally began making trucks back in 1907, and the Scout was created in 1960 in order to compete with other off-road vehicles new to the market made by Jeep, Ford, Chevrolet and others.
By the 1980s though, declining sales forced International Harvester to begin selling its separate equipment divisions until 1985, when the company finally went defunct.
However, in 2020, Volkswagen purchased the name rights to the International Scout, with the intent to bring the Scout back as a new electric-powered, off-road vehicle. According to Car and Driver magazine, the Scout Traveler is due to be released in the consumer market by 2028.
