automotive
Laps for kids
1926 Rolls Royce 20/25 Silver Ghost, Tilbury body, Photos courtesy LeMay American’s Car Museum
1926 Rolls Royce 20/25 Silver Ghost, Tilbury body. Photos courtesy LeMay American’s Car Museum
1937 Fiat Topolino. Photos courtesy LeMay American’s Car Museum
if you dare, and you will find some of the most unique old vehicle insignias, emblems and brand plates anywhere. Don’t leave downtown Sprague without visiting Dorothy and Gary Giddings’ antique store, where you can purchase automobile memorabilia including old car parts that just might make a cool centerpiece in your den or wall art in your garage. Without a doubt, Washington has one of the most renowned automobile museums in the LeMay – America’s Car Museum, in Tacoma. Opened in June 2012, this four story museum was designed to preserve history and celebrate automotive culture. The museum can house up to 350 cars at any one time. The LeMay collection itself has amassed more than 3,500 vehicles. “Everybody remembers their first car, family driving vacations, a sports car or muscle car they fell in love with as a teenager,” says ACM CEO David Madeira. “Personal experiences with cars are at the heart of the American experience, and we’re going to showcase more than a century of automotive lifestyle and history as well as the future of transportation.” The LeMay ACM is so new and the story has not yet become recognized by the world for the significance it is worthy of. From the LeMay website is this historical reference: “Harold and Nancy LeMay amassed the largest privately owned collection of automobiles, trucks, motorcycles, other vehicles and related memorabilia in the world.” At its peak, the LeMay Collection numbered in excess of 3,000 vehicles and thousands of artifacts and was listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the largest privately owned collection in the world; impressive if accomplished by a king, but jaw-dropping awesome when accomplished by a local businessman from Tacoma, Washington. In 1998, Harold and Nancy LeMay formed the 501(c)3 charitable organization, The Harold E. LeMay Museum, now called LeMay – America’s Car Museum, and committed themselves to donating the vast LeMay Collection to the museum for the benefit of the public. LeMay - America’s Car Museum was chartered to secure, preserve and interpret the valuable LeMay Collection, along with additional vehicles and artifacts that it may acquire, in order to explore the broad themes of American mobility and lifestyle in an instructive and entertaining manner. The magnitude of the LeMay Collection, and its power to relate the story of the American experience with the automobile, demands a new paradigm in transportation museums. The museum will be an inviting place, eliciting memories and stories from those who visit. It will provide a venue to explore history, design, technology and restoration. In short, the museum will create “America’s Auto Experience” and become a world-class tourist destination in its own right. Do not miss the opportunity to visit the LeMay ACM the next time you are in Western Washington.
For a preview that will make you want to get in your car right now and make the drive to Tacoma, check out http://www. lemaymuseum.org/
1932 Ford Sedan Delivery. Photos courtesy LeMay American’s Car Museum.
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Spokane CDA • September • 2013