Books for the Car Guy in Your Life

Jacksonville has long been a mecca for car enthusiasts and collectors, due in part to the city's unique automotive history. Bystanders gazed in wonder as John Einig drove Florida's very first steam-powered horseless carriage through the streets in 1889. Fred Gilbert opened the first automobile dealership in 1903, just before the city's first automobile parade, and people were soon clamoring to buy cars of their own. Claude Nolan, whose local dealership has been in business for well over a century, gained fame for racing his Cadillac against an airplane at the Jacksonville Fairgrounds. NASCAR held races at the Jacksonville Speedway in the '50s and '60s. Author Dorothy K. Fletcher explores the rich history and memories of car culture in the River City.

When Bristol's racetrack opened in 1961, tickets were often given away to fill the 18,000 seats. Over the years, Bristol Motor Speedway has grown to 160,000 seats and legendary status among race fans. There is a fascination with the unforgettable moments that take place at the track, including rivalries that are hard to miss when you can watch all the action around the half-mile track no matter where you are seated.

Night Salvage is a nocturnal love letter to three rarely seen collections of junk cars, lost in the deserts of Southern California. Follow the author as he haunts these vehicular graveyards. Even as he paints his scenes with light during the lengthy time exposures, he paints pictures with words as his essays capture the essence of the experience. Drift with him like a ghost through these strange sites: a classic abandoned High Desert junkyard; a TV and movie prop vehicle graveyard; and a little known art project, consisting of thousands of cars, forgotten up a remote canyon. Whether you're a fan of automotive history or creative photography, riding into the night with Troy will be an unforgettably mind-bending journey.

Spokane, located just 20 miles from the Idaho border, is the largest city in Eastern Washington, and during the 1940s, it became a center point of an evolving postwar hot rod community. Auto sports were expanding at this time from stock car and midget racing to street cars and drag racing. Local car enthusiasts joined together with an influx of military personnel and college students who were just as passionate for hot rodding, and it was during this time that the Spokane hot rodding culture started flourishing. Together, they pushed the boundaries of hot rodding and created lifelong bonds in the process. This book explores that evolution of inland northwest hot rodding from the mid-1940s to the mid-1960s, starting with the jalopy-styled hot rods that began popping up on local streets to the formation of new clubs and organized racing.

In Abandoned Vehicles of New Hampshire: Rust in Peace, renowned illustrator and photographer, Jerry LoFaro, takes us on an inspiring photographic journey through the wilds of New Hampshire as he uncovers the automotive relics of a not-too-distant past. It's a breathtaking, peaceful, and sometimes sobering look at the remains of a wide variety of cars, trucks and buses that are both enhanced and softened by nature's blanket. What began for the author as purely an exploration of color and dramatic abstract compositions slowly and unexpectedly evolved into a very personal odyssey as he shares stories and humor about his own history and family. To take it a step further, music, art and cinematic references abound enrich the photos in a surprising and entertaining fashion. This approach is further accented by the words of many notable musicians, artists, and others who were invited to contribute captions to the images in the author's "added bonus" approach to the subject matter. An unusual and creatively imagined book on rusty stuff, readers will enjoy finding a few extra "thrills and shocks." Step inside!

Discover the current condition of many of the old cars, trucks, and other motorized vehicles across the state of Minnesota. Through her photography, author Julie Bronson takes readers on a journey to some of the rusting relics stationed at various locations in the North Star State.

Many only see beautiful old cars after they have been restored, and fail to realize that many weren't as fortunate. It is rare for one of these relics to be refurbished and able to travel the highways once more. Most are left to "rust in peace." In Rusting Relics of Minnesota: Evading the Crusher, discover the nuanced beauty hidden in back lots and other out-of-the-way locations.

Hydroplane racing burst onto the Seattle scene in 1950, and local sports fans embraced it with a passion that is hard to imagine. Throughout the early 1950s, thousands of fans flocked to Lake Washington to watch classic races between Seattle's Slo-mo-shun boats and a fleet of East Coast challengers. For over 40 years, hydroplane racing was synonymous with summertime in Seattle. During its golden age, when "hydro fever" was at its height, drivers like Bill Muncey, Ron Musson, and Mira Slovak were sports heroes on par with today's Ken Griffey Jr. or Ichiro. Seattle became the "hydro" capital of the nation.

Hot Rodding began in Southern California in the 1930s and had spread throughout the United States by the mid 1950s, spawning the sport of drag racing and the advent of the Detroit "muscle cars" of the '60s and '70s. Hot Rod Magazine and the National Hot Rod Association promoted the formation of responsible car clubs to combat the delinquent reputation of hot rodders, earned through illegal street races and Hollywood's portrayal in "B" movies. And thus were born the Middletown Pacemakers in 1951.

The Pacemakers brought southern Ohio its first reliability runs (1952), custom auto shows (1954), and drag racing competitions-setting national records (1958, '63, '64) and winning national championships (1963, '64, '65). When the hot rodders were not busy upgrading their drive train for more horsepower or "chopping" and "channeling" for improved performance, they could often be seen on the streets of Middletown feeding expired parking meters or rescuing motorists whose cars had broken down or run out of gas. By 1966, as was the fate of so many hot rod clubs, the mass production of Detroit muscle cars ushered the Pacemakers to fold.