A couple of weeks ago I put together a drive with 10 other Widetrackers to the Gilmore car museum in Hickory Corner's Michigan (NE of Kalamazoo). It was a two-hour drive with half of it going through winding farm country. The Gilmore is literally in the middle of nowhere Michigan. There is a special reason for this road trip. I will explain that at the end. For now, enjoy the sites of the Gilmore on a sunny, cool spring Michigan day.

The Amish buggy was a bit unexpected but very neat to see.

For those of you who have never heard of the Gilmore, it is now the largest car collection in the USA! Over 300 cars are on display at all times with several being rotated in and out.

Ah the Avanti - the car that outlasted Studebaker itself. Dual Quad Pete had one.

Kaiser Darrin - I love how the door slides into the front fenders

I still think this is the best looking Olds Toronodo of all time.

A dual cowled Duesenberg Phaeton? One can only imagine what this car is worth!

Ever hear of a Columbia? I didn't think so.

A gorgeous Electra convertible

This is a real Tucker. I think it is #47

A curious exhibit about the top 20 items that revolutionized the auto industry.

Now we are in the Franklin wing of cars

Lots more cars to come in my next post. Got to do my duty for Mother's Day today.

7 hours ago, Frosty said:

Ah the Avanti - the car that outlasted Studebaker itself. Dual Quad Pete had one.

Detroit's very own Alice Cooper also own's and drives one regularly. He had a small block ford 302 engine swapped into his.

Tuckers really are so cool!

7 hours ago, Frosty said:

A curious exhibit about the top 20 items that revolutionized the auto industry.

This is justa awesome!

Thanks for sharing these with us Frosty one!

Edited May 11May 11 by Wrongway

Very cool 😎

I would be interested to see those twenty things that revolutionised the car industry !

Fantastic thread as always, great pic's.

Now we moving into the Lincoln Room. No, not Abraham Lincoln, Lincoln cars!

Founded by......Henry Leland, the same man that founded Cadillac.

I think the 70s Lincoln Continental was my absolute favorite Lincoln.

Now onto the Brass Era cars.

I have ridden in a 1903 Curved Dash Olds before. It was quite interesting. It's definitely the oldest car I've ridden in.

Lunch was at George and Sally's Diner. Lunch was couple of coney island hot dogs, retro style root beer, and chocolate swirl ice cream for desert. This dinner was moved from Meriden Connecticut.

Moving to the next barn, this is set up as a formal hall with a workin bar. What reception all do you know has an old movie set from an obscure Disney movie and a full scale Wright Brother's Flyer?

This 1930 Rolls Royce Phantom II and the nearby movie set was used in the 1967 Disney movie - the Gnome-Mobile

Moving onto the reconstructed Shell gas station.

This building is brand new. It is clearly intended to be used a reception hall.. These things are huge money makers for museum's like the Gilmore. The Pontiac Transportation Museum has one planned for the near future as well.

Near the Shell gas station is the brick '48 Pontiac. "Mom's Favorite Car".

Stay tuned = there is still more to come.

Edited May 12May 12 by Frosty

More interesting things to see at the Gilmore.

These restrooms were once a train depot station.

Here are some classic 1930s era luxury cars.

Obviously a US Army Jeep is not luxurious.

How about a boat tail Rolls?

How to reverse engineer something that is no longer produced....

How about some Pierce-Arrows?

Moving onto another barn

This is truly a piece of history.....this is the original Bantam prototype Jeep. Bantam delivered this to the US Army for testing. Bantam was too small a company to meet the US Army's demand for these vehicles in WWII, so they were built under license by Willy's and Ford instead. Bantam was awarded a contract to build trailers for these Jeeps for WWII.

Wood wheels were a thing during WWII when everything including rubber and gasoline were rationed.

Moving over to the Ford Model A building/gas station.

This Model A was owned by Thomas Edison, the man who invented the light bulb. He was close personal riends with Henry Ford.

A true ice box from back in the day!

A real Paddy Wagon!

Moving over to the Cadillac/LaSalle dealership building.

How well I remember thei Northstar V8. I worked with many of the engineers that developed this engine for Oldsmobile and Cadillac.

Don't forget that LaSalle was Cadillac's companion car company, just like Pontiac was Oakland's. Pontiac outlived Oakland and was cancelled in 2010. LaSalle was the next longest running companion car company after Pontiac. LaSalle ran from 1927 to 1940. Viking (Oldsmobile), Marquette (Buick) and Oakland were gone well before 1940.

Now we are getting to the good stuff....

An authorized replica of the first car, the Benz. There is also one at the PTM.

A Buick Electra convertible

A '69 Yenko Camaro - does it get much better than that?

Anybody wanna see some cool muscle cars and art? Okay, let's go.!

Who doesn't love a '70 GTO convertible?

This Buick GS is already rare with the Stage 1 kit. However, according to the placard, this car was ordered by someone who know GM's COPO/special order system. The color of this car is NOT a stock Buick color. Instead it is a Cadillac color called Cinnamon Firemist.

Original Shelby GT500 prototype - very cool!

I think this is my favorite Hurst/Olds. I love the hood and the spoiler combo! The HO 455 ain't bad either.....

Now for the main event and the big reason I lead a bunch of Widetrackers 2 hours to see, the Joe Bortz collection of GM Motorama concept cars. Many of these cars are unrestored and in some cases, in poor shape. Still these are cars that GM designed and showed to the public during it's Motorama days in the 1950s and early 1960s. I think the cars will impress you.

While not part of the Joe Bortz collection, this car is significant and it is still owned by GM. It is part of the GM Heritage Collection. This is the Buick Y-Job. This was the very first concept car, designed in 1938! Notice how modern this car is. If you didn't know better, you'd swear this car came out of the 1950s.

Say hello to the 26th Corvette every made. This is one of the original 300 Corvettes that were made in Flint, MI in 1953.

The original Buick Wildcat. There were would be more later on. The Wildcat II concept car (looks like a 50s Corvette) is in the Sloan Museum in Flint.

The Pontiac Parisienne

One of two original Pontiac Banshees built. This has a tri-power V8. The other Banshee is lost and it is believed to have been destroyed by GM.

The Pontiac X-400. The red lever on the console opens the exhaust cut outs!

The Pontiac Bonneville Special. This is one of two built. The other is a green metallic. This car is clearly unrestored.

This Chevy Biscayne is in gorgeous shape.

The LaSalle II roadster was either restored or very well maintained....it's sedan twin.....not so much.

This was truly a unique opportunity to see this cars up close and personal. I have read about most of these cars before but I have never seen them up close except for the Buick Y-Job (which I have seen at past visits to the GM Heritage Collection). The fact that a large percentage of ths display were Pontiacs were more than I could have hoped for.

One other thing to note, this is supposed to be the largest car collection in the USA now (it surpasses the Harrah Collection now). Other than a few examples in the Model A portion or a one of exhibit, there is a serious lack of trucks in this collection. I am told this will change in time. When this collection was first put together, trucks were not considered or purchased. The collection's trustees have had a change of heart in then last several years and are working to add trucks to the collection.

The latest issue of POCI's Smoke Signals ran a story on the Motorama cars. I will scan the article and post it here later.

Edited May 12May 12 by Frosty

As promised, here is the scanned article from the current issue of Smoke Signals about these Motorama cars.

Motorama Article - Smoke SIgnals May 2026.pdf