A Tiny Town With A Huge Collection Of Classic Cars
By: BY TOM MURPHY (Autoweek)
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
A Tiny Town With A Huge Collection Of Classic Cars
Harbor Springs, Michigan, only has 1200 year-round residents, but there’s no shortage of vintage sheetmetal, especially in summer.
All photos are by Tom Murphy
Small-town America loves its summertime holiday parades, and Harbor Springs, Michigan, puts on a great one every Fourth of July. It's so well attended that this old-money beach town of only 1200 year-round residents probably quintuples its headcount on Independence Day. The cars are a big draw, most of them belonging to summertime residents (from Detroit, Chicago, and much further away) whose families have been boating, sunning, and tending to stately waterfront homes for generations.
We also met up with Gary Dwight, a retired surgeon from the Lansing area who lives in Harbor Springs and has built the ultimate man cave where he stores three Packards, a Shelby Cobra replica, a 1987 Ferrari 328 GTS, and a newer BMW 6-Series.
Porsche Spyder replica.
Porsche Spyder replica.
Willys Woody Wagon.
Willys Woody Wagon.
Cadillac Coupe de Ville.
Cadillac Coupe de Ville.
Cadillac Coupe de Ville.
Ford roadster.
Ford roadster.
C2 Chevy Corvette.
C2 Chevy Corvettes.
Auburn Supercharged two-seater replica.
Auburn Supercharged two-seater replica.
Hot rodding in Harbor Springs.
Buick Riviera followed by a GEM EV.
Buick Riviera.
Mercury Woody wagon.
Mercury Woody wagon.
Mercury Woody wagon.
Oldsmobile wagon.
VW Beetle in pale yellow.
VW Beetle in pale yellow.
This pint-sized Bird classic belongs to Gary Dwight.
Gary Dwight also has quite the man cave in Harbor Springs, and the locals love to see his classics on the road: a 1909 Packard limousine (from left), 1955 Packard Clipper, and the 1929 Packard sedan he bought in 1965 at age 18 and fully restored.
Dwight's 1909 Packard limousine.
Gary Dwight at his man cave.
Dwight's 1987 Ferrari 328 GTS.
Dwight wrenching on the straight-eight in his 1929 Packard.
Out for a ride in Dwight's 1929 Packard, the classics are everywhere.
A vintage Pontiac as seen through the rear window of Dwight's 1929 Packard.
Dwight's 1955 Packard Clipper.
Dwight's Cobra.
A classic MG roadster spotted in Harbor Springs.
A classic MG roadster spotted in Harbor Springs.
A classic MG roadster spotted in Harbor Springs.
Tom joined Autoweek in 2022 after nearly 25 years as an editor at WardsAuto, and 10 years as a daily newspaper reporter before that. He’s been in metro Detroit all his life. His personal cars have been downright practical, and he’s happy paying them off and enjoying several years of debt-free motoring. The craziness of COVID drove him to buy a 1953 Packard Patrician, in honor of his grandfather, who worked at the Packard plant until production ceased in the mid-1950s.
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Just north of me. Been to it a couple times. A little further north is another one a week earlier.
A little less stuffy and hands on than Harbor Springs.
I guess Michigan is most likely where you're going to find this kind of thing.
Can't sleep?
You got it! Actually it was because I couldn't finish this article but was tired and went to bed but I guess the fact that I couldn't finish is what woke me up and made me go back to it to finish it. I didn't think anyone was going to start posting comments on it to put it on the Front (Home) Page in the meantime - didn't think anyone was going to see it. Now I'm going back to bed.
Sleep well
I did. Thank you.
Lots of nice old cars
Yep, and lots of nice old clapboard houses with big front porches.
Sorry for the spaces, it's taken me hours to post this article. Fetch wouldn't accept it, and I had to adjust each photo individually to fit. Had I bought that 1937 Packard Limousine when I was 16 years old that I spoke about in a much earlier article on this site, I could have hung out with Gary Dwight. He's got one hell of a bar.
By the way, this author is not that knowledgeable about vintage cars as you might think. I noticed that for picture number 31 he calls a vintage Chevy a vintage Pontiac.
And since he wrongly identified the car in the background in picture number 31, I'm not surprised that he didn't even TRY to identify the car that appears to be the main subject in picture number 30 which I know to be a 1950 Ford Club Coupe. Why do I know? When my father wouldn't allow me to buy the 1937 Packard limo I had fallen in love with that was sitting for sale at the Sunoco Gas Station around the corner for only $600 and I had the money, he bought a two year old used 1950 Ford Custom Coupe to be shared by my older brother and me so we wouldn't drive HIS car.
Just turned-on TV and Mechun Auto auction is on. A 1960 Corvette just sold for $120,000
Those car auctions are crack cocaine for motor heads.
The dollars they pay underlines that fact for sure.
When I'm looking for articles to post I have to wade through vintage auto auctions and cars for sale that are up to my neck.