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st e ering committee local car buffs are driven to collect Story by Kim Baer Photos by Rebecca Sell f

September 3, 2006 12:50 am

ROM LATE SPRING TO EARLY FALL, it's car show season.

On Friday nights, parking lots around the Fredericksburg area fill with bright cars that sparkle like jewels in the sun. They're fields of chrome and dreams.

Car lovers like to study the details. Guys, and a few gals, poke their heads under hoods.

Car guys have deeply held opinions and aren't afraid to share them.

Got a new battery in your 1955 Ford? A car guy will point it out. Think your car is all that? The vinyl top on your classic had better be original.

But owning an old car is about more than debating the fine points. After all, as any car salesman can tell you, cars are about dreams. Dreams of freedom. Driving down the road, radio blasting, roof down on the 1966 Mustang convertible. Wind in your face, wind in your hair.

Sometimes, it seems like an old car can drive a man back into his past. When he was wild and free, drag-racing down a strip. When he and a few other buddies piled into a car and just cruised.

A younger man is connected to generations of car guys before him. He's one of them.

In honor of the breed, here's a peek at a few car guys.

Wesley Musselman looks like a wild man. His wavy brown hair is messy, overgrown.

He wears a T-shirt with his name and the Chevrolet symbol airbrushed in cursive.

He likes a hot rod. You ask him why. Oh man, he says, you've just got to drive one.

"You gotta have the gas in your veins," he says.

He rebuilt a 1973 Chevrolet Nova SS. It's not a classy car, not a rare car. But it can't be ignored. He had it painted bright yellow. He says his grandson wanted a yellow race car.

The car belonged to his brother-in-law. It was sitting behind his garage in King George County, covered up by weeds, until he re-built it.

"To most people, it would have been junk."

The car was his first total restoration. He tore off the frame, redid the motor, the seats, everything. It was torn completely apart, he said.

There are show cars, transported from show to show in trailers and pampered. Man, those cars' tires don't even touch the pavement, Musselman says. Then there are hot rods.

"A hot rod is something you drive."

It's not just the drive, Musselman explains. It's hopping in the car, crossing your fingers, hoping nothing leaks.

He's working on a 1956 Chevrolet Nomad wagon. His dream car is a 1957 Chevrolet Bel Air, but he can't put his finger on why.

"Something about the way it looks. If you do it right, they look real good."

Ernest Bareford is a Ford man. Always has been and always will be.

"I never will change until I die," the 76-year-old said. "Take it or leave it. That's me."

When he was younger he never kept a car for long. He had some beautiful cars.

"I was crazy about automobiles."

One stands out. A 1954 Mercury Monterey Sun Valley. The car had a transparent roof. You could look through it at night and see the stars and the moon.

He didn't keep it for more than a year before he traded it. He never saw another one like it on the road. He found out later why: Ford had made only about 9,000 of them.

"I didn't even know what I had."

He now has a 1965 Buick Skylark and a 1966 Mustang. He goes to car shows nearly every weekend. His wife of 55 years tags along.

"She don't have any interest in these cars. She just wants to get out of the house." he says.

He doesn't like driving his Mustang. It shakes, rattles and squeaks. The Buick is easier. It has power brakes and power steering. His wife loves that Skylark. She's crazy about it.

Everything still works after 41 years, Bareford says. He shuts the driver's side door. It lands with a heavy thud.

"Hear that solid sound?" he says. "Just as solid as the day it was made."

In high school, Ray Bohlayer raced cars. On Friday nights he headed to Old Dominion Speedway in Manassas. He'd drive his 1967 Acapulco Blue Mustang Fastback.

Bohlayer left his racing days behind years ago. But he still has Mustangs. One is a 1966 Mustang GT coupe. It's dark green. A special material was mixed into the paint to make it sparkle, Bohlayer explains. It looks like glitter. He calls it metallic.

Bohlayer points out the details. The seats embossed with racing ponies. That was part of GT's pony interior, he says. The new chrome door handles. The wood grain on the steering wheel, dash and glove box.

He recites the statistics. But ask him about his dream car and he lights up.

"Ever heard of the Shelby Mustang? Mr. Shelby?"

He shares the story. Carroll Shelby designed a special Mustang in 1965. It was a race version of the mustang. Racing stripes. Bigger engine. The car is rare now.

Hertz had a Shelby for rent, Bohlayer says. People would rent the car on Friday nights and go out to drag race.

He can't have his dream car. The rare cars are too expensive. But he has a close second. He turned one of his Mustangs into a Shelby clone.

Bohlayer is a grown man. With his graying hair, he looks more dad than racer. But when he drives down the road in his Mustang, people of all ages give him thumbs up. When he stops at a stoplight, he gets compliments.

"It makes me feel like a kid again."

Steve Lambrose

Steve Lambrose likes the basket cases, the cars that look like they can't be brought back. His first restoration was one of them.

He rebuilt a 1955 Chevrolet 210 last year when he was 23 years old. The car was almost completely gone. It was wrecked in the front. The glass was broken out of it.

He pulled the body off the frame, put in new floor pans. Sandblasted the car inside and out. Redid the whole body and interior; rebuilt the engine.

"There was not one bolt or screw left on it."

He brought it back, he says, to something even better than it was originally. The car's a 1950's beauty, bright blue and white, sharp fins in back and a shiny chrome fender in front.

Lambrose just laughs when asked how much time he spent on the car.

Three years working in the garage of his Spotsylvania County home. A lot of late nights. He likes it that way.

"It's peaceful out there, nobody's bothering you."

His car buddies like to tease him about his hobby. They say it keeps him from having a girlfriend.

Lambrose should advertise his availability in the newspaper, they joke. He bristles. He can find a girl all on his own, he retorts.

For now, he's at work on another car. He shakes his head when asked to describe the 1967 Mustang.

It's wrecked. It has no frame. Lambrose isn't worried.

"I'll restore that one into a show car."

Ronald Dotson

Ronald Dotson doesn't belong to a car club. Too many rules and regulations, he says.

Besides, he doesn't like it when he sees cars at the car shows with signs that say "Don't touch."

He wants people, kids especially, to be curious about his 1932 Chevy.

He got the car so he and his 14-year-old grandson could ride around. He had another reason, too.

"A car like this is something I used to dream about as a kid," he says.

He likes old cars because they are prettier than what's put out today, he says. It's craftsmanship. These cars weren't made by robots, he says, running his hand along the sloping curve of the back fender.

"It's got a design of its own."

In the summertime, Dotson, who is in the process of a retirement move to North Carolina, always had a big family picnic at his Stafford County home. He took relatives for rides. They eat that up, he says.

He too has a dream car. A 1957 Studebaker Golden Hawk. He almost got one.

"I was at the right place, but I didn't have the cash."

He names the one that got away.

A 1967 Camaro, the first year the sports cars came out. It was a super sport with a high performance engine, a burgundy body with a white vinyl top and louvers on the hood.

But he got married, and back then his wife couldn't drive a standard shift. They traded the Camaro for a 1966 Chevelle.