Black Diamond Harley-Davidson hosts end-of-season auto show
MARION - Now that cooler weather has finally arrived, don't expect many more car shows around the region.
That's probably why Black-Diamond Harley Davidson owners called theirs Saturday the End of Summer Car, Truck and Motorcycle Show.
The event was organized by the Southern Illinois Corvette Club and featured a selection of show quality cars, trucks and motorcycles with all entry fees being donated to two area nonprofits, Saint Frances Animal Shelter and the Alzheimer's Association.
Becky Dorion of Marion works at the Southern Illinois regional office for the Alzheimer's Association and was on hand Saturday for the car show.
"It's so important we have donations such as this with monies donated to us being used for care, support and research for the disease," she said. "By them doing this it also helps raise awareness to this horrible disease. Alzheimer's disease is always fatal and is the sixth largest cause of death here in the United States."
Among those participating in the car show was the Johnston City father and son duo of Steve and Austin Haynes of Johnston City. The elder Haynes said that he and his son spent countless hours working together over the past seven years putting the truck together.
"We actually found the truck sitting in an overgrown fence row here in rural Williamson County," Austin said. "I was still in high school and just 15 years old. Dad and I did all the work on it in a pole barn, except for the seats, which we had rebuilt by someone else."
After first acquiring the truck, the younger Haynes had a goal of getting it road worthy enough to drive to high school when he turned 16.
As he explained, that didn't happen.
"It needed so much work that we had to take the body off the frame and began a rebuild from the frame up," he said. "So, my next goal for it was to have it ready to drive when I graduated high school, That didn't happen, so we set another goal to have it finished by the time I graduated college. That didn't happen either. I was 21 when dad and I finally finished it."
The bright orange 1970 Chevy S-10 pickup truck sporting a 430-cubic-inch engine turned a lot of heads at Saturday's End of Summer car show in Marion at Black Diamond Harley-Davidson, sponsors of the event.
When kidded about how much money he had invested in the truck, Haynes laughed, "You're looking at a lot of birthday and Christmas presents right there!"<object id="Extra Pictures" type="x-im/image" uuid="951622B1-C838-45C9-851E-40F84AC0D6A3"><links><link rel="self" type="x-im/image" uri="im://image/951622B1-C838-45C9-851E-40F84AC0D6A3.jpg" uuid="951622B1-C838-45C9-851E-40F84AC0D6A3"><data><title><![CDATA[