Car show a yearly labor of love

COSTA MESA — Inside the small confines of his 1934 flatbed Ford, Gary Amon carries artifacts of a bygone America.

A drive-in movie speaker, salvaged from an old theater in New Jersey, hangs over the driver-side door. Two thick bales of hay occupy most of the open storage space in back. But most prominently featured are the autographs displayed across the interior and exterior — from comedian Drew Carey, news anchor Paul Moyer and music legends Ray Charles and Bo Diddley, among others.

Amon, a retired cargo handler for American Airlines who lives in Anaheim Hills, said he got most of the signatures at car shows around Southern California. It’s an impressive collection, but Amon still looks to add to it.

“A few weeks ago, I was at this Bob’s Big Boy, and I just missed [actor] Tim Allen,” he said on Sunday morning, standing next to his car at the Orange County Fairgrounds’ annual Great Labor Day Cruise.

Amon was one of hundreds of car owners who brought their vintage models down to the fairgrounds this weekend for the 24th annual event. Every year, for the Labor Day weekend, auto buffs from around North America congregate in Costa Mesa and cruise around the fairgrounds from morning until night.

Darrell Moore, one of the event’s board members, said the organizers had two requirements: that all the cars be American-made, and that all were produced before 1972, when the market for muscle cars — high-powered, mid-sized automobiles suited for drag racing — petered out.

“We consider that the last year of our era,” Moore said. “I’ve been racing since I was 16 years old.”

The Great Labor Day Cruise accommodates much more than muscle cars. Puttering around the fairgrounds on Sunday morning, or parked nearby on the sidelines, were vintage black Fords and other brands from the early days of the motor industry.

Dale Amburgey, a superintendent for California Pacific Homes and a Costa Mesa resident, recreated an image from his childhood with his 1928 Ford. A few decades back, he had read a newspaper comic in which a character drove around with an outhouse attached to the back of his car. Amburgey couldn’t remember the name of the strip, but the image stayed with him — and so, when he purchased the Ford, he mounted a mock wooden privy on the back end.

The outhouse isn’t functional, though it does have two seats and a roll of toilet paper inside. Still, Amburgey said, the car garners quite a bit of attention when he drives it around town.

“It’s kind of a car that’s been around eight, nine years that everybody knows,” he said. “So it’s kind of a conversation piece.”