[title subtitle=”WORDS Dwain Hebda
IMAGES courtesy Razorback Corvette Club, Fort Smith Antique Automobile Club, Arkansas Valley Mustang Club, Donna Redding, and Mickey Calicott”][/title]
Jan Marshall, the spitfire events coordinator for the Razorback Corvette Club in Fort Smith, is caught in a delicious memory. Asked when she first fell in love with the iconic sports car, her mind races back to Cedardale High School.
“Well, I was a senior in high school and saw my first one,” she says, her age transposing from seventy-one to seventeen in an instant. “It was green; I don’t remember what shade of green, with a tan interior, and I lost my mind. It’s the lines that make my heart beat faster. It’s not necessarily the colors; it’s the lines and the aerodynamics. It just called my name and said, ‘You need me.’ That was it for me.”
Jan has owned multiple Corvettes in her life; her latest, a 2009 c6 and red clean to the underside of the hood where a big snorting Razorback graces the liner, is undoubtedly a looker. But the native of Uniontown and retired high school teacher admits to one as-yet-unattained model, the thought of which still makes her go weak in the knees.
“My very favorite one is a ’63 split-window,” she says. “That’s the one I would love to have, and if someone gave me that instead of an engagement ring, I would probably marry them on the spot.
“I aspired to own a Corvette by the time I was thirty, and I did that. I’ve been a gearhead pretty much my whole life. I didn’t need any other car; I didn’t care about Mustangs.”
To rival car enthusiasts, them’s fighting words, West Side Story-style. Ask members of the Arkansas Valley Mustang Club, and they’ll take up as passionately for their choice of ride as Jan does hers.
“I like to get on the crooked road; I raced go-karts for years back in the day when I was young and could get into the things,” says Mickey Calicott, club president. “I like the twisty roads, and the Mustang is a good car for that.
“I really did not know anything about [Mustangs] until I got this first one, and I’ve had a ball with it. I go coast-to-coast and don’t really worry about it; I just keep it up. I can see why Ford sold so many of these Mustangs because they are fun.”
Mickey’s introduction to his now-ride of choice was a family affair and came about largely by happenstance. A dyed-in-the-wool Pontiac fan growing up, he bought a 1968 Mustang coupe six-cylinder for his daughter as high school transportation. When she got a new car to go to college, Mickey’s son John claimed the hand-me-down.
John was as interested in restoring the car as he was driving it, and in following his son around to various car shows, Mickey got the notion to have a Pony Car of his own.
“I’m seventy-five according to some; if you ask others, they’ll tell you I’m twelve,” chuckles Mickey. “I told my son I’d like to have a Mustang too, but I want one to drive; I don’t want a show car. We started looking for a fastback ’67 and found one that had been wrecked in the back and was going to the crusher; no engine, no interior. But that’s all we could find for a fastback because, after the movie Gone in 60 Seconds, everyone was buying them and making Eleanors out of them. I think I paid $300 for it.”
Both Jan and Mickey were led to their respective car clubs out of a desire to share their car passion with like-minded peers. And both clubs mirror each other in many ways: camaraderie, mechanical know-how, the occasional car show, and rally. Both clubs are getting back to live meetings after missing most of 2020, and most are thinning in numbers, too, fifty for the Corvettes, founded in 1983, and twenty for the Mustangs, formed in 1980.
“Well, the original concept, and I don’t think it’s changed very much, is a group of people in Fort Smith owned Corvettes, they were all friends, and they said, ‘Why don’t we form a club for anybody who had an interest in the Corvette?'” Jan says. “We share all of our experiences and create new ones, and hopefully, other people want to join us. It’s just for anyone who wants to get out, drive their car, have a good time, and travel all over the beautiful state of Arkansas.”
Mickey says in addition to the social benefits of the Mustang club, there’s a wealth of technical and mechanical information to be had as well.
“When my son wanted to take over his first Mustang, I told him he needed to get a shop manual and join the Mustang club,” he says. “There are a lot of individuals in that club who have won national championships and been involved for years. It’s a wealth of information. They really helped us with parts, where to get them, all the technical advice, because they’ve been there and done it.”
The two clubs have one other thing in common – they are both come-lately whippersnappers compared with the Fort Smith Antique Automobile Club. That group, currently about forty-five members strong, was formed in April 1962.
“It’s about sharing the old cars, the friendships you make through the years,” says Donna Redding, club president. “Just enjoying going out in the old cars. We do parades if we’re asked, some of the members have been asked to do weddings and we get involved in things like that, too.
“One of my favorite things to do is at Petit Jean Mountain; they have a car show and a swap meet every year in June that’s on the Museum of Automobiles grounds. My husband’s been going to that since 1970. We enjoy that because there are people from different states that we’ve gotten to know there. It brings back a lot of memories for everyone.”
While the club is agnostic when it comes to the make of members’ cars, they require the models to be original and at least twenty-five years old to qualify as “antique.” Members include a little bit of everything, including people who don’t even own an antique car but simply hold an interest in them.
In fact, Donna herself was not a car enthusiast until she started dating her husband, retired longtime Fort Smith businessman Don Redding.
“We did not meet at the club, but that was one of the first activities I went on,” Donna says.
Today, however, she can rattle off car facts and specs with the best of them. She also gets a kick out of the reaction the couple gets when out driving their 1949 fastback Cadillac or their 1956 Cadillac Special.
“They turn heads; everyone loves the old cars,” she says. “People are honking, waving, reminiscing, talking to us about them. It’s just the beauty of the body of the car—that’s what it is.”
For more information on club events, visit these car clubs on their respective Facebook pages:
Arkansas Valley Mustang Club
Fort Smith Antique Automobile Club
Razorback Corvette Club
