One last blog for 2015, an end of the year wrap up! Nate Truman’s StarCarCentral.com was started around the turn of this centurty, and has been growing in leaps and bounds every year. From a single 66 Adam West Style batmobile, the idea of building, sharing and driving iconic movie and TV vehicles has grown to include StarCarCentral members around the globe.
In the early years of the hobby, people would fall in love with a famous ride, and the lucky few would buy a piece of movie history from the studios. A few Herbie the Love Bugs, a handful of General Lee’s from Dukes of Hazzard and a Barris replica batmobile were in private hands. Occasionally a short lived star car museum would open up for a while, then close down a year or two later. The cars would be put in storage, or scattered around. George Barris was kean on keeping track of all the famous cars, both the ones he had a hand in building, and anything else that had been on the screen and caught the public’s eye. A couple of big auctions at his Barris’ Kustoms city and at the Peterson, gathered together for a brief time star cars from all walks of media and entertainment in the 1970’s and 1990’s.
If you didn’t get to the museum in Hollywood, or go to these simi-secret auctions that only movie car guys knew about, you would never have a chance to see more than one famous car together.
A few years down the road, fans started gathering for reunions. The biggest of these was “Dukesfest” that happened for several years, and rows of repainted Challengers gathered together. Some other famous cars would show up as well for a group photo. Then interest waned and the shows stopped. Now a new “Fanfest” has been reborn.
Knight Rider fans also banded together and with the help of this new thing “The Internet” started finding other owners of Knight Rider KITT cars. Rob Louisell, Mark’s Customs, Jay Ohrburg, sold fiberglass parts and the fans constantly improved the interior electronics and helped each other find rare parts to get their dream ride on the road. A few gatherings of Knight Riders happened as well.
With the advent of the world Wide Web, every individual star car fan found a home to swap stories and ideas with other owners and fans. There is a Herbie page, lots of Knight Rider pages, 1966batmobile.com, basically there is a fan page for every famous movie and TV car that you can think of!
Even though Nate Truman had been tracking and finding screen used movie and TV cars since the 70’s, it wasn’t until 2003 at Crusin for a Cure that Nate finally decided to make his idea a reality. “Let’s put them all in a pile, and play with them!” So over the last 12 years Nate has collected, connected, and introduced all the star car fans to each other! It wasn’t easy, as many owners thought that their special car was cool, but didn’t want to park or do events with lots of “vehicular Unicorns”. But Nate knew that seeing one amazing rare car out in “the wild” was amazing – seeing a HERD of them was mind blowing! So out of that little new idea, and lots of detective work, Nate Truman’s StarCarCentral.com has become the hub where all the starcars can play together for good. Hundreds of charity events, police, fire, Autism, Make-A-Wish, Pediatric Cancer Survivors, etc. have been able to include a display of famous movie and TV cars never seen before in public. The first “Carsplay” panel at Long Beach Comic Con happened this year and Nate and his team outlined the history of the hobby, and where it’s headed.
So as a cap to 2015, Nate organized his lineup to set a new record. The most famous movie and TV cars in a single parade. Over 40 cars appeared in the 2015 Hollywood Christmas parade! It was a driving, rolling star car museum – brought together for just a few hours, and then disappeared into the night! A big thanks to all the fans, owners, restorers, historians, and bloggers who have helped the star car hobby grow, and make new friends around the world! Here’s the Star Car Central video of all the cars on the red carpet in the 2015 Hollywood Christmas Parade! We have another 20 cars that could have been included, but we were just TOO big! 2015 Nate Truman’s Star Car Central.com Hollywood Christmas parade
So come join the fun in 2016, bigger and better! Email Nate@starcarcentral.com or info@starcarcentral.com if you have a famous on screen ride! With chapters across the United States and around the world, get your toy out and drive it!
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