MG Day '99 @ M.O.T.

Well MG Day is finally behind us and what a great show it turned out to be! We had 75 MG’s show up at the Museum of Transportation on Sunday June 13. The day started out foggy, but by 7:30am, the sun was starting to shine and the day turned out to be partly cloudy and very warm. Ellie and I arrived at 8:30am to begin the setup for the show and as we arrived we saw that a MG Midget was all ready parked on the lawn and the show wasn’t suppose to start for another hour and a half!! Jack and Jan Horner showed up shortly after we arrived to help with the setup. Jack and I decided that this year the MGA’s were going to be parked under the trees for a change instead of out in the open so it would be a lot cooler for our members. This really worked out well and will become the norm for years to come! Bruno and Janet Ilmonen, Dick Fabrizio, Bob and Sylvia Freerksen showed up before 9:00am and were a big help in getting everything unpacked and setup before the show began. One thing I can say about our MG comrades, they like to come early! The show wasn’t suppose to start until 10:00am, but I estimate that we had 35-40 MG’s on the field before the gates were officially open!! I would also like to thank our "welcoming committee" of Judy Pruitt, Janet Ilmoen, and Sylvia Freerksen who graciously passed out our packets and instructed people where to park along with quizzing them to see if they had won at MG Day before so they could be directed to our Premiere Class parking area.

The cars were separated by class on the show field with six different classes. We had 16 Pre 1955 MG’s, 16 MGA’s, 22 chrome bumper MGB’s, 13 rubber bumper MGB’s, and 8 MG Midgets. It truly was a beautiful site to see all these MG’s lined up on the lawn. The popular vote started around 11:30am and we began to count the votes at 12:45pm as a light rain shower started to dampen the area. As soon as the votes were counted, I announced the first, second, and third place winners in each of the six classes. Each winner received a beautiful plaque to commemorate the day. (See below for a complete list of winners). I also had a little friendly bantering going on with Mike Nolan of the Boston Area MG Club as Mike wanted to know which "club" the winner belonged too!! At the completion of the awards ceremony, we held our first raffle ever at MG Day which was a success as we sold over 400 tickets. The prizes given away included two t-shirts donated by our club, four $25 gift certificates donated by Moss Motors, and a MG tee-shirt, hat, and MGF model car donated by Brit Bits of Rye, NH At the completion of the raffle everyone began to pack up and leave as the weather did look threatening. As the MG’s filed out of the parking area, our "leaving committee" made up of Judy Pruitt, Janet Ilmonen, Ellie Guyot, and Sylvia Freerksen gave every MG a "Thank you for coming and see you next year" salute!!

I would personally like to thank all 17 of our members who showed up at MG Day this year to support their club and especially thank Bruno Ilmonen, Dick Fabrizio, Bob Freerksen, Jack Horner, and John O’Maley who helped out where they could because with out your help it would not have been the success that it was.

List of winners for MG Car Day:

Pre 1955:

First Place - Bob O’Meara 1937 MG VA Tickford

Second Place - Bob & Sandy Weston 1952 MG TD

Third Place - Frank Prince 1954 MG TF

MGA:

First Place - Jim Guyot 1959 MGA 1500

Second Place - Dick Fabrizio 1958 MGA 1500

Third Place - John Xenakis 1956 MGA 1500

Chrome Bumper MGB:

First Place - Andy Ritzer 1966 MGB

Second Place - David Enos 1974 MGB

Third Place - Brian Gurney 1974 MGB

Rubber Bumper MGB:

First Place - Jim Prior 1976 MGB

Second Place - Paul Gamache 1978 MGB

Third Place - Bob Brown 1975 MGB V8

MG Midget:

First Place - Jeanne & Will Traphagan 1979 MG Midget

Second Place - Mike Nolan 1978 MG Midget

Third Place - Frank Bangrazi 1967 MG Midget

Premiere:

First Place - Abby Neal 1950 MG Y

Second Place - Mike Oliva 1966 MGB

Third Place - Mark Eckland 1971 MG Midget