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Last weekend, I took another trip with friends to the National Corvette Musuem in Bowling Green. There, I met a fine fellow who's a curator at the Henry Ford/Greenfiled Village. He convinced me that I need to put The Gilmore on my Bucket List that already included a visit to the Packard Proving Grounds and the National Packard Museum in Warren. And since I'd be driving up I-75, why not the Packard dealership museum in Dayton?

One of my sons said something to the effect of Tempus Fugit and Carpe Diem so I think I'll be heading north before the first flake of snow threatens. Since I still think I'm healthy enough, and my wife has had enough of my car stuff after 45 years, I may just pack up a nine year old Corvette with only 30K miles and have a good time looking around, wishing it could be done from a sixty year old Packard. But that might be pushing things a bit much, although I saw some of this previously from a 1967 Corvette in 1992. On that trip to witness The Millionth Corvette celebration at the old GM Building, a very nice Detroit cab driver escorted me out of harm's way on Grand before it got dark.

I'd be interested in what Roger, Tim and others might suggest in making my plans. For instance, can a guy in a blue Corvette drive by EGB in broad daylight if he doesn't slow down too much? Is there anything left to see at Conner except an empty lot and weeds? Are there still remnants of Hudson/Cadillac presence to make that worthwhile?

I may try for a third visit to the ACD Museum in Auburn IN on the way home, just to see what's happened in the past fifteen years. Since I've grown up in St. Louis, and older in Atlanta, I can appreciate what's become of a car manufacturing mecca that no longer exists in any tangible form. But, through the magic of museums and dedicated people who support them, I'd like to see it for the experience. After all, it's the journey, not the destination. Why else would we have Packards to play with?

IMO the Gilmore is an absolute MUST for anyone in this hobby, whether Packard enthusiast or not.

About 50 miles north of the Corvette Museum in ELizabethtown, Ky is the Swope Museum (www.swopemuseum.com). Its just a few miles off I-65.

He has several pre-war Packards among his collection.

Hello Dave:

You asked:

"... can a guy in a blue Corvette drive by EGB in broad daylight if he doesn't slow down too much?" Answer: Yes, but do it just as you said, in broad daylight and do a slow roll by.

"Is there anything left to see at Conner except an empty lot and weeds?" Answer: No. I was driving north on Conner just last week and made it a point to scope out the old Packard site - nothing is there. As a kid I lived about 6 blocks east of there and I barely recognize my old neighborhood.

"Are there still remnants of Hudson/Cadillac presence to make that worthwhile?" Answer, Yes and no. The original Hudson plant (built to produce the Aerocar) at 6501 Mack Avenue is located at the NE corner of Beaufait. It was used from 1909 to 1912, is still standing and used as a warehouse. The "new" Hudson plant that was built at Jefferson and Conner in 1912 (Albert Kahn design) was torn down in 1961. My grandfather retired from Hudson and again I was by the site last weekend.

The Cadillac Clark Street Plant was shut down in 1987 demo'ed in 1994. The only GM plant left in Detroit (and Hamtramck) is at 2500 E. Grand Boulevard and produces the Cadillac ELR and CT6 along with the Chevy Volt/Opel Ampera, Malibu and Impala.

As for the Packard Proving Grounds you are just 2 weeks away from one of our biggest days of the year - Open House: Sunday, October 18 from 1:00 PM to 5:00 PM. Last year the weather was sunny and pleasant and we had about 1500 visitors, 36 Packards and 300+ collector cars on the boulevard.

We are only open 6 months a year (no heat in most of the buildings) and we do not have regular hours. You should PM me to arrange a specific time for a guided tour.

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Hi DaveB845

".......need to put The Gilmore on my Bucket List that already included a visit to the Packard Proving Grounds and the National Packard Museum in Warren. And since I'd be driving up I-75, why not the Packard dealership museum in Dayton?"

Here are a few more to put on your list, make it a total auto history immersion tour:

Studebaker National Museum, South Bend, Indiana.
Hostetler's Hudson Museum, Shipshewana, Indiana.
Sloan Museum, GM and Olds, Lansing, Michigan
Jack Miller's Hudson Dealership, Ypsilanti, Michigan
Crawford Auto-Aviation Museum, Cleveland, Ohio

Guaranteed if you visit every one of those you've planned and add these, you'll have a tour to remember forever. You'll see a wider selection of automotive history and a high number of prototype and one-offs.

When you do, please take us along virtually with frequent posting from the road.

Steve

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Drive a relatively new Corvette from Atlanta to Detroit on I-75? Piece of cake. Back in the 1970s I drove a 1958 Corvette from Los Angeles to Detroit over what was left of Route 66-yes, like Todd and Buzz! And yes, a lot of it was still 2-lane blacktop in those days.

Today, there really isn't much going on in front of the EGB Packard Plant. Just don't plan on parking and getting out on foot. That would not be wise.

For sure add the Citizen's Packard Dealership/Packard Museum in Dayton, Ohio to your list. It is just a hop & skip off of I-75 and is just loaded with great Packard stuff. I was just there last week and looked at their propane-powered Twelve, oodles of other cars and literature. The Turnquist library is there and now I see that many of the items from the Mitchell-Bentley auction have turned up there-some are already on display. The 1953 Caribbean supposedly owned by Perry Como is among these items... along with other Caribbeans. There is also a very interesting bubble-top Studebaker on display.

As for sites on Conner Avenue in Detroit, the "new" Packard plant there never even made it out of the 1950s since they started tearing it down in a hurry almost right after it closed... and quickly shoved a shopping mall in on top of the land. Last I saw of the mall, it had one foot in the toilet, the other on a banana peel and it was leaning on the flush handle. Nothing at all left to see from the Packard era.

And likewise for the Hudson plant on Conner which went to Hudson heaven in the early 1960s. My family's music store and restaurant were located on East Jefferson Avenue, not far from the intersection of Conner (our building is gone too). And I well remember watching the plant being torn down-which took forever since they were doing it with a wrecking ball. Nobody had real experience with tearing down poured reinforced concrete plants in those days (another reason why nobody back then really wanted to tackle the big Packard Plant on EGB).

I even went to take photos of the old site of the headquarters and main plant of Creative Industries of Detroit. The place where the Panthers were made... where the Request was made...and where the Predictor was serviced and photographed. One driveway remains in very poor condition... and the other can be partially found under the overgrowth. But otherwise? Five sad decimated acres of weeds.

I did find a few crushed souvenirs of building pieces that perhaps only myself or someone who worked there might even recognize. Pic here shows a scrap from decorative wall that was in front of the building and a scrap of glass from one of the beautiful glass blocks once in the building. The ground below in this shot is the original asphalt where Rex Terry's Panther, the Request and Predictor all once sat. Heartbreaking for me to see this sad destruction.

Oddly enough and unlike EGB at the Packard Plant, there is still quite a bit of traffic on East Outer Drive past the site of Creative. I counted a couple hundred cars go by while I was there. But it all made me wonder: how many people driving past this site even know the incredible automotive history and other technological history that took place at this very location from the 1930s to the 1990s?

Oh, and just a few blocks from the old site of Creative Industries is the intersection of East Outer Drive and Packard Avenue... which is now a one-way street. Note the art-deco glass blocks in the bay window bulge on the house. Interesting in a photo...no caption needed...

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Thanks to Roger, Steve and Leon for stoking the fire that smoulders within me. I looked at my calendar to see where I could be on October 18th and it showed me obligations that will keep me home, including our semiannual Peachstate Packard barbeque at the Cofer Collection where some beautiful 1915-1939 Packards live under constant care. That will be shortly followed, that same day, by an annual Oktoberfest celebration that's been a must for fifteen years

If I were a younger, carefree (and stupid) guy, I might not think twice about leaving the Oktoberfest and driving straight from there, up I-75 to the PPG event. I must have made a dozen Cannonball-like trips between ATL and DET in the thirty years we've lived here. But sanity comes with age, and the best I could do would be to arrive the day after the event with an offer to help the clean-up and hope to hear stories about who/what showed up on Sunday. And, of course, to see what's going on with PPG after Ford left. As I explained to my youngest son in our room at the Dearborn Inn, Ford really got a true proving ground when Packard left and they moved from the walled test facility in Dearborn. The re-engineered River Rouge and Dearborn facilities of Ford make me heartsick for the lack of appreciation and dis-use of all those Albert Kahn designed plants.

I'll have to carve out a week or so in October to do a portion of Bucket List sites near I-75 once I arrange the dog sitting. Like the Appliachian trail walkers, doing it all at once might be too grand an undertaking for a guy like me. And no sane relative would want to go with me to my dream places in Car Disneyland of Detroit Yore. All things in good time, or before the sand runs out. Tod (Martin Milner) may have left the stage, but my blue Corvette seems itching to go and see what's left.

If you go to Michigan use a rental car. And buy the collision insurance.

The roads are dangerous and unsafe. One of the engineers I know blew a tire on I-75 as soon as he crossed the state line into Michigan. Another totalled his Chrysler 300 when it fell through the River Rouge bridge on I-75.

I was in Livonia last week and as soon as I got onto I-275 the road was so bad it sounded like somebody was hitting my car with a baseball bat. I bailed at the first exit, but not before I hitting a hole so big it sounded like I hit a deer.

The goverment in Michigan cares nothing about public safety. It only cares about being corrupt and taking care of dope addicts on welfare. They hate the taxpayers.

Stay out of Michigan.

Well, everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but I don't think that Tim is being at all fair to the state of Michigan, and I certainly don't want his impressions -- such as they are, dripping with unnecessary hyperbole -- to deter you from making your dream trip.

There is only one Packard Proving Grounds, and only one Henry Ford Museum. Only one National Automotive History Collection, and only one birthplace of the Model T Ford. Only one Meadow Brook Hall, Fair Lane, and Edsel & Eleanor Ford House. There are literally hundreds of historic sites in our area that tell the story of the automobile and the industry that it spawned, and it's all in only one place.

So if you really want to experience the sense of place and a wealth of one-of-a-kind artifacts, you have to come and experience them in Michigan.

So, by all means, pack up the Corvette or whatever your vehicle of choice, and come on up. We have a great car culture here, and we know how to show hospitality to both old friends and to new friends that we haven't met yet.

Feel free to send me a PM if you'd like some suggestions for planning your trip!

Yes, Detroit is a run down city, broke and with poor maintenance. But I crossed the Rouge on I75 Tuesday, and went through Livonia on I275 last week. In a car with fairly low airdams and low profile tires, at 75-80 mph.

I think that two of the smaller bridges over the Rouge are still closed.

The Packard plant doorway and bodybridge emblem are removed. The area is pretty bad, I would do a drive by or skip it. Do not wander the plant.

The Proving Grounds are evocative - I think you will enjoy them. Kudos to the Foundation for their work.