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Mecum Auction to Hold Vintage Car Auction at Road America Elkhart Lake

20 July 1999

Mecum Auction Company to Hold Vintage Car Auction at Road America Elkhart Lake

    ELKHART LAKE, Wis., July 19 -- Elkhart Lake, Wis., except for
a week each July, is a nice, quiet little place where folks can stroll the
streets or sit of an evening in front porch swings and be reasonably sure no
one will drive past and squirt the area with bullets from the muzzle of an
AK-47 assault rifle.  That is nice to know.
    But Katie bar-the-door for the week in July when Road America hosts the
Merrill Lynch/Brian Redman International Challenge car races.  From far and
wide they come -- all across the land, Europe, down under, even San
Franciscoites pack up and head for the little town east of Sheboygan.  Some
New Yorkers, who normally think there are still Indians roaming the country
west of the Hudson, make the trek.  In sports car racing this is really a big
deal.  Not a little deal trying to become a big deal, but a really big deal.
Anyone who is anyone shows up.  Even some of the famous make an appearance --
Carroll Shelby will be in attendance this year displaying his new breed of
Shelby along with a lot of near greats.  And of course all the race groupies.
    This year's event will have a neat additional touch.  The Mecum Auction
Company of Marengo has been invited to hold an auction of vintage race and
sports cars.  This is also a big deal.  Not hundreds of cars and days on end
of auctioneering, but around 100 cars, some of them with remarkable race
records and one Ferrari that could easily fetch well over a million bucks.
The car has the proper provenance in that it was once the property of Dino
Ferrari given to him by his father Enzo to act as a development car for later
Ferrari racers.  But that is just the start -- the 1935 and 1936 Indy 500 Pole
Sitter, driven by Rex Mays, will be sold.  An alloy body Jaguar Racer, a
C-Type Jaguar of which only a few were built, and Lola's, and others with
Cosworth motors, and the list is endless and spectacular.
    In fact, Road America Elkhart Lake attendees, some of whom have been going
to the races for a quarter century or so, are billing the Mecum Auction as the
"event of the summer."  Indeed.  100 of the upper echelon of vintage race and
sports cars will be sold on the sprawling lawns of the Osthoff Resort the
evening of July 24 beginning at 7 p.m. promptly.
    If vintage racing and sports cars are your cup of tea, don't miss the
event.  Even if you can't make it to Elkhart Lake in person, the Mecum Company
is publishing a comprehensive catalog in color with complete details of each
car and their histories.  For your copy call 800-468-6999.  $25 ppd to your
mail box.