Northwest Technical School hosts car show
CHRIS ROUSH/DAILY FORUM
Several classic car owners brought their vehicles to the first ever car show at the Northwest Technical School Saturday. There were 10 classes in all with dozens of cars and trucks.
The Northwest Technical School gives students an opportunity to learn and find a career outside of the classroom. The school helps students discover their abilities with hands-on training and real world experience. After discussing the idea for a few years, the school created a car show fundraiser to help the students.
“The students get to work on quite a few different things throughout the year,” Collision Repair Instruction Ron Wiederholt said. “We build a couple of show cars each year for the World of Wheels show. We talked about doing this ever since I came to the school.”
The school held the first ever car show Saturday afternoon with dozens of classic and restored cars filling up the parking lot in front of Maryville High School.
Wiederholt has been an instructor at the school for the past seven years. Over the years, he has enjoyed helping and watching the students build each show car. He decided that Maryville once again needed a car show and is going to make the tech school’s car show an annual event.
The plan is for the event to be the weekend after Father’s Day and the all of the funds raised goes towards Skills USA.
“It’s our student run organization,” Wiederholt said. “We take the students to state contests and we have to pay for rooms, food and this is an opportunity to raise money for that program.”
Maryville native Joey Wagner attended the school for two years and studied auto body and welding. Wagner has always had a passion for cars and said his dad is the main reason for that passion.
While helping out with the car show Saturday afternoon, Wagner had the opportunity to bring his own classic car to the show. He brought his 1969 Volkswagen Bug and said he did all of the work on the car himself.
“I bought the Bug from a guy here in Maryville,” Wagner said. “I actually chased him down for about 20 blocks and talked to him about it. He didn’t sell it to me that day, but about two months later he called me up and sold it to me.”
Wagner said the car has a completely new look and design than what it did before he bough it. Some of the work on the body of the car was actually done at the tech school. Wagner has had the car for four years and said that he’s taken a lot of pride in the fact that he went to school to do something he loves.
“My dad is big into car shows and I was pretty much born into a car family,” Wagner said. “I always wanted to work on cars. It was always a passion of mine. When I was 13, I bought my first car and started working on it. It’s something that you can come home from work each day, relax and work on your car.”
Wagner worked the admission and registration table at the car show Saturday, which allowed him to meet new car enthusiasts. He said the car show is a great opportunity for students to learn more about cars and the stories behind them.
“I think it’s great, it gets the word out,” Wagner said. “As a kid, I grew up going to car shows. I feel very at home and I know this well. This shaped a lot of who I am personally and to be able to get the word out to other kids that this is a rewarding hobby.”
Wiederholt said fundraisers like the car show are extremely important to the school, because the school has helped out so many different kids over the years.
“A lot times, the kids build the cars that are at the car show,” Wiederholt said. “We don’t have any here this year, except for my 1970 Chevy Chevelle, they built that one. This shows the public what kids can do and what they learn from our programs.”
CHRIS ROUSH/DAILY FORUM
For the first ever Northwest Technical School car show, Bob Gaskil brought his 1985 Chevy Truck. The car show is a fundraiser for the school’s student run organization, Skills USA.
CHRIS ROUSH/DAILY FORUM
Joey Wagner poses with his 1969 Volkswagen Bug during the car show Saturday afternoon at the Northwest Technical School. The funds raised from the car show went for to Skills USA.
CHRIS ROUSH/DAILY FORUM
Collision Repair Instructor at the Northwest Technical School, Ron Wiederholt brought his rebuilt 1970 Chevy Chevelle to the first ever car show at the school. The students in Wiederholt’s classes helped rebuild the Chevelle.
