ROAD KNIGHTS - OF THE MICHIGAN HOT ROD ASSOCIATION

The club was formed in 1951 by 6 or 8 teenagers in the Northwest side of Detroit. Many of them went to Cooley Hight School. Thoughout the fifties they had a mix of Hot Rods, Street Machines, and Customs. There were a lot of road trips, picnics, and house parties.

The late fifties found many of the members getting involved in drag racing, on real drag strips, and enjoying this new pastime. Around this time go-karting became popular and many of the members went in that direction. Many other members became very involved working at the Autorama, which we were part of. The purpose of Autorama was to raise money to build our drag strip, which we did and it opened Motor City Drag Way in 1956. Several of our members have been on the Board of Directors of Michigan Hot Rod Association, which we are all members of. Michigan Hot Rod Association is made up of 7 clubs, including the Road Knights.

The sixties activities included reliability runs, poker runs, picnics, and going to the drag strip. In the early sixties the club members built our own dragster, which any member could drive if they wanted to. Not everyone wanted to, but we had a couple of guys who did a very good job. We had three different cars in a fifteen-year period. The last car was sold in 1975. Since then we enjoy our own cars which included Hot Rods, Customs, Street Machines, Drag Cars, and even some Custom Vans, and Trucks.

We meet twice a month at members’ houses and are very active in Michigan Hot Rod Association activities, including working at Detroit Autorama. There are currently 20 active members.

We started our annual car show in 1984 at Walt’s Auto Supply in Dearborn Heights.The show was held there until 1987 when we teamed up with The Friends of the Wilson Barn in Livonia. The show has been held annually at the park ever since. We have helped many charities and share our hobby with many car enthusiasts.