The Military Vehicle Collectors Club of Michigan Newsletter

TThhee SSeennttiinneell

Autumn 2020

Winter Meeting:

Saturday, January 9, 2021: The Winter General

Membership meeting is tentatively scheduled for Noon at the Michigan Military & Technical

Historical Museum, 16600 Stephens, Eastpointe. The

next Sentinel will be published in January 2021.

The Fall General Meeting

Assembly: After time allotted for a BYO lunch, the Fall General Membership meeting at the Michigan Military Technical & Historical Society in Eastpointe, MI was called to order with the pledge of allegiance on October 3rd at 12:35PM.

Quorum: A quorum was established with four

Board members present. (Thatcher, Kitter, Nutting, W., Shelswell) In total, eleven members and two guests attended, both of whom joined that day. Welcome new members, Robert Causley and Joel Deshane. At the time of the meeting the club roster totaled 72 members. Unfortunately however, we also learned of the passing of member Greg Canjar. A moment of silence was observed in his honor. Eric Richardson will try to get funeral details.

Financial Report: The club’s finances were reviewed. Funds remain stable, even showing a small increase over typical recent numbers. Our PayPal account is in use and working out well.

Military Vehicle Collectors Club of Michigan

The MVCCMI is a non-profit educational organization created to promote the preservation of antique military vehicles. The group meets at least four times a year at various locations.

Officer / Trustee Contact Info: (Effective Winter 2020)

T. Shelswell (586) 212-9523 Terry.Shelswell@gmail.com

Curt Kitter (810) 765-3107 ckitter2@att.net Bill Thatcher (248) 991-4399 wrt1@comcast.net Jan Nutting (586) 995-9900 JandianaJones@gmail.com Bill Nutting (586) 876-0786 billn@gobsb.com Remi Seabolt (248) 830-1340 rjseabolt@aol.com Chuck Chapman ((313) 676-0037 cfcgc@aol.com

Club Dues

All members: $25 yearly - $5 Discount for MVPA Members

Meeting Place: Locations vary.

Sentinel & Website Editor : Rick Forys rf@r-jweb.com

Web Site: WWW.MVCCMI.ORG

Old Business: Sponsor slots for the annual club calendar were offered up and went fast. Only the cover and the December sponsorship remained by meeting's end.

A brief discussion was held about the rather short list of events or reasons to get the truck out.

Shelswell gave an update concerning Michigan MV legislation. Bill 4866 has passed the Senate Transportation committee 9-0 and now goes to the Senate floor for a vote. If approved, it will go to the Governor for signature into law.

New Business: The remaining event schedule was reviewed briefly. The November Candy Buy-Back had been canceled. There are two parades in December: Lake Orion and Rochester, the latter of which had also been canceled.

Be sure to renew your MVPA membership. If you don’t

belong, join up today!

In total, thirteen members attended.

New Business cont: Jan Nutting is going to have back surgery and will be convalescing for about two to three months. Thatcher volunteered to step in and perform many of the duties until her return.

The Selfridge Military Museum is seeking volunteer labor to refresh their M113 and M35. Work is planned to begin in late spring. Each volunteer must individually be screened for admission for one year. Interested members can contact Shelswell.

In recognition of his standing offer to use his shop for meetings and events, and his frequent use of his GP large tent at club events, Shelswell announced an offer of up to $500.00 to purchase materials to help Terry Burke complete the restroom in his shop. The offer is conditional to Terry completing the balance of the work needed to finish the job.

Merchandise was available for purchase including the new club hoodies.

Dave Pawlowski won the 50/50 raffle and donated the winnings to the club.

Fall Meeting Attendees:

Terry Shelswell Bill Nutting

Curt Kitter Bill Thatcher

Rick Forys Mike Brink

Dave Pawlowski RJ Hayden

Ken Reeves Eric Richardson

Chris Causley Robert Causley (N)

Joel Deshane (N)

M37 & M1008 - Part of the museum MV fleet.

A couple members drove their MVs to the meeting.

Adjournment: After a request for any other business, comments or questions, the meeting was adjourned at 1530. The next meeting is scheduled for Noon - January 9, 2021, tentatively at the MIMTHS, Eastpointe, MI.

2020 Events

Here is a brief rundown of the events we are planning for 2020. More may be added as the year goes on. (POCs in parentheses.)

� Candy Buy Back November 1 Dr. Wainess’ office. Canceled. (Kitter)

� Lake Orion Parade December 7 Canceled. (Seabolt)

� Rochester Parade December 8 Canceled. (Thatcher)

MVCCMI Attends Selfridge BCC

Luncheon By Bill Thatcher

We had been approached some weeks ago by the Executive Director of the Selfridge Air National Guard Military Air Museum. In a nutshell, he was looking for help in restoring two vehicles in the museum’s collection. He invited us to appear with MVs as guests at their September 15 luncheon. It would also be coordinated with the Selfridge Base Community Council, (BCC) an organization created to enhance the image and relations with the communities surrounding the base. This would not be a regular weekend-type event, but rather more of a business meeting.

On the morning of the luncheon, we met at the Nutting residence, not far from the base and convoyed over. Our little group consisted of six BoD members with two M37s, an M37B1 and an M38. Upon arrival and security clearance we arranged our vehicles between the museum building and the 42 retired aircraft on display outside. Also there was one of the few privately-owned M4A1E8 Sherman tanks, fully operational (except gunnery) and it was driven out from its garage on base to join us at the luncheon. After a delicious meal we heard some remarks from base commander Brigadier General Ralph Mammon and museum PR director Tom Demerly. Incidentally, General Mammon reported that Selfridge was on the short list for consideration to become a SPACECOM installation, which would boost their manpower on base considerably and be commanded by a four-star air force general.

F-86 Sabre at the museum.

For you history buffs, Selfridge

AFB, at the height of the cold war,

was the Midwest Command Center

for anti-aircraft defense of the

industrial Midwest.

We setup among 42 retired aircraft on display.

Privately-owned M4A1E8 Sherman tank

Once the presentations were over, we got down to business. Specifically, the museum is seeking help, in the form of maintenance and restoration labor, in rehabilitating an M113 APC and an M35 deuce. It was determined that the onset of the rehab would not begin until next summer due to the fact that the small hangar that would be available to us is currently fully occupied by a WWII Corsair fighter undergoing its own restoration. We agreed to begin our effort by discussing it with our members at our next two quarterly meetings. Once the details were understood by both parties, we toured the museum grounds. We then went to the hanger we would use and found a mechanic (Below) who was tearing down the Corsair’s engine, a Pratt & Whitney R2800 double Wasp engine, which can produce 2,100 hp.

Post-war German Weasel APC

Before leaving we got a close up look at the Sherman. This model, M4A1 (76mm) GUN, WET, was built late in the war and sports a Wright Whirlwind R975 nine-cylinder radial engine, built by Continental under license.

After convoying back to our starting point, we gathered on the deck and discussed the logistics of supplying a meaningful amount of resto-labor for the deuce and the APC. This will be the first time we helped out another non-profit and for our efforts we would receive much appreciation and the knowledge that, as a group, we were able to help out a military museum in a worthy cause.

The MVCCMI delegation to the party.

The MVCCMI-VFW MV Rally By Rick Forys

After our very successful June day-convoy, MVCCMI members were eager to do something else, but with everything still basically shut down it became very evident that if any event was going to take place, we would have to make it happen. During a board meeting it was discussed that veterans' groups like the VFW, AMVETS, and Legion were also facing hardships during this pandemic, and an idea began to take shape to possibly join forces with a such a group that also had enough real estate to physically house a truck show. Feelers were put out to club members who were known to belong to groups of this nature and within a short time, a candidate VFW chapter with sufficient acreage was identified.

Chris Scalise set up a meeting with Jerry Boswell the Post Commander of his VFW Post #7573 Lempke-Blackwell, New Baltimore, MI. We proposed our idea of a joint show. The post was very receptive to the idea and dates and other details were discussed further. Before long, a plan was approved and the date, August 21-23 was announced.

While doing a walk-through during the initial meeting, members noticed a rather derelict M116 75mm pack howitzer tucked away in a corner. Rather upset with their discovery, members

RJ Hayden displayed his 1942 Ford GPW.

This 1972 M151A2 was displayed by Chris Scalise who is the one

who also belongs to the VFW post and made this interaction

possible.

Rally-Cont. Chris Scalise and Bill Nutting took it upon themselves to rectify the situation by performing a depot refresh on the artillery piece to bring it back to proper condition. A lot of work had to be done in a short time to get the gun finished before the show, and it looked great.

The layout of this particular VFW Post worked out well with a large gravel parking lot right off of the street which served as the display area. At the far (north) end of the lot was a good-sized covered pavilion where meals were served, and beyond that was an open mowed grass field that housed not only the club member's sleeping quarters (a club member supplied GP large tent), but also a camp area for a scout troop. The actual VFW Post building sat directly to the east, across a small parking lot from the pavilion on an adjacent equal sized plot of land. Weather for the event was about perfect, hot, sunny and dry. Our trucks started rolling in after noon on Friday, and by 4:30 the gravel display lot already held over ten MVs.

Overall club turnout was very good with more than twenty military vehicles onsite during the weekend. There was also a good variety of trucks with basically all eras and conflicts represented. Vietnam era vehicles were prominent, with more quarter-ton MUTTS than any other vehicle type. The six MUTTS were joined by three M35A2 deuces. We did have four WWII vehicles, one GPW, two Dodges, and a Kubelwagen. The Korean War was also represented by an M38 and two Dodge M37s, and finally there were two 900 series 5-tons on hand from Gulf War times.

To help set the mood, and to also provide well spaced sleeping quarters for members staying onsite, the MVCCMI erected Terry Burke's GP large tent. In addition, we interacted with the scout troop setting up a couple trucks in front of the tent and providing helmets and other props for them to use to pose for pictures in the trucks. Finally, on Saturday evening the club organized a short convoy circling the area on local roads. Aided by a police escort, most of the trucks went on the run, taking the VFW show workers and the scout troop. This proved to be very popular with all involved. After returning to camp, we finished things off with a movie night before calling it a good day.

M116 75mm howitzer refreshed by Nutting & Scalise.

Joel Leik's 61 M151 was the oldest of the six MUTTs at the show.

Show POC was Bill Nutting who brought his M934 mobile office.

Terry Pitts's M37 and artillery piece by the new sign structure.

Rally-Cont. On the whole, this was a good show and a fun event. Mask usage was evident, and people seemed respectful of the circumstances. Public turnout could have been better, but these are the times we live in, and this was a first-time event, which are typically unpredictable at best. Regardless, it did accomplish both parts of our mission, first to get the trucks out, and second to help support a veterans group. It was also a good organizational experience for our club as it gave the show committee exposure to some aspects of an event they normally wouldn't be involved with, and provided an opportunity to work closely with another group, all while certainly proving that we could indeed produce our own show.

With six MUTTs they were the most numerous type on display.

Above: Eric Richardson displayed his Kubelwagen.

Below: Scouts pose for pictures on Ben Lapinski's MUTT in

front of Terry Burke's GP large .

Available

December 2020

Place Your On-Line Orders

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