Downriver: Home to the best Classic Car Cruise south of Woodward Avenue

In 2000, Evelyn Cairns, then the lifestyles editor for The News-Herald Newspapers, was paid a visit at work by her son, Glen Cairns. She was busy at the time, so Glen began talking to the director of advertising, Ray Woodrow.  Cairns’ son talked about how he wanted a local classic car cruise because the Woodward Dream Cruise in Oakland County was too far for him to drive his 1929 Ford Model A. 

“My son said, ‘This is where it should be because these are the car people,’” Cairns said. “The Downriver people either worked in factories or their relatives worked in factories, and this is the car area of metro Detroit.”

Evelyn Cairns, former Food and Lifestyles editor for the News-Herald, holds the front-page plaque showing the first Cruisin' event in 2001.

That was the idea: give this largely blue-collar area that has long been intertwined with the auto industry a major event to show off with pride.

Cairns said she told Don Thurlow, then publisher of the newspaper, about the idea, and also brought it to the late Heinz Prechter, owner of the paper at the time.  Thurlow remembered recently what he thought of the cruise. At first, he didn’t take it too seriously, but he didn’t dismiss it.  “Then, the more I thought about it, I thought that might be something we could do Downriver because it is kind of a contiguous community,” he said. “There’s a lot of car people down here, with the Trenton Engine Plant, the Ford Plant, Mazda a little bit further down.”

At the time, Thurlow met with Ed Clemente, who was president of the Southern Wayne County Chamber of Commerce and then was Democratic state representative from Lincoln Park from 2004-10.  Even though neither is a car enthusiast, both were enthralled by the idea and brainstormed about how to pull it off.

“I think the first thing we decided was we had to pick a route before we talked to anybody,” Thurlow said. “It turns out, if you think about it, Fort Street is the perfect route.”

It was settled that the route would be on Fort between Southfield and Sibley roads.  Fort Street was perfect for several reasons, Thurlow said: It’s centrally located Downriver, it’s a state highway so there was only one transportation entity to clear it with and the speed limit increases just south of Sibley.

For those driving older cars that overheat frequently, the higher velocity helps cool the engine.

“It doesn’t really matter who started the event.  What matters is it’s still going on, which, to me, is a victory in itself for the area because we were sort of isolated.” - ED CLEMENTE Former president, S.W.C.C.C.