Old Car Festival: Motoring’s Earliest Days Come to Life at The Henry Ford

If you want to get excited about prewar cars, look into the Old Car Festival, held at the beginning of September in Greenfield Village by The Henry Ford. First held in 1951, “Old Car Fest” is the oldest continuously running car show in the United States, and the Dearborn, Michigan, venue—known as America’s Greatest History Attraction—is half the charm.

Greenfield Village is a collection of historic buildings established in the early 1900s by Henry Ford. It was founded in 1929 as part of an educational network called the Edison Institute. The walled complex housed a museum (for the smaller items Ford liked to collect) as well as the 28 buildings themselves, along with the Greenfield Village school, an experimental education facility with a focus on hands-on learning. It opened to the public over 90 years ago, with admission charges of 25 cents for adults and 10 cents for children.

Today, the Village has grown to more than 80 buildings, and the neighboring museum, the Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation, sprawls over more than 12 acres. (If you aren’t a member of The Henry Ford, admission to the Village is $37 for adults and $27.75 for anyone under 11.) In the Village you’ll find the Wright Brothers’ cycle shop, transported from Dayton, Ohio, and one of Thomas Edison’s laboratories. The oldest building is a windmill from the mid-1600s. The newest historic structure dates to 1860. You’ll find working farm buildings, including a cider barn, a silk mill, the 1861 home where Henry Ford grew up, the school he went to at age 9, and the soybean lab where he thought up The Soybean Car.

Though the Village is open year-round, and particularly charming at Christmastime, it is never more alive than during Old Car Festival, when throngs of prewar cars clatter through its brick-paved streets. The event attracts a remarkably diverse crowd—including kids in strollers and young adults in period dress—but criteria for entering a vehicle into “Old Car Fest” is strict. The vehicle must have been built in 1932 or earlier, and the engine bay must look stock. The vehicle cannot wear any accessories that aren’t period-correct, like a Motometer, or strictly safety-focused, such as electric taillights. Cars upgraded with disc brakes need not apply. Entries are capped at 600 and vie for awards in several classes.

That said, serious competition isn’t the point here so much as the overall atmosphere and a good time. Vehicles swarm the streets, driven by people of all ages, wearing bowlers or baseball caps. Costumed police officers direct traffic, which chugs and whistles and puffs and grumbles in a fascinating symphony. Steam cars sound their train-like “wolf” whistles, echoing the shriek of the whistle on the real, live steam engine that is also on the premises. Fire trucks wail through hand-crank sirens. Drivers nonchalantly operate arrays of tillers, levers, and shifters. A flock of penny-farthings roams the streets, one of which is ridden by a man in a newsboy cap and brocade vest and tall, striped socks, with an AirPod in one ear. Wire or wood wheels, giant round headlights, and unsynchronized gearboxes abound.

Over by the grandstands, a stage is setup with a PA system, and cars are crawling along in a very slow, rackety parade, with the announcer offering various factoids about each one, including what it is and who owns it. The vehicles often stop, and it’s safe to walk among them and chat with the owners. Some of your author’s favorites were the fleet vehicles: the taxicabs, tow trucks, stakeside pickups, tanker trucks, and fire engines, one of which was a 1927 REO Speedwagon.

It would be logical to expect this event to attract purists and perfectionists, but its owner, Tom Fitzgerald, from Dearborn, stumbled into prewar ownership nearly by accident. He knew other people with a prewar fire truck, and he came upon his example on Facebook Marketplace for the entirely reasonable sum of $5000. It wasn’t running, and he had never worked on one before, but that didn’t deter him from buying it. Friendly people on Facebook groups recommended a mechanic who could get the truck running again. Now, he wants to get in touch with the western Michigan village of Fruitport to see if he can find any documentation on the old rig that once protected it.

Old Car Fest is truly an event for all ages—whether or not you’d call yourself a car person. The period represented here predates anyone who would go, meaning it’s old, yet new, to any age. If you want a fresh way to look at cars, go to Old Car Fest and step back in time.

This story first appeared in the March/April 2025 issue of Hagerty Drivers Club magazine. Join the club to receive our award-winning magazine and enjoy insider access to automotive events, discounts, roadside assistance, and more.