Yahoo Autos McPherson Auction in Rapid City Is Project Car Paradise
Online Auction from South Dakota will eventually offer 2000 cars
Lots of memorabilia is online, too
Decorate the tree with chrome script!
I was just scrolling through the Moore Family Car Collection at the McPherson Auction website and suddenly I had had all kinds of ideas. All those chrome car logos for DeSotos and Chryslers, those hood ornaments, the ones from the ’50s and ’60s shaped like jet airplanes, that Cadillac V16 distributor cap? Surely I could make something from that? Or just hang them on the wall? Or better yet – Christmas gifts! Who wouldn’t want a Chrysler Coronet chrome script? Scrooge, that’s who!
But you have to act fast. The first round of this auction closes Thursday at 6:00 p.m. CST. The Moore Collection, AKA “Moore’s Auto Salvage,” consists of 2,000 cars sitting in a field outside Rapid City, South Dakota. In addition to the cars, there are tons of automotive ephemera. They can’t sell all of them all at once. So they’re selling some now and will have more auctions in the spring.
“There's grilles and radiator covers, headlight assemblies, hood ornaments, you know, some of the different door handles. taillight assemblies,” said auctioneer Kevin McPherson. “There's going to be lots of those different kinds of things… and old license plates…”
And right now there are many, many project cars parked in that field 31 miles from Mt. Rushmore that are calling your name. Or maybe that’s just the sound of rust not sleeping. There are a lot of MOPARs, everything from Chryslers to Desotos. There are some International Scouts that look salvageable. There are some decaying cars and trucks from the ‘30s and ‘40s that might just decay into the earth and be gone forever. But there are also cool hood ornaments, chrome scripts of car model names, wheels, grilles and turn signals that would look great hanging on your wall. Or on your Christmas tree.
My friend Mike Magda drove out to the auction site near Rapid City, South Dakota and started bidding on some Hemi valve covers to hang on his wall. It’s he you can thank for all these photos. I learned of the auction from Mike’s social media post.
“A long-time, family-owned salvage business is selling off the first of some 2,000 vehicles this week,” Mike wrote. “The owners are heavy into MOPARs, so there are plenty of old Hemi-powered cars and trucks. They also have a fondness for Internationals. I saw a handful of very restorable Scouts, a nice Ramcharger and a Matador that could be a great project. Also found a decent Mercury Bobcat that would make a nice Nostalgia Pro Stocker!”
The only problem might be that you'll buy too many cars. But is that really a problem? If it is, just buy some of the taillights, grilles and badges, there are plenty of those.
The “collection” is going in chunks, and it’s all online. So go browse! There’s something for parts pickers and a lot for artists, especially those working with metal. I myself kinda like some of those hood ornaments. Maybe it’s time to register. Only 22 days left till Christmas, but only 24 hours left in the first auction!
