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Japanese Classic Cars Get Their Due at JCCS’s 2024 Edition

japanese classic car show 2024
Japanese Classic Cars Get Their Due at JCCSMark Vaughn

Earlier this year there were major exhibits of Japanese cars at the Audrain, LeMay and Petersen museums, as well as an exhibit at the California Automobile Museum in Sacramento. Nissan has been a featured marque at The Mitty and at the Rolex Monterey Motorsports Reunion, and a class at the elegant La Jolla Concours was set aside for Japanese cars.

An exhibit sponsored by Infiniti sat up the hill and about a half a mile away from the lawn at Pebble, and there have been Japanese concepts on the concept lawn, but the big P has still not had a Japanese car on its concours lawn since, maybe, ever.

So the all-volunteer-run Japanese Classic Car Show in Long Beach, California, remains the single greatest celebration of Japanese cars in the entire US, if not the world.

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It was started 19 years ago by Koji and Terry Yamaguchi along with legions of volunteers as a nostalgic look back at the cars of their native Japan. Back then it wasn’t meant to make any larger statement than just a gathering of cool cars that they and their friends liked. But over the course of almost two decades, it has remained the biggest and maybe only such one-day gathering of the cars, trucks, and motorcycles of Japan.

Will it ever get some competition? There is the Toyotafest held in the spring at the same location, dedicated to—obvs—Toyotas. But the Yamaguchis remain at the forefront of presenting Japanese cars as cool.

Click on the gallery to see 77 of our favorites out of over 300 cars at the show. Sayonara for now, and see you at Toyotafest next spring.