MG 2016 Louisville
Maintaining the Breed
June 13-17, 2016

The MG convention was well attended by folks of the Chicagoland MG Club and The Vintage MG Car Club of Chicago in Louisville, KY Three different groups traveling at different times to attend the event. John & Ann Schroeder led a group starting at the Lincoln Oasis on Monday and others left later in the week. Barney Gaylord in his MGA with trailer were in attendance arriving from a run through South and North Carolina holding tech sessions on various cars of local club members. Jim Evans traveled down later in the week for the car show and visiting old friends before heading back to Illinois.

After leaving the Oasis John’s group traveled down Route 41, before joining the Interstates at I-74 and had lunch just south of Indianapolis and fed the cars before continuing the rest of the drive into Louisville. They arrived at the hotel around 4 PM and dined at the Blue Horse Restaurant in the hotel. The following day started with a continental breakfast at the hotel, registered for the event, and headed out for some sightseeing in downtown. The first stop was the Louisville Slugger Factory and Museum. They got to see how the production of baseball bats has evolved since the 1880’s. The average major league player uses over 100 bats per season. There was a lot of sawdust being made there. The museum and gift shop were very interesting also, with a Ripley’s Hall included. Lunch was at a neat little restaurant just a few blocks from the factory, before going to the Jim Beam Urban Stillhouse. Next it was back to the hotel to prepare for our visit to Churchill Downs. They had lots of hors d’oeuvres, (did not need dinner that night for sure.) There was an informative tour of the paddock and stands along with a small museum. Then it was back to the hotel with some of the group gathered in the lounge for a nightcap.

Meanwhile Barney was doing nearly sleepless days at MG-2016 in Louisville, KY, with four national MG registers. There was a Magnette register dinner Monday evening, then about a dozen tech sessions in two days for which he managed to attend eight (foregoing the rest as schedule conflicts).

Tuesday, John’s group got back in our cars for a drive to Bardstown to check out some distilleries. Our first stop was the Bourbon Heritage Center and Heaven Hill Distillery. They wandered around the gift shop and saw their history of bourbon display. They have many six-story rack houses for aging. It was a huge place. They then headed to the Barton Distillery for a tour and tasting. They walked into their rack house and were met by cooler temperatures and the “angel’s share” aroma. It was fantastic. They enjoyed some very good bourbon and even some bourbon flavored candy. After their tour, they drove back into Bardstown to the Talbot Tavern for lunch. The building was built in 1774 according to the threshold step. They had a great lunch followed by some Derby Pie. Some of us enjoyed Kentucky Bourbon Ale which is highly recommended. There were four separate MG Register banquets on Tuesday evening so they drove back to the hotel and prepared for the MGB register dinner. Roger and Shirley Goebbert were recognized for attending all of NAMGBR’s conventions. After dinner, about 1,000 members from all the registers came together for a performance by Captain Rat and the Blind Rivits from Champaign, IL. Lots of good music from the 50’s and 60’s.

During the three day at the convention Barney managed to revive an MGB that was running on three cylinders (bad spark plug), and an MG TD with a dead battery (adjustment of control box), and help replace a broken MGA windscreen.

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