Woodward Dream Cruise rolls to a close for the 29th year (2024)

ROYAL OAK — The Woodward Dream Cruise brought nearly a million people to Woodward Avenue to enjoy thousands of classic cars and hot rods Aug. 17.

The Dream Cruise began in 1995 as a fundraiser for a children's soccer field in Ferndale. It is now in its 29th year and has grown into the car show that it is today, being credited as the biggest in the world.

Over 40,000 classic cars, hot rods and customized vehicles gather to cruise down Woodward Avenue through nine participating communities: Pontiac, Bloomfield Township, Bloomfield Hills, Birmingham, Royal Oak, Berkley, Huntington Woods, Pleasant Ridge and Ferndale.

Many of the participants in the cruise have brought their favorite cars to showcase since the start in 1995, including Tim Hopkinson, the owner of a 1967 Chevy Impala that has a deep and touching backstory.

Hopkinson set up his Impala at the Performance Park Classic Car Show at Memorial Park in Royal Oak with a few artifacts explaining the story of the car.

Hopkinson calls himself the “caretaker” of the Impala, which once belonged to a young man named Billy Sohns, who was paraplegic.

At age 15, Sohns created greeting cards to purchase the Impala. According to a memorial document on unitedstreetmachines.com, Sohns became interested in lowriders in the 1980s and chose to buy the Impala.

Following the purchase of the car, Sohns called up a few people to install hydraulics, do some mechanical work, paint the car and make it a cruiser.

“He made greeting cards with a pen and pencil in his teeth,” Hopkinson said. “In ’87, Billy passed away and his mom and dad kept the car in storage for, I don’t know, around eight or 10 years.”

The parents of Sohns gifted the car to Ralph Haney, a member of the United Street Machine Association, a club for custom car lovers. Later, he passed the car onto Hopkinson, who was someone that he trusted to take great care of Sohns’ car.

Hopkinson said that a group of 10 people worked together on Sohns’ car to modify it to exactly what Sohns would have wanted.

“Everybody had their own little part that they did and contributed to it, to redo it just the way Billy wanted himself to do it,” Hopkinson said. “And now we just take it around wherever and display it in Billy’s name.”

Hopkinson did not personally know Sohns, but when he became involved with the United Street Machine Association in 1988, he was told Sohns’ story, and after helping modify the vehicle, he was able to take it home and care for it.

“It’s always going to be Billy’s car, of course; I am just the caretaker. No matter whose name is on the papers, it’s always Billy’s car,” Hopkinson said.

Another longtime supporter and attendee of the Woodward Dream Cruise is Charles Turner, who also happened to be working at the Performance Park Classic Car show at Memorial Park in Royal Oak, helping direct car owners where to park.

Turner said that he was glad to see so many people show up to the show, especially since it was predicted to rain most of the day. He said there were more cars in the Performance Park Classic Car Show than last year.

“Certain cars won’t come out in the rain, and then you get the people that live on dirt roads — they aren’t going to be able to get out to the pavement,” he said.

Turner is also a member of the Michigan Hot Rod Association, which is a group with around six clubs. Turner said he has also judged the Detroit Autorama for over 44 years and plans to judge again during the next Autorama Feb. 28-March 2, 2025.

Because Turner was on the job, he did not bring a vehicle to the Dream Cruise this year, but if he had, he said he would bring one of his Camaros.

Alongside Turner was Mark Laskosky, another person helping to organize car owners in Memorial Park. Laskosky said he had also attended the show since 1995, and he had even brought his own customized vintage Ford shop truck to display in Memorial Park.

“I have had that forever. It was so rusty that the hood flew open on my nephew on the freeway, so it ended up being I either scrap it or fix it,” Laskosky said. “It’s got over 300,000 miles on it. And I redid the interior, redid the motor, and just drove it to Louisville for the (National Street Rod Association) Nationals down there.”

But the work did not stop there. Laskosky also personally painted the car, creating a super detailed design on the hood and sides of the truck, which he said was tedious work.

Laskosky said he has also worked with the Michigan Hot Rod Association Rod Repair Shop, where he repairs cars if someone goes to a show and breaks down.

The Woodward Dream Cruise is one of a kind, according to Laskosky, and entices people to come back each year for the variety and shared love of cars.

“The car culture keeps me coming back, and you can see everything: the Jeeps, the custom cars, the muscle cars and trucks,” he said.