MTFCA Forum

That fire was devastating! It was huge automobile showing. Hundreds of the latest and greatest models on display for the public to see! Pre crash boom-times had manufacturers showing their best.
However, far worse than that. One of the first really large efforts of its kind, many manufacturers at their peak of success, were showing off their history. Many manufacturers were showing some of their earliest and finest cars of the previous thirty years! I have never heard a reliable number, but it was a lot of very historic cars were destroyed in minutes! Barney Oldfield's custom built "Golden Submarine" was reduced to ashes and an aluminum puddle. Several other famous racing cars were similarly destroyed. Packard lost five or six of their most historic cars including one of the first three built! (Exactly which one of the first three has never been clear to me, or some writers I have read excerpts from?)
The financial loss in those days was in the millions! The historic loss incalculable.