Antique Car Club Travels Area’s Yellowstone Trail

The Thorp Courier (Thorp, WI)
October 3, 2007
Transcribed by Dolores Mohr Kenyon

On Sunday, September 30, twenty members from the Tri-County Antique Car Club toured the area’s Yellowstone Trail, stopping at attractions along the way.

John Freudigmann of Greenwood, president of the 30 member antique car club explains, “I set up Sunday’s cruise to explore our local segment of the Yellowstone Trail.  We followed the Trail from Owen to Cadott.  We would have started from Curtiss, but there is a section of Willow Road that is gravel, so we began the Trail in Owen.”

Because antique cars must be treated carefully, many members left their treasured vehicles at home due to Sunday’s rain, taking instead their “everyday cars.”  After touring Owen, the antique car club stopped for breakfast at Rondi’s Country Café in Withee.  Over breakfast, the antique car club members and their spouses mostly discussed their favorite subject, antique automobiles.  After dining the group “cruised” westward to the Thorp Historical Museum in the old St. Hedwig’s Rectory.

“We cruise along at about 40 miles an hour, a good speed to view the countryside,” says Freudigmann.

The tour stopped off at other local, favorite attractions as well.  “Because we are a car club, a must-stop is at the Breezy Acres Auto Body Shop between Thorp and Stanley on Highway X.  Here we will watch Jerry and Bob Brenner do some hands-on car restoration work.  The frontwards/backwards car was fascinating for the car buff—two front halves of cars make one car that drives frontwards and back,” laughs Freudigmann.

The caravan of cars continued on to Cadott to the Little School Museum and the Cadott Historical Museum.  The trek through the countryside concluded with a buffet luncheon at Kathy’s Diner on Highways 27 and X.

“We had a wonderful cruise – our hosts were just great,” raves Freudigmann.  “A couple of drivers with old cars came to see our cars then joined us on the Trail.  Our cruises are fairly short day trips.  We always have a destination, stopping in places of interest within the sate,” Freudigmann explains. 

The Tri-County Antique Car Club was stared (started) in 1985 and is chartered by the State of Wisconsin.

The area of the Yellowstone Trail from Curtiss to Cadott is promoted by the Highway 29 Community Partnership, a collaboration of volunteers from those seven communities who are devoted to enhancing region al economic development and housing.  The Partnership would like to highlight that the above antique car cruise is an example of the many trip possibilities that can be planned along the area’s Yellowstone Trail, which could be the area’s best marketing tool for tourism.