Auto Action

The Charleston area and South Carolina as a whole had its share of car-related events and announcements as of late.

Here’s a few.

Glass master

In the “Not Everything that Happens in Vegas, Stays in Vegas” department, a Charleston technician won top honors there for windshield installation.

Jamie Browning of the Glasspro on Daniel Island took the gold medal at the International Pilkington Classic Auto Glass Technician Competition, which organizers call the “Olympics” of auto glass replacement.

Browning was awarded a $10,000 cash prize, gold medal, a large trophy and the coveted title of “World’s Best Auto Glass Technician.” The event took place Nov. 6-7 in Las Vegas.

The technician competed against 18 other regional champions from around the world. Each competitor installed a windshield on a car in accordance with a globally recognized standard set by the industry’s Auto Glass Replacement Safety Standards Council.

He also went head to head in the final round against three other finalists who removed and reinstalled a vehicle’s back windshield, otherwise known as its backlite.

Browning, 36, has competed twice before in the competition. “The entire competition is about education and having the technicians learn from one another as well as educate the common consumer,” said Debra Levy, publisher of Auto Glass Repair and Replacement magazine and co-sponsor of the contest. “Jamie faced some grueling competition and came out on top.”

Glasspro, founded in 1995 by Paul Heinauer, is based in Charleston and has locations in 10 surrounding cities.

The Pilkington Classic Auto Glass Technician event is co-sponsored by AGRR magazine and the Independent Glass Association. For more information, visit www.autoglassolympics.com.

No show

Held for just two years, the Carolina Open Car Classic & Hot Rod Run drew huge crowds as well as women dressed in antebellum garb, minor celebrities such as Ernie Irvan and hundreds of vintage cars and trucks.

The festival took place at Boone Hall Plantation in December 2007 and then last December, bringing a boost to the car show circuit during a typically slow time.

But this year, organizer Gregg Holloway of Cripple Dog Hot Rods in North Charleston has decided not to put on the show citing “conflicting schedules and weather concerns.”

Notably the hot rod shop, which also has an operation in Florida, is hosting a big show in Jacksonville today and Sunday. “It would be impossible to turn around and put on a quality show in Charleston two weeks later,” he said.

Holloway, though, hasn’t left local car enthusiasts in the lurch. “I am working on a spring 2010 date for a large show in the Charleston area.”

Palmetto engines

South Carolina has a storied military history, especially its role in the Revolutionary and Civil wars. Yet of lesser renown, the state also has an automotive lineage dating well before BMW opened its Greer manufacturing plant in the 1990s.

The state’s car heritage will be the topic of Vintage Auto Television, a new program on South Carolina Education Television that debuted Nov. 8 at 5 p.m. and on ETV’s SC Channel on Nov. 15 at 6 p.m.

Classic cars profiled in the first edition were Ken Gottleib’s 1963 Impala convertible that he bought after serving in Vietnam (it was the same make and model as his “dream car” before the war); a 1947 Ford Sportsman Super Deluxe Convertible Woody; a 1926 Packard Sport Roadster and a 1966 Studebaker Daytona. They all are owned by Hilton Head Island-area residents.

According to producers, South Carolina’s automotive history is deep and rich, yet it is an untapped treasure trove of remarkable achievements. There was a time when six out of 10 people worked in an auto-related industry and many Southerners worked on cars in their backyards.

Paul Ianuario, longtime curator of the BMW Museum in Greenville and a retired automotive engineer, noted that NASCAR was born in the Carolinas and that the Anderson Motor Co. manufactured cars in Rock Hill from 1916 to 1925. “It was a car the Smithsonian called one of the finest cars built in the U.S.,” he said. “But because John Gary Anderson refused to compromise the quality of the car, he could never make it price competitive with the Fords. Still, more than 5,500 Andersons were produced, but only about a dozen still exist.”

Vintage Auto Television will feature classic cars through the memories of auto enthusiasts, from race cars, to brass era cars and even muscle cars, providing eye-catching imagery and historical information and footage to bring automotive history to life, according to the show’s producer, Guy Smith of Hilton Head Island.

“Vintage Auto Television transports the audience back to a wonderful time and reflects the cars’ early origins, with all the nostalgia and great love stories that go with each collector’s car,” Smith said.

The show is hosted by Hilton Head Island resident and former ESPN sportscaster Bob Stevens. For more information, visit www.vintageautotv.com.

Reach Jim Parker at 937-5542 or jparker@postandcourier.com