Autorama 2023 comes to Detroit: Everything you need to know

Marina Johnson, Detroit Free Press

February 24, 2023 at 5:12 PM·3 min read

Detroit Autorama is roaring into the Motor City at Huntington Place this weekend. For all the car enthusiasts out there or anyone looking for some family fun, here’s what to know about Autorama:

What is the Autorama?

Autorama is a series of custom car shows taking place in major cities throughout the United States. This year, the Motor City celebrates the 70th Detroit Autorama, sponsored by O’Reilly Auto Parts. It will feature over 800 custom, hot rod vehicles from all over the world, with one vehicle making an appearance from New Zealand.

Who is Rat Fink?

According to the Los Angeles Times, Rat Fink is a hot rod cartoon character from the ‘50s. Ed “Big Daddy” Roth, the creator of Rat Fink, made the character an anti-hero to Mickey Mouse. Rat Fink became an icon in pop culture during the ‘60s, '70s, and '80s because of his large, bulging eyes, piercing glare, and pointed teeth. A highlight of the Autorama includes a Rat Fink reunion.

More:Vibe sessions, hip-hop orchestra, 'Pride and Prejudice': Best of the arts in Detroit

More:Autorama, Outdoorama and a comic-con: 5 things to do this weekend in metro Detroit

Eldie Troyer, left, and Ivan Fry, of Indiana, look at a classic hot rod inside Huntington Place for the 70th Annual Meguiar's Detroit Autorama car show in Detroit on Friday, Feb. 24, 2023.

Who is Ed "Big Daddy" Roth?

Ed "Big Daddy" Roth was a custom car designer and artist known for his unique cars and drawings. He was born in 1932 and died in 2001. Roth designed his first car in his garage in 1958, called "Little Jewel," and his success ultimately grew from there. The character Rat Fink put Roth on the map and he continued to sell his artwork to finance his car projects. Roth sold his artwork as posters, T-shirts, model kits and more.

Bob Weir looks at the neon signs displayed inside Huntington Place for the 70th Annual Meguiar's Detroit Autorama car show in Detroit on Friday, Feb. 24, 2023.

What is the 'Black Ghost'?

According to a news release, a legendary street racing car known as the “Black Ghost” will be featured at the Detroit Autorama. The vehicle is a 1970 Dodge Hemi Challenger R/T SE and dominated the Motor City racing scene. Godfrey Qualls, former owner of the “Black Ghost,” was a Detroit police officer who loved street drag racing. He kept his identity a secret and would show up to a race on roads such as Woodward and Telegraph, win, and then drive off. The car would vanish for weeks or months at a time and the street crowd nicknamed it the “Black Ghost.” The car is currently owned by Godfrey’s son, Gregory Qualls.

Will there be entertainment?

The Detroit Autorama has a lot of highlights including a sneak peek of a new documentary by Emmy award-winning filmmaker Keith Famie, titled, Detroit: The City of Hot Rods and Muscle Cars; Cars of George Barris, The King of Kustomizers, known for TV, Hollywood cars and more.

There will be live performances from rockabilly bands, including KC and the Classics and the Blues Brothers Tribute Band. Celebrities at the show will include Flavor Flav, Henry Winkler, and Dave Kindig.

People gather inside Huntington Place for the 70th Annual Meguiar's Detroit Autorama car show in Detroit on Friday, Feb. 24, 2023. The car event features over 800 hot rods, customs, trucks and motorcycles worldwide.

When and where is the Autorama?

The Detroit Autorama will take place from noon to 10 p.m. Friday, 9 a.m.-10 p.m. Saturday, and 10 a.m.-7 p.m. Sunday at Huntington Place, located at 1 Washington Blvd.

How much do tickets cost?

General admission ticket costs are $25 for adults, $10 for children ages 6-12, and free for children 5 and under. Tickets are available at the gate.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Autorama 2023: Rat Fink, 'Big Daddy' Roth come to Detroit show

Associated Press
In the polar bear capital of the world, a community lives with the predator next door and loves it
Sgt. Ian Van Nest rolls slowly through the streets of Churchill, his truck outfitted with a rifle and a barred back seat to hold anyone he has to arrest. “How are you today?” Van Nest asks. It's the beginning of polar bear season in Churchill, a tiny town on a spit of land jutting into Hudson Bay, and keeping tourists safe from hungry and sometimes fierce bears is an essential job for Van Nest and many others.
Associated Press
Forget downtown or the ’burbs. The far-flung exurbs are where people are moving
Not long ago, Polk County’s biggest draw was citrus instead of people. Located between Tampa and Orlando, Florida’s citrus capital produces more boxes of citrus than any other county in the state and has devoted tens of thousands of acres to growing millions of trees. Bulldozed citrus groves in recent years made way for housing and big box stores that could one day merge the two metropolitan areas into what has half-jokingly been dubbed, “Orlampa.”
Associated Press
Investigation reveals a Russian factory's plan to mix decoys with a new deadly weapon in Ukraine
A high-tech factory in central Russia has created a new, deadly force to attack Ukraine: a small number of highly destructive thermobaric drones surrounded by huge swarms of cheap foam decoys. The plan, which Russia dubbed Operation False Target, is intended to force Ukraine to expend scarce resources to save lives and preserve critical infrastructure, including by using expensive air defense munitions, according to a person familiar with Russia’s production and a Ukrainian electronics expert who hunts them from his specially outfitted van.
Associated Press
Operation False Target: How Russia plotted to mix a deadly new weapon among decoy drones in Ukraine
At a secretive factory in Russia's central grasslands, engineers are manufacturing hundreds of decoy drones meant to overwhelm Ukrainian defenses as they try to protect against a horrific new weapon, an Associated Press investigation has found. The plant at Russia’s Alabuga Special Economic Zone recently started churning out thermobaric drones alongside the decoys, the investigation found. The thermobaric warheads create a vortex of high pressure and heat that can penetrate thick walls.
Associated Press
An Indian family froze to death crossing the Canada-US border, a perilous trip becoming more common
On the last night of their lives, Jagdish Patel, his wife and their two young children tried to slip into the U.S. across a near-empty stretch of the Canadian border. Wind chills reached minus 36 Fahrenheit (minus 38 Celsius) that night in January 2022 as the family from India set out on foot to meet a waiting van. Coordinating things in Canada, federal prosecutors say, was Harshkumar Patel, an experienced smuggler nicknamed “Dirty Harry.”
Associated Press
The November Project gets people outside to exercise and socialize together all winter long
The sun had yet to come up in Edmonton, Alberta, and it was more than 20 degrees below zero. Tanis Smith layered up anyway, ready to run up and down hundreds of stairs among the trees in the Saskatchewan River Valley. It wouldn’t be the last time they risked freezing their toes off to get in a workout before the rest of the world wakes up.
Associated Press
Alaska political leaders hope to see Trump undo restrictions on oil drilling
President-elect Donald Trump promised repeatedly during his campaign to expand oil drilling in the U.S., which is good news for political leaders in Alaska, where oil is the economic lifeblood and many felt the Biden administration has obstructed efforts to boost the state's diminished production. A debate over drilling on federal lands on Alaska's petroleum-rich North Slope will likely be revived in the coming months, particularly in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which environmentalists have long sought to protect as one of the country's last wild places.
Associated Press
AP PHOTOS: 1,000 days of war in Ukraine captured in images
A thousand days of war in Ukraine have been captured in stunning images, many of them horrifying, some of them poignant, others uplifting. Since Russia’s all-out invasion of its smaller neighbour on Feb. 24, 2022, Europe’s biggest armed conflict since World War II has cost tens of thousands of lives on both sides. The Russian military has repeatedly used missiles, drones and artillery to blast civilian targets across Ukraine with devastating consequences.
Associated Press
House elections produced a stalemate. Can Republicans figure out how to work with a thin majority?
After one of the most chaotic and least productive sessions in modern history, voters made a surprising choice in elections for the U.S. House -- they overwhelmingly stuck with the status quo. House Republicans will hold onto a thin majority, and while the chamber's exact partisan divide is still to be determined as votes are tallied in a handful of states, the results of 435 House races nationwide have produced hardly any change to the makeup of the chamber. In fact, it's more like a stalemate: Republicans and Democrats have each flipped seven seats, while just eight incumbents nationwide have lost their races.
Associated Press
In final talks, Biden to press China's Xi on North Korea's ties with Russia
President Joe Biden is expected to use his final meeting with China's leader, Xi Jinping, to urge him to dissuade North Korea from further deepening its support for Russia's war on Ukraine. Saturday's talks on the sidelines of the annual Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Peru come just over two months before Biden leaves office and makes way for Republican President-elect Donald Trump. It will be Biden's last check-in with Xi — someone the Democrat saw as his most consequential peer on the world stage.
Associated Press
More states are ditching exams as high school graduation requirements
When Massachusetts voters decided to ditch the state's standardized tests as a high school graduation requirement on Election Day, they joined a trend that has steadily chipped away at the use of high-stakes tests over the past two decades. The vote on the ballot question leaves only seven states with mandated graduation exams, a number that could soon shrink further. A backlash to standardized tests has been fueled by complaints they take up too much classroom time and questions about how well they measure readiness for college or careers.
AFP
Japan PM expresses concern to Xi over South China Sea situation
Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba expressed "serious concerns" over the situation in the South China Sea to Chinese President Xi Jinping in their first in-person talks, Tokyo's foreign ministry said Saturday.Ishiba "conveyed serious concerns over the Chinese military's growing activity" to Xi, the Japanese foreign ministry said.
AFP
Tens of thousands flee as Super Typhoon Man-yi nears Philippines
A powerful storm sweeping towards the Philippines intensified into a super typhoon on Saturday, the state weather forecaster said, warning of "significant to severe impacts" from the wind and "life-threatening" storm surges.Up to 14-metre (46-feet) high seas were expected around Catanduanes, while "significant to severe impacts from typhoon-force winds are possible" in the hardest hit areas, along with a "high risk of life-threatening storm surges" exceeding three metres, the forecaster said.
NBC News
Trump taps Karoline Leavitt for White House press secretary
President-elect Donald Trump announced that he is selecting Karoline Leavitt, his campaign's national press secretary, to serve as White House press secretary.
NBC News
Woman told House Ethics Committee she saw Gaetz have sex with minor, her lawyer says
A woman told the House Ethics Committee that she saw Matt Gaetz, who is President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for the U.S. attorney general, have sex with a minor, her lawyer said Friday.
NBC News
Offensive, racist texts now being sent to high-schoolers, Latinos and LGBTQ community, FBI says
The FBI on Friday said reports of racist and offensive text messages sent from anonymous phone numbers are now being sent to members of Latino and LGBTQ communities.
AFP
Trump defense pick Hegseth accused of 2017 sexual assault
One of Donald Trump's most controversial cabinet picks just became even more so: Pete Hegseth, tapped for defense secretary earlier this week, was accused of sexual assault in 2017, according to police.The accusations against Hegseth come as Trump's pick for attorney general, far-right former congressman Matt Gaetz, stunned many following his lengthy embroilment in sexual misconduct allegations.
Reuters
China willing to be partners, friends with US, Chinese envoy says
SHANGHAI (Reuters) -China is willing to be partners and friends with the United States, China's ambassador to Washington said, seeking to strengthen dialogue between the world's two largest economies. China has no plan to surpass or replace the United States, Xie Feng said in a speech in Hong Kong on Friday, addressing Chinese officials and the U.S. ambassador to China. Beijing is seeking to reset relations with Washington ahead of Donald Trump's return to the presidency in January.
AFP
Mushroom houses for Gaza? Arab designers offer home-grown innovations
As winter descends on Gaza's tent cities, emergency housing made from mushrooms could keep out the cold -- just one of several sustainable, home-grown innovations put forward by Arab designers at an expo in Dubai.ReRoot's emergency housing was not the only example of sustainable Arab design at the annual exhibition in Dubai, which closed on Sunday.
NBC News
She admitted to posing as a nurse in Virginia. Now she's accused of doing the same in California hospitals.
A convicted identity thief who admitted to posing as a nurse in Virginia nearly a decade ago is accused of impersonating nurses in at least two hospitals in Southern California this year, authorities said.