The Two LeMays:

Many have heard of the late Harold E. LeMay, and Nan­cy LeMay, who togeth­er for over thir­ty some years col­lect­ed cars, trucks, motor­cy­cles, dolls, toys and more, enough to fill many, many build­ings in south Taco­ma. Last year, the long await­ed LeMay Muse­um was opened in Taco­ma, WA, next to the Taco­ma Dome along­side I‑5.  Now called “LeMay-Amer­i­ca’s Car Muse­um” the con­crete and glass edi­fice house sev­er­al hun­dred LeMay vehi­cles along with many oth­ers donat­ed or loaned for exhi­bi­tion. Read More about the LeMay Muse­um.
The orig­i­nal LeMay col­lec­tion was housed at the fam­i­ly home, still used by the fam­i­ly and hous­ing sev­er­al hun­dred cars and arti­facts. When Harold and Nan­cy ran out of space to house the grow­ing col­lec­tion, they pur­chased the Mary­mount Acad­e­my near­by. The 80 acre cam­pus is described in their web­site.

Now, Mary­mount pro­vides an oppor­tu­ni­ty to see, on any giv­en day, 500 vehi­cles of the col­lec­tion plus dolls, toys, mem­o­ra­bil­ia and it con­tin­ues to grow.
From its roots as the orig­i­nal auto­mo­tive col­lec­tion of Harold & Nan­cy LeMay, start­ed in the 1960’s, the LeMay fam­i­ly formed the LeMay Fam­i­ly Col­lec­tion Foun­da­tion (LFCF) with the objec­tives of sus­tain­ing and grow­ing the LeMay Col­lec­tion and a desire from the com­mu­ni­ty to pre­serve the amaz­ing LeMay Col­lec­tion for the future. The LeMay fam­i­ly col­lec­tion includes over 1,500 vin­tage vehi­cles, plus relat­ed Amer­i­cana (dolls, toys, antiques, farm equip­ment, etc.) and much of that is locat­ed at Mary­mount, a dis­tinct cam­pus with a unique his­to­ry all its own.

The LeMay Fam­i­ly Col­lec­tion Foun­da­tion at the Mary­mount Event Cen­ter was estab­lished so future gen­er­a­tions may enjoy all these arti­facts year-round!

The most fab­u­lous day of the year, for car enthu­si­asts, is the annu­al open house and car show. It is the only day of the year when the home­stead is open to the pub­lic — a “not-to-be-missed” expe­ri­ence. The lega­cy of the Harold E. LeMay col­lec­tion, how­ev­er, is at Mary­mount where his­to­ry, preser­va­tion, edu­ca­tion all come togeth­er as the LeMay legacy.

The cel­e­bra­tion, of course, is always on the last Sat­ur­day of August. Now, the 36th year of the event has become, in our opin­ion, like an “5 ring cir­cus” of auto­mo­tive activ­i­ty, events and exhi­bi­tions. While the LeMay Mary­mount Event Cen­ter is now open year around (hence the “Two LeMays”), the cel­e­bra­tion is August 31st.  (The auc­tion con­tin­ues on Sun­day).  You are all wel­come — it’s fam­i­ly fun — at it’s best and not lim­it­ed to just auto­mo­tive enthusiasts.

 36th Annual LeMay Car Show

Acres and acres of gorgeous vintage cars — what’s not to love?

Plan now for August 31st for the LeMay Car Show.

If you have nev­er attend­ed the LeMay Car Show, it is more than 1,000 cars! It’s a TWO loca­tion car show, which means that it’s the ONE day a year that in addi­tion to the LeMay Col­lec­tions at Mary­mount, Nan­cy LeMay and her fam­i­ly open their LeMay home­stead prop­er­ty in Spanaway for the gen­er­al pub­lic to come gawk and walk through. She may call her house a stan­dard five-bed­room farm­house, but the garages… well, let’s just say that there’s some­thing real­ly spe­cial about hav­ing a 300-car garage! In addi­tion to the vin­tage vehi­cles, there are spe­cial dis­plays of dolls, antiques, a Gen­er­al Store & Soda Foun­tain Room and all sorts of Americana.

 See below for AUCTION information

Col­lec­tor car own­ers are invit­ed to bring their vehi­cles to dis­play on the show fields (park­ing is first-come, first-serve, no need to pre-reg­is­ter), there’s a car club cor­ral, and there is even an auto­mo­tive swap meet and a vin­tage vehi­cle auc­tion that starts in the after­noon! (the auc­tion will con­tin­ue into Sun­day — more about that below). Vis­i­tors will even get a chance to see a spe­cial “Rat Pack” dis­play which includes cars from the stars: Peter Law­ford’s Dual Ghia and Sam­my Davis Jr’s Stutz.

There is also a NEW “Mas­ters of the Brush” fea­ture to the show where sev­er­al auto­mo­tive artists will be show­cas­ing their auto­mo­tive art, and they’ll be draw­ing for kids — so neat to see the artists as they work!
All in all, you won’t want to miss the LeMay Car Show! Our LeMay vol­un­teers are already work­ing hard to ensure that it is going to be the best car show ever! Be sure to round up your friends and fam­i­ly and make a day of it! Admis­sion is just $10/person (or FREE admis­sion for LeMay Fam­i­ly Col­lec­tion mem­bers), and you can pur­chase tick­ets online ahead of time, or at the gate. Free park­ing, free shut­tles. Read more details about the show here…
Side­note: There is  still space for auto­mo­tive swap meet ven­dors at this event — spaces are just $35 ea for a 10x20 space — call 253.272.2336 to reserve your space!

The Cold War is com­ing back to Spanaway…

In what might be the odd­est project ever under­tak­en by the LeMay Restora­tion Shop, a sales­man­’s sam­ple of a 1961 Civ­il Defense Fall­out Shel­ter has been restored and brought to Mary­mount for

the 36th Annu­al LeMay Car Show. It’s believed to be one of just a very few ful­ly restored Civil­ian Defense shel­ters in the Unit­ed States.

Feeling Lucky? Don’t Miss Lucky Collector Car Auction 

August 31-September 1 

The upcom­ing Lucky Col­lec­tor Car Auc­tion at Mary­mount will be held in con­junc­tion with the 36th Annu­al LeMay Car Show, which draws thou­sands of vis­i­tors each year. This Lucky Auc­tion is a 2‑day auc­tion on August 31st-Sep­tem­ber 1st, and will fea­ture dozens of vin­tage vehi­cles! Auc­tion pre­view is on August 31st from 9am-1pm, and the auc­tion begins at 1pm on August 31st for the first lots. There are more lots than there is time, so the auc­tion will car­ry on into Sun­day for the remain­ing lots.

Bid­ders are welcome!

Con­sign­ers — see spe­cial offer here!

More than 150 lots have already been con­signed and are list­ed online, and more than 200 are expect­ed, so there will be plen­ty of vehi­cles to choose from! There are sports cars, mus­cle cars, true clas­sics, a few pick­up trucks and motor­cy­cles, some mod­el cars and auto­mo­bil­ia, and some real­ly unusu­al rar­i­ties. Whether you are hunt­ing for anoth­er col­lec­tor car to add to your sta­ble, or whether you are a first-timer wait­ing to “fall in love” with your first col­lec­tor car, we know that you won’t want to miss out on all the auc­tion action!

Reg­is­ter to bid ahead of time or you can reg­is­ter at the auc­tion, or you can even bid remote­ly off-site through Prox­ibid. Pre­view the lot list­ings ahead of time and check back as the date gets  clos­er — more vehi­cles will be added soon!

Sub­scribers and read­ers of NW Car Events Cal­en­dar who want to con­sign their vehi­cles may obtain a $50.00 sav­ings on fees by using our spe­cial Pro­mo Code: Use this Pro­mo Code: UPFR-450 when reg­is­ter­ing. Details here.

MORE AUCTION INFO:
www.luckyoldcar.com or call: 206.467.6531 or email: info@luckyoldcar.com

About other opportunities at LeMay Marymount Events Center

Private Events at Marymount

Plan­ning a spe­cial event? The Mary­mount Event Cen­ter has great indoor spaces for groups of 50–500. We also have out­door spaces that are per­fect for car shows, fes­ti­vals, wed­dings, cor­po­rate func­tions or oth­er events! Learn more

Vintage Vehicle Tours & Historical Marymount Tours