OH to CA: The Nethercutt Collection

The nice part about this being Dad's second visit here to Los Angeles is that we could take him to places we normally don't get to go to with people on their visits here.

The Nethercutt Museum is one such place. Typically, if you want to go to a car museum in LA, you go to the Petersen Museum, which Dad and I did on his first trip here (and talked about in this post). The Nethercutt was introduced to me after Dad left the first time, so when he came out again, we put this on the To Do list.

There are actually two parts to the Nethercutt Museum. The actual museum, and then the Nethercutt Collection. The Collection is only open a couple of days a week, and you have to be on one of their twice daily scheduled tour groups to go.

Dad was on his way back up from San Diego, and we missed our tour slot. We will definitely make plans to go back, because the Grand Salon (where the collection is housed) looks amazing! They have a bunch of vintage and one-of-a-kind cars, as well as instruments.

Anyway, Dad, Nick and I headed to the Museum part. It is in a very nondescript area in Sylmar, CA.

I thought I had a fairly decent knowledge of some of the weird car companies that have existed throughout history, seeing that my dad is a car fanatic, and I have been to so many car museums over the years. But I'll tell you--I don't know a thing! Even my dad proclaimed, "I've never heard of any of these companies!"

The Nethercutt Collection was founded by JB and Dorothy Nethercutt. He bought and restored cars his entire life, most of them still housed in his collection. His son, Jack, now owns and manages the collection. A lot of the cars are entered each year in the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance, and win.

My favorite, a 60s era Bugatti (won last year's Concours):

Dad in front of a good old American supercar.

Hey! A Dayton-based NCR-made cash register!

Good old Model T

An unfortunate license plate (do you think they thought that through at all?)

It's Doc Hudson!

This old-school automated music machine still works! Just put in a nickel, and it plays both the violin and the piano!

This Voisin was owned by Rudolph Valentino. (See? Who has ever heard of a Voisin before??)

$14,000 in 1923?!? Yikes!!

This is the only museum in the world to own every model of the Rolls Royce Phantom series. The green one used to belong to a sheik prince.

Outside the museum, they have a railroad steam engine and personal car. They were beautiful to go through! They have all been painstakingly restored to their original glory. There was a Wurlitzer organ inside this car that they found, and they believe it is the one that was in the original car because of the finish on the outside. Pretty cool.