SUMMER Events – Mark your Calendars!!!

Tune Up Week Sponsored by Huntington

Thanks to our Sponsor, Huntington Bank, our Tune Up City partners, and the many volunteers and behind-the-scenes helpers who make this possible, we are thrilled to announce the Tune Up Week Schedule for August 4th—9^th, 2025!

Registration is OPEN NOW for all August Events, including Tune Up Week, so get ready to Cruise around Genesee County and the surrounding areas, car fans, we will have a BLAST!!!!

Tony Bauer, Chairman of Tune Up Week, would like to thank everyone who submitted their vehicles to be considered for the featured T-shirts we give away each night. Hundreds of submissions were received, but it came down to picking only 6 cars. Those will all be announced at a later date.

So it’s TIME to make plans, get Registered and get ready for a JAM PACKED week of fun, before the Main Event Week of FUN! Man… we are kinda crazy! But LOVE cars, car shows and most of all… Being around YOU!

21st Annual Main Event Logo Unveiled

Exciting News from Back to the Bricks®!

We are thrilled to unveil the 21st annual Back to the Bricks® Main Event logo, and we couldn’t be prouder to announce that the honored volunteer is none other than Keith Damon. A cherished community member, Keith has dedicated 21 years of hard work and passion as a volunteer and now serves as a Board of Director.

Under the thoughtful guidance of our chairman, Al Jones, deciding who would be featured on this year’s logo was no small feat. Al had the challenging task of narrowing down a list of remarkable individuals and their iconic vehicles. After much consideration, Keith emerged as the perfect choice.

Thanks to Gary Alumbaugh’s artistic talents, the logo features a stunning rendition of Keith’s vehicle, the STUNNING 1972 Pontiac Lemans. From a simple photo to a beautifully crafted logo, it’s a testament to the time and precision that go into this artwork.

We are thrilled about this year’s logo, proudly displaying Keith’s vehicle and inspiring story. You can catch it live at the fifth annual Dust ’em Off Car Show. Don’t miss out!

And for those eager to show their support, visit our merchandise trailer to pick up your main event T-shirt.

By: Gary Fisher

President – Genesee County Historical Society

“Robert T. Longway”

We continue our exploration of the auto giants that led to the creation of the world-class Flint Cultural Center. One of the most important was Robert T. Longway. Best known today for the thoroughfare and planetarium that bear his name, he was a critical driver of the entire Flint Cultural Center project. He was, in fact, the President of the College and Cultural Center Development Committee of Sponsors, charged with raising the funds required to bring the project to fruition.

A longtime Flintstone, Longway arrived in Flint in 1907 along with other members of the Weston Mott Company, which was being transferred to Flint along with the owners, Charles Stewart Mott and William Doolittle, from Ithaca, New York. Longway had been a bean counter at Weston Mott (an accountant by any other name) and continued in that role after the move to the Vehicle City.

Weston Mott was a crucial piece of the puzzle in scaling Buick into a world-class automobile concern, and an even bigger part of the company soon to be called General Motors. When Mott’s partner Doolittle died shortly after moving to Flint, Mott became the sole owner of their shares in the firm (20% had been acquired by Buick leader William C. “Billy” Durant and his partner J. Dallas Dort, among others, as part of the deal that brought Weston Mott to Flint).

Longway moved up the company ladder. As Durant and Buick’s symbiotic relationship strengthened, he moved over to work at Buick, eventually becoming Buick’s treasurer. His career progressed steadily, and he ultimately landed as Buick’s vice president and assistant general manager.

After retirement, he devoted his time to an incredible array of Flint community projects, including the YMCA, YWCA, the Industrial and Mutual Association (IMA), Women’s Hospital, the Flint Institute of Arts, the Urban League, and the Flint Recreation and Parks Board.

Longway succeeded wildly as the leader of Flint College and Cultural Center’s fundraising efforts, personally contributing the equivalent of $2.5 million in 2025 dollars. The entire fundraising total, inflation-adjusted, was $237,235,687—nearly a quarter of a billion.

Along with the street and the planetarium, an East Side park at Potter School was named after him. That was more than appropriate given his efforts and the results he delivered to Flint. When people reflect on leaders who made the city the success story it became, it was because of people who gave back in gratitude for the prosperity they realized from calling Flint home. This virtuous cycle stands strong today along the sterling buildings on Kearsley Street that comprise America’s greatest little cultural center.

That devotion to the community extended to William Ballenger and Robert T. Longway, also pillars of the Flint auto and business community. Ballenger started as an officer of the Flint Wagon Works and later played a pivotal role with Buick, Chevrolet, and General Motors. He made significant bequests to Flint Junior College (now Mott Community College). The central athletic facility on campus, the William S. Ballenger Field House, was named in his honor.

Ferdinand “Dutch” Bower was another Buick executive whose funding led to the creation of the Bower Theater at the Flint Institute of Music. Longway, a Buick Vice President, made significant contributions that led to the Longway Planetarium being named after him. J. Dallas Dort’s family donated their home to house the original Institute of Music before it was destroyed by fire. Dort co-founded the Flint Road Cart Company, later renamed Durant-Dort, with Durant. He also played a pivotal role in funding Buick and Chevrolet, and later started his auto firm, the Dort Motor Car Company.

Inarguably, one of Genesee County’s jewels—if not the jewel—is the Cultural Center, which demonstrates what can be done when a community is focused on success and reinvests that success into the city that breathed life into its ventures. The American auto giants lived that, and their legacy serves as a very real reminder of the importance and enduring significance of that mentality.

Photo from, Flint our Community One Voice

Map From Wikipedia

Learn more about the Genesee County Historical Society by clicking the button below

Al’s Garage

Al’s Garage

Vol. 6, Issue #5

“Twenty-one and still counting”

Twenty-two years ago, my wife and I attended the annual ‘Woodward Dream Cruise.’ At that time, we owned a ’67 Chevelle powered by a 427 cubic inch engine and a 4-speed transmission. The clutch in the car was a 12-inch unit with heavy loading. After traveling as far as Ferndale, we decided to try to find a parking spot that was not too expensive and finally found a spot in a private business parking lot. After a few hours, we finally left and traveled north to Pontiac. Gridlock was the name of the game! My left leg was beginning to cramp, and the engine’s temperature was increasing by the minute. Finally making it to the ‘loop’ in Pontiac, we left to return to the Flint area.

On the way home, my wife and I began discussing hosting a show in the Flint area, structured like the WDC. And the Back to the Bricks® idea was ‘Hatched’!

The first thing needed was to sell the idea to Flint area car enthusiasts. Most of the people I approached thought it was a promising idea until I told them that if we moved forward with the idea, we could hold it on the same day as the WDC. That is when I acquired a new name (along with some other descriptive adjectives) like %&@$!&* nuts’! Or ‘you must be an idiot; that will never work. I am going to ‘Woodward’!

I approached several of my car friends and convinced them to try the idea, and Back to the Bricks® was born. So here we are, twenty-one years later, and Back to the Bricks® is going stronger than ever. Our one-day event has morphed into one of the nation’s largest automotive events. If you choose to conduct a Safari search and a Facebook search on the BttB, you will be amazed by the combined number of searches on the BttB. As it turns out, the BttB ranks close to number one in the nation. Not bad for a few gearheads that got together twenty-two years ago to lay the groundwork for our first show!

Unfortunately, many of the founding members of the BttB committee have passed away, with only a few still with us. One of the more vital facts is that a couple of us still alive have lived long enough to witness some of our children pick up the banner of the BttB. The John Olay family, including John, Georgeanne, Amy, and son-in-law Gary, has passed out t-shirts at all the events where t-shirts were given away, and Gary is the Back to the Bricks® designer of logos. Both Amy and Gary serve on multiple committees for Back to the Bricks®. Our youngest son, Phil, a Main Event Committee Member, helps coordinate the parking on Saginaw Street and is on the Chrome and Ice committee, working even in the winter months to help make these events run.

We need more young people and, for that purpose, more event volunteers. And here is a vital point. Each volunteer can look back and a warm glow of great satisfaction should overcome them. Hats off to all willing to give up some free time to volunteer. I guarantee that at the end of the day, you can tell your family, friends, neighbors, and co-workers, “I helped contribute to the BttB legacy”.

See you this summer and ‘Keep on Rollin.’

Al Hatch

Founder of the Back to the Bricks® 

Chairman Emeritus

Official Back to the Bricks® Online Store