Mario Lorenz
The Walt Kaplin I knew
I met Walt through my good friend Bill who like Walt would try and talk you into almost anything. I had just become manager of the Hilltop Business Association and was beginning to think about producing a street fair. We did produce it and it later became the "Hilltop Street Fair." It was about that time in 2012 that Bill introduced me to Walt. Walt was a pretty good talker, and as I recall, he spent most of the time talking about Busch's Drive-in, Griots Garage, car shows, his wife Joanie, and Jackie Robinson.
Well, he talked me into putting a car show in the first Hilltop Street Fair in August of 2014. Walt had a listing of all the car shows in the country, and he said for a few bucks he could get me listed in this publication and it will have a huge impact on the success of the car show. I think it only cost the district $3-$400, and that first year we had five cars.
After the sparse participation, the Hilltop Business Association board wanted to drop the car show, I said if we are going to do it, we must give it a chance to succeed. Three years is a good test. So we kept the car show in, and the next year, thanks in part to a man named Geoff and his wife Laura and the Black Top Rebels, there were 65 cars in 2015, and 110 in 2016, and now we were on a roll. The last year we did the car show there were 160 vehicles.
I know Walt was not a perfect person, and he could drive you nuts sometimes with his talk and wild ideas, but Walt had a great deal of faith and always felt that anything could be done if you just had the will to do it.
Mario Lorenz
December 4, 2019