Both the Monterey and San Francisco Bay areas, coastal neighbors, are considered bastions of automotive excellence and elegance, in terms of classic car collection, restoration, racing, and pageantry. Particularly on the Monterey Peninsula, where many first- and second-homeowners keep their cars, knowing they can get a quick flight in or out of Monterey, and they’re not far from shipping ports in San Francisco or Los Angeles when they need to move those cars.
What an ideal place for automotive repair and restoration programs to train young men and women passionate about preserving and restoring classic cars. The staff at Rancho Cielo Youth Campus, one of the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance designated charities, agree.
Armed with a belief in youth and a vision for their success, Rancho Cielo is a comprehensive learning and social services center for underserved and disconnected youth in Monterey County. Their goal is self-sufficiency for youth and the self-esteem it generates. Established in Salinas in 2000, the nonprofit organization provides education, workforce training, counseling, and other support services to youth who have struggled in traditional academic and social settings, often as a result of drugs, gang affiliation, poverty, or neglect.
Automobile impresario Don Williams died this past March. Williams’ family, friends, and fans have sought to pay tribute to him by helping fund a program that trains underserved youth to enter the rarified car community as mechanics and restorers.(Ron Kimball, courtesy of Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance)
Two years ago, both seeded and developed by automobile enthusiast and Carmel Rotary Club member Mark Grandcolas, Rancho Cielo, which initially instituted culinary and construction programs to great effect, implemented automotive repair and classic car restoration programs.
Automobile impresario and legendary champion of the Concours d’Elegance, Don Williams, who died this past March, likely never met a car he didn’t already know. In the wake of many tributes to celebrate and memorialize the family man, the friend, the champion of the classic car hobby, Williams’ family, friends, and fans have sought to pay tribute by helping fund a program that trains underserved youth to enter the rarified car community as mechanics and restorers.
How convenient, fortuitous, and bashert that a program is already up and running at Rancho Cielo, in our own backyard.
Coming up in the classic car community
The idea to pay tribute to Don Williams by investing in youth who will learn how to invest in classic cars through repair and restoration, emerged in a conversation between Pebble Beach Concours Chairman Sandra Button and her husband Martin Button, president of Cosdel International Transportation, along with Barrett-Jackson Auction Company Chairman and CEO Craig Jackson and his wife Carolyn Jackson, the auction company’s chief philanthropy officer.
“Don was a beloved member of our Barrett-Jackson family and the collector car community as a whole,” said Craig Jackson. “For five decades, Don was a vital part of our auctions. A trusted advisor, we shared a love for restoring cars, and it’s an honor to make this donation in his memory as we fuel the growth and prosperity of this hobby that Don loved, for generations to come.”
Williams first entered the classic car community as a young man and first participated in the Concours d’Elegance in 1972, bringing a Lincoln to the show field. He was typically the first person out on the show field in the morning if only to greet other entrants, earning him the title of “Don Patrol,” later renamed “Dawn Patrol.” Also involved in establishing Barrett-Jackson and the Blackhawk Museum, and the first person to sell a car for more than $1 million, he’d be thrilled to know that the collector car community has rallied to establish funding in his name, to train youth as restorers and mechanics. First and foremost among them are the Buttons and the Jackson Family Foundation, who launched the fund and invited others to join in.
“This fund will not only benefit our automotive repair and classic restoration programs, but it will enable students to achieve a high school diploma and recognized certifications in the field,” said Rancho Cielo CEO Chris Devers. “In addition, this support will enable our students to look toward postsecondary education, via scholarships to McPherson College in Kansas and San Francisco’s Academy of Art University, two leading four-year colleges in industrial design and automotive restoration.”
Perhaps some of those students will return to find meaningful work in this truly car-focused community, particularly through organizations that complement the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance and WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca.
“Friendship is the glue that connects the car world globally,” Sandra Button said. “The word ‘friend’ doesn’t seem like a big enough word to describe Don Williams and his influence on the whole of the collector car world. But it describes exactly what Don was: a friend to all.”
Contributions can be made in memory of Don Williams to the Pebble Beach Company Foundation, the charitable partner of the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, via https://pebblebeachconcours.net/charity-giving/donate-now/.