What goes better with classic cars than rock ‘n’ roll? Rock-Ola jukeboxes, of course! It was at the Rock-Ola parking lot in Torrance, Calif., where the SouthBay Mopars car club held its 15th annual Rock ‘N Roll Cruise In/Car Show on a beautiful, sunny SoCal day, Sat., Aug. 10. (Rock-Ola’s Ken Urban is VP of the car club and the group holds its monthly meetings at the juke factory.)
Not limited to “just” Mopar classics, it was open to all makes and styles, with the factory and adjacent parking lots lined with trucks, rat rods, Shelbys and more. Rock-Ola President Glenn Streeter even had some of his own car collection inside the factory, which was open for tours.
In attendance was Alexander Walder-Smith, who remarked about how pleased he was to be the new owner of the iconic jukebox company, especially considering the long history between his family and the brand. (His father began operating Rock-Ola jukeboxes and other equipment just after World War II.) You could sense the excitement Walder-Smith has for the legacy of the company and what he has planned. He said a new website is under development by a team in England that “is going to be unbelievable when it’s finished” and that there are a number of other exciting things underway.
