David Bednar has a long history in show business, including involvement in the Shaw Festival and Livent. But for more than a decade, he has been staging another big show in Toronto – the annual Canadian National Exhibition.
The CNE, which runs from Aug. 21 to Sept. 7 this year, is one of the oldest and longest-running fairs in the world; it started in 1878.
But Bednar, the CNE's general manager, also has an affinity for old cars.
The avid car collector has a stable of vehicles including a 1952 Chevrolet pickup, a 1952 Chevrolet Suburban, a 1962 Buick LeSabre, a 1995 Mazda Miata (which was originally owned by the late June Callwood), a 1988 Chevrolet S10 Blazer, a 1979 Harley Davidson golf cart and his daily driver – a 2004 BMW 325xi sport wagon.
“I don't have a strong conscious memory of this, but apparently the summer I turned 2, my brother would sit on the porch and go through car books with me,” he says.
“By the time I was 4, I could tell a Maserati from a Jaguar. There's a funny tape recording of me and my father saying, ‘Are you sure it's not a Jaguar?' And me saying, ‘No. No.' In a four-year-old voice. ‘That's a Maserati!'”
Bednar's collection started in 1991 with the 1952 Chevy pickup. “My wife and I were on a road trip in Knoxville, Tenn., and I told her that I always wanted to have a Chevy pickup truck from the year that I was born.
“I bought the thing on the spur of the moment and drove it back. I've had the pickup truck the longest and I'm the fondest of it,” says the married father of four children and two stepchildren.
“My wife has correctly determined what the '52 pickup truck says about me. As she points out, I tend to be nostalgic and I had a very happy childhood. She thinks that owning a truck from the year of my birth, 1952, somehow speaks to my love of that time of my life,” he says.
“I often have people ask me if I'll sell it. The others might be for sale some day, but the pickup truck I'll be driving until they take my licence away!”
The pickup truck cost $2,100 in 1991, but he spent nearly $6,000 repairing it. “It took me about three years to rebuild the engine and it's due for a whole round of renovations that I haven't had a chance to get to yet.
“It's really easy to work on. There are so many things about this hobby that I like. I love the mechanical involvement. I like driving a variety of vehicles,” he says.
“I do have an ambition that my wife doesn't share with me – I'd love to drive my pickup truck to Alaska,” says Bednar, who worked on major theatre productions such as The Phantom of the Opera , Ragtime and Showboat during his three-decade run in the arts and entertainment industry.
His second purchase, the 1962 Buick LeSabre, also holds a special place in his heart. “It's a big honking V-8. It'll pass anything but a gas station,” he laughs.
“When I was in high school, the car I learned to drive on was a car like this. I spent three or four years trying to find one. I found one in South Dakota in 2000 and flew out and drove it home.” So far, he has invested about $6,500 in it.
“We took the Buick to Florida once. My wife didn't want to take it. We argued about it. We got as far as Pennsylvania and ran out of gas. It's stupid of me – the gas gauge was working. I don't know what I was thinking,” says Bednar, who was born in Dallas; he received his Canadian citizenship at the CNE in 2000.
