Presenting one of our favorite vintage car shows, the annual Ypsilanti Orphan Car Show. Here’s our report on this year’s edition.

Although we’ve been covering the Ypsilanti Orphan Car Show for years now here at Mac’s Motor City Garage, we still feel like the event requires some explanation, especially for folks who dwell outside the Motor City. What’s an “orphan car,” anyway? And where, or what, is an Ypsilanti?

Well, Ypsilanti is the awesome little city right next door to Ann Arbor, Michigan, about 40 miles west of downtown Detroit, that is home to Eastern Michigan University, among other things. And orphan is the car world’s term for all the lapsed and obscure brands that make automotive history so rich and endlessly fascinating, from Auburn to Zimmerman. In recent years, more makes have joined the ranks of the orphans.  Plymouth, Oldsmobile, Pontiac… the list continues to grow.

This year’s featured marque was the 1960-69 Chevrolet Corvair—which is not an orphan make, strictly speaking. It’s a Chevrolet, after all. But the Corvair has always enjoyed honorary orphan status in the show, because it was manufactured at the nearby Willow Run complex, and it has a devoted local following. And with its air-cooled, rear-engine design, the Corvair is a bit of an outlier, we have to admit.

Unfortunately, this year’s show got rained on—but not rained out. Rain or shine, the show goes on, and the enthusiasts who don’t mind getting their prized collector cars soggy and dirty bravely stuck it out. We left around lunchtime with ourselves and our gear thoroughly soaked, but those who stuck around tell us the weather cleared up nicely and in the afternoon, more cars came out to fill up the show field at Riverside Park. Our apologies to the cars and owners we missed this year. Gallery below—click on any image to start a slide show.