When Sewickley resident Joey Bojalad III gets into his 1955 AC Ace, he thinks of his late father, Joe Bojalad Jr.
The elder Bojalad raced the sports car all over the East Coast and Canada.
“This car is a piece of history to me,” Bojalad said on July 15 at the Sewickley Stampede & Roundup event.
Years after his father sold the vehicle, Bojalad got a call that it was for sale. When he told his dad the vehicle identification number, the elder Bojalad knew it was the same car.
The son bought it in 2012. It was the first right-hand drive AC in North America.
It was one of 32 sports cars on display at the Sewickley Stampede & Roundup outside of The Hotel and Rosa’s Cantina on Beaver Street.
It was the third year for the event, which was co-chaired by John and Dotti Bechtol of Fox Chapel, Joe and Rosemary Mendel of Plum and Robin and Ann Fernandez of Sewickley, owners of The Hotel and Rosa’s Cantina.
The event is part of the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix, which takes place in the middle of July each year with several happenings throughout the area.
A portion of Beaver Street was closed as approximately 400 guests walked among the sports cars, including the AC Ace, Aston Martin, BMW, Corvette, Lamborghini, Porsche, Ferrari and more. Vehicle owners were invited by organizers to be part of the event.
Presented by Sewickley Porsche, the street block party began with a parade of cars through the downtown business district of Sewickley before parking in front of the Hotel and Rosa’s Cantina.
The most important part of the event is that the proceeds benefit individuals with autism and intellectual and developmental disabilities, Dotti Bechtol said.
Helping to raise money is one of the reasons Bojalad III said he wanted to be part of an event like this. And it’s also a way to keep his father’s memory alive.
“It was by happenstance that I got this exact car,” Bojalad III said. “We lost my dad the week after the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix in 2019. He loved racing cars and he loved the Pittsburgh Vintage Grand Prix.”
