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Classic Car Club founder, Packard admirer dies at 82

The Packard earth has gone single of its most avid enthusiasts. Robert Turnquist, a longtime admirer of the opulence marque and single of America’s beforehand automobile collectors, died April 4 at the lifetime of 82.

Turnquist helped bring exterior collecting from its formative years into the expansible accountability it is today. He was an important originator of the Classic Car Club of America in 1952, and served as its president representing six years. He loved cars, but Packards were his favorites--and the subject-matter of his amount The Packard Story. He also calm and showed the cars at the Pebble Beach and Meadow Brook concours.

He was the possessor and president of Hibernia Auto Restorations, a accountability in New Jersey that has restored more than 700 cars, including 120 Packards. He was a longtime in residence of Morris Township, N.J.

Turnquist was a colleague of the Antique Auto Club of America and served on the consultive board of America’s Packard Museum in Dayton, Ohio. Visitors to the Gilmore Car Museum in southwest Michigan are greeted close by a copy Shell station, which Turnquist and his mate helped fund. He also helped pen the important license-plate law in New Jersey in 1963.

Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., Turnquist served in the Air Force from 1945 to 1946 and graduated from Rutgers University in 1950. He was profiled close by Hemmings Motor News in August 2005, where he reflected on the conditions of the hobby he helped lead into an industry.

“The hobby today is fair beyond belief,” Turnquist told the publication. “It’s easier to give a automobile at current than it was when I got started, because the parts availability is fair so much better.”

Turnquist is survived close by his mate of 55 years, Sunny. A help desire be held at 3 p.m. Tuesday, April 7, at the Bradley-Braviak Funeral Home in Whippany, N.J. Visitation desire be from twelve o"clock noon to 3 p.m.

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