In the late 1950s, a small group of Boonville teenagers formed the Monarchs Rod & Custom, giving them a reason to hang out together with their cars. As was popular in those days, the club worked up a design and had license plates made so that everyone knew they were a part of the club. They even came up with a logo to design themselves a “club jacket”, also a popular car club symbol in the day. As
the 1960s moved forward, and the Vietnam War escalated, many of the club members went to the armed forces, and eventually, the ‘never large’ membership in the club dwindled away, and the few remaining club members ceased getting together. As a grade school-aged kid growing up in the late 1950s, my parents drove me between my home on South Yankeetown Road and the town square in Boonville. On that everyday route, I can remember seeing the Monarchs’ cars parked around Wilkinson’s Machine Shop near the corner of South Second Street and Oak Street. Because these guys had the coolest cars in town, there was no doubt in my young mind that these had to be the coolest guys in town. After the club faded away, I went for over 50 years never so much as hearing a word about the Monarchs. I would ask people, here and there, from time to time, but no one seemed to remember the old car club. This past November, my luck finally changed. I was having lunch with lifelong Boonville resident Charlie Gunn. Not only did Charlie remember the Monarchs, but he just happened to be one of its two founding members, along with the late Garrett Wilkinson. We talked the entire lunch about the old club, with Charlie remembering many of the member’s names, and recalling the license plates and the club jackets. We wondered out loud if any of the license plates or jackets had survived all these years later. We flirted with the idea of trying to locate an original plate and jacket to see if we could have them reproduced, just as a reminder of days gone by. Within a week, Charlie had located Jim Addington, one of the original Monarchs, and learned that Jim had both an original license plate and a club jacket, and was willing to let Charlie borrow them to see if someone could possibly replicate them. The next day Charlie drove to Sparta, Illinois (south west of St. Louis) and picked up Jim’s old plate and club jacket. Incredibly, Charlie located Grandview Aluminum Products in Grandview, Indiana. They had manufactured the original club license plates all those years ago, and were thrilled to recreate new ones for us. Charlie took the original club jacket to Creative Embroidery in Evansville, Indiana. They were able to digitalize the embroidered design of the old jacket, and duplicate it perfectly onto a new jacket. We ordered plates and jackets for ourselves and some extras for Christmas gifts to family members and a couple of friends. After Christmas, the nonprofit organization BOONVILLE NOW approached us and asked if we would help them organize a car show for downtown Boonville. One thing lead to another, and before we knew it, the 1st annual Rock ‘in Around the Clock car show was conceived and scheduled for May 20th, around the town square in downtown Boonville. Word of mouth quickly spread about the rebirth of the Monarchs, and membership took off. As of the date of this post we have 27 members, with one or two new ones being added every week lately.
