The Iconic, built by Claudio Ballard, of Iconic Motors in Farmingdale, N.Y., on display.

The Providence Journal / Steve Szydlowski

NEW YORK -- Standing out from the current, new and future vehicles at the New York International Auto Show, which runs through Sunday, is a display from Rhode Island of vintage cars and motorcycles as well as a hand-built prototype roadster from Long Island.

The vintage vehicles include a 1927 Rolls Royce, a 1927 Bentley, a 1931 Dusenberg Roadster and a 1950 Buick Woody wagon.

This is Mark Hurwitz’s promotion for his 2008 Newport Concours d’Elegance, which is scheduled for the Memorial Day weekend, with the public showing of the cars and awards scheduled for Monday, May 26, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Oceanside at Belle Mer on Goat Island.

“The original Concours were inseparable from fashion and we’re going to be highlighting the marriage between the fashion industry and the coach-building industry by including fashions that match the interior of the car from that period,” Hurwitz said. “There will be a number of displays that will be significant.”

This will be Hurwitz’s third annual Newport Concours and is the only one in Newport this year. Indeed, it is not to be confused with the Belmont Festival of Cars, which had been scheduled for June 21 at the Alva Vanderbilt Belmont Estate in Newport, but which has been canceled.

With him in New York was Bob Knechel, executive director of the Collectors Foundation, which gives out about $300,000 a year to promote the training of young men and women in restoring the engines and bodies of vintage cars and which is partnering with him in the Newport Concours.

“This is a high-end, low-key Concours,” Hurwitz said last Wednesday during the press preview for the auto show, referring to his event and declining to elaborate on the politics involved in the two events last year and the demise of the second Concours at the Belmont Estate this year.

Hurwitz, dressed in casual slacks, sport jacket and baseball hat, and displaying his usual good humor despite being relegated to a stand behind the inventive but commercially dubious Milner flying car, said all the vehicles were from New England.

He said the Rolls-Royce, made at the Brewster plant in Springfield, Mass., when Rolls-Royce had an American manufacturing unit, was a rare Derby Open Tourer with scalloped teardrop doors with no handles on the outside

“Roadsters generally had no windows,” he said, pointing out the long cowl with raked back windshield and second windshield for the large passenger compartment.

The Bentley, a classic 4 1/2 liter with fabric coachwork by Vanden Plas, looked surprisingly small next to the Dusenberg with a Murphy body

“It’s a coupe that looks like a roadster,” Hurwitz said of the massive Dusenberg, pointing out the window slots that are covered by a spring loaded flap of polished chrome when rolled down.

He said such a car cost about $10,000 to $15,000 for the chassis and an additional $10,000 to $15,000 for the body at a time when most cars cost about $500.

“Clark Gable drove these,” he said, adding. “Look at the size of these monsters,” and pointing at the enormous rear backup lights.

The car, which he said weighs about 5,000 pounds, has a 140-inch wheelbase with front wheels that push out aggressively in from of the hood.

“It’s all about appearance,” he said admiringly. “Even the vents on the side of the hood say velocity.”

The Woody wagon is a rounder vehicle than the classic 1930s and ’40s Ford Woodies made famous by the surfer culture of Southen California in the 1950s and early ’60s. Indeed, the 1952 Buick Road Master, with the Buick Dynaflow automatic transmission, its combination of varnished wood framing and simulated wood appliqué on the metal and massive chrome grille, was one of the last woodies to be produced.

Also on display were two vintage motorcycles, a 1905 Michl., Orion, from Europe and a 1920 Harley-Davidson with a sidecar.

Up front next to the flying car, Hurwitz was displaying a prototype modern American roadster that he said he was including because it exemplified the coach-builder’s art.

The 800 horsepower, 6.9 liter, V8 Iconic GTR was hand built at a factory in Farmingdale, N.Y. Company founder Claudio Ballard, who has a computer science background, explained that he wanted to build a super car from the ground up, designing and manufacturing the car in the United States so as to retain complete quality control.

Apart from the specially designed engine, the car, which has vague echoes of the AC Cobra and Ferraris, is stylish with a strong influence of computer design.

“We do everything ourselves, it’s true coach building,” he said. “Nothing is off the shelf.”

Ballard, who was born in Italy and had an uncle who worked at Ferrari, said he is a car nut who wanted to bring his computer science background to producing a car that is highly computerized in addition to being stylish and powerful.

He said he designed the many aspects of the car himself, including the fuel injection system and the shifter, and pointed out a number of design features, including rearview mirrors that are built into the windshield, indicator lights on the roll bars and louvers that provide some 500 pounds of downforce. He said the car is capable of 200-plus mph.

He said the scoop on the hood was actually a vent as his team had discovered negative air pressure on top of the hood. Instead, the air intakes are under the front of the car.

The car is meticulously detailed in polished aluminum and stainless steel with a number of patented features, including an elegant sliding gas cap. The car looks hot in black with yellow flashes and large five-inch pipes running down the sides with the muffler buried so as to prevent them getting too hot.

“It makes a nice rumble,” he said, grinning.

Ballard said a second car is being built and that will serve as a shakedown version before starting a limited production run of 100 cars, which will be marketed at about $600,000 each.

Hurwitz has always focused on making the auto collecting and restoring hobby attractive to young people and this year’s partnership with the Collectors Foundation out of Traverse City, Mich., is a perfect fit.

The foundation was established by McKeel Hagerty, whose family made a fortune in the insurance business and had segued into providing special insurance policies for collectors of vintage boats and cars.

Hagerty, who has judged the Federation Internationale des Vehicule Anciens at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance since 2000, established the foundation in 2003 and has raised and given out grants worth $1.2 million since then.

Among the recipients is the International Yacht Restoration School in Newport where it has provided a number of scholarships, according to executive director Knechel.

Knechel is a former vice president at McPherson College in McPherson, Kan., which has offered a bachelor of science degree in auto restoration since 2002. That program was inspired and partly supported by Jay Leno, who is a passionate car collector.

Knechel said Hagerty was also inspired by Leno after listening to a speech in which the host of The Tonight Show said: “Those of us who have gotten so much out of the hobby — we’ve got to start giving back or the skills will be lost.”

Indeed, Leno has said he considers restoring old cars in the same category as restoring old works of art.

Hurwitz agreed.

“Bob (Knechel and the foundation) represent the essence of the true collector’s goal,” he said, adding, “We are only part-time caretakers of these cars.”

For more information, go to:

www.newportconcours.org/

www.collectorsfoundation

.org/

iconicmotors.com/

pelsworth@projo.com