Stealth Parade '98

How it started- When I was only about 9 years old, I remember seeing Mr. Highfield drive past my grandma's house while I was playing catch with my uncle, who had recently purchased a Plymouth Laser RS just before the Stealth came into production. A beautiful white Dodge Stealth, the first one I had ever seen, drove past with a deep exaust tone. My uncle instantly recognized the car and pointed it out to me, followed by a grumble of how he now wanted a Stealth and how he should've waited in buying a new car. The design was just amazing and I hadn't seen a car that impressed me so much in my life. From that time on, I was a hugh Stealth fan.

My Idea- Being the total Stealth freak that I am, I wondered if other Stealth owners in out local area would like to get together on a "Stealth" event. I decided to give it a shot. July 2, I made my first stop to check on the intrest of having local Stealths in the parade. I saw Mr. Highfield's gleaming 1991 Dodge Stealth in his driveway. I pulled in and asked Mrs. Highfield if I could talk to her husband. She seemed to think he would be excited about the idea. It turned out she was 100% correct. I talked with Mr. Highfield for about 5 minutes. I learned about how he had found his Stealth, which was very interesting, including some facts about his car. It was NO. 22 in production. (actually, NO. 42, but the first 20 were destroyed in crash tests, I couldn't stand to see that) By looking at his car, you'd probably notice that it looks like the SOHC 12V Stealth. Not so. At the time, Dodge hadn't decided what engine to match with the diffrent models. This Stealth has a 24V V-6 lurking under the hood, which means it's actually faster than all base model Stealths. I also learned that he may be replacing his Stealth with a Plymouth Prowler :-( With only 60K miles on it, it's in perfect shape in and out. It's a shame that all Stealth owners don't take such good care of their cars as he does...... Maybe they need to take a few notes. (This Stealth is an exceptional example of how a Stealth should be treated)
Just to clear this up- I've gotten mail from literally tons of people, which I always welcome. We weren't the only people in the parade. There were bands, businesses, and people like us, just trying to be seen. From the attention we got, I'm certain we were. Thanks for visiting. Enjoy!

Attending Owners/Cars

Paul Dawson	1995 Dodge Stealth R/T	Dark Green	attended
Jay Highfield	1990(!) Dodge Stealth	Bright White	attended
Susan Highfield	1993 Dodge Stealth ES	Platinum-Gold	attended

The Event

This event was plagued with cancelations and low turnout, possibly because of the short time I "threw" this together in. (only 7 days) It was a blast, though. I'd say we had a LOT of attention. I heard number of comments: "I bet that could do the quarter in under 12.5," "Maybe I'll get a Stealth instead of a Rambler," "Cool, what car is that?!?!" While in the parade, Susan would pop her headlights up and then down. In turn, I would flip on the rear windshield wiper. She left the headlights up for the rest of the parade (why I don't know). Sitting in the crowd on the second day of the parade, Jay overheard a converstaion....PersonA: Why are those headlights up? PersonB: Well, she probably had them up, but she turned them off they broke and stayed up. My conclusion.... PersonA has never seen a modern car w/ working pop-up lights..... PersonB either is a Stealth/3000GT hater or is as clueless as PersonA. Also overheard was "I like the white one better." Hmmmm..........

Candy!!!!! We used tons of candy to throw to (at) all of the local kids (including some adults). The first day, I went to a vending supply store and bought 2 hugh bags of Tootsie Rolls, the fruit flavored kind. Not expecting to go a second day, I only bought enough for 1 day's worth. Saturday went to Jay's house looking for Susan (Jay didn't want to go a second day). So, I went w/ Susan all the way to Trenton, just to find Koch Candy closed.... So, we drove all the way back to Lebanon and then to Wal-Mart in Fairview Heights. (pretty fun trip) We bought about 20 bags of individually wrapped candy (Starburst, Rolos, etc.) Then we detailed our cars, 2 and 1/2 hours worth. We cleaned the engines, hot washed the cars, and then waxed them. That took a while, but well worth it. Once we arrived back at her dad's house, we found out that Jason was going to drive Jay's Stealth. So we divided up the candy into 3 bags. Bad move. We ran out early. The parade was lengthened the second day, we had less candy, and more people were there. After the parade both days, we all went uptown the the festival. We had a blast up there, except for the hammer-head. How did they get me to go on that? It obviously didn't take too much persuading. I could have given a bleeper-machine a good workout there (ie, you've never heard anyone sling off more profanity in such a short amount of time, if you could hear it over the noise, not possible) There were food and drinks, so that was a blast, except watching everyone drinking beer while I'm just sitting there. Well, I'm going to start early for next year, maybe try to organize an event before then.

Schedule of Events
All owners met in front of Mr. Highfield's house	6:15 P.M. July 10
From there, we moved to our spot in the parade	6:30 P.M. July 10
Afterwards, we went up to the festival	8:00 (?) P.M. July 10