The Thompsons | californiastreetvans

Owners: Bob and Gary Thompson

Club: Simi Valley Vans

Van name: "Midnight Special" and "My Orange Van"

Make: (Both) GMC Vanduras

Interview Location: Fontana Motorsports, Simi Valley

November Feature:

Bob and Gary Thompson-

"Vannin since 74"

Had a chance to meet up with a pretty amazing pair of guys, Bob (Dad) and Gary ( Son) Thompson, vannin since 1974 and still out there doing the deal. The biggest suprise to me when I sat down to talk to them was that both of them are stil rocking their original vans! I thought for sure there would be a list of vans they had been through over the years but nope...100% loyal to their first ones. Rad, right?

Bob Thompson is in his 80's and amazingly is still an active vanner, we looked at his van "Midnight Special" first...the interior is amazing and of course 100% period correct rocking shag and veined mirrors on the ceiling as well as a sculpted bed entrance. Bob had a magazine that featured his van in the 70's with its original muraling ( his van currently is not muraled as that faded off over the years)

Gary Thompson, like his dad, is still an active vanner also, we checked out his van "My Orange Van"...the same killer interior style as Dads with shag and veined mirrors on the ceiling as well as also featuring a sculpted bed entrance. WEhen we were talking, Gary broke out somethingI had never seen before, a 1977 Van "Yearbook". This was one of the most amazing things I saw that day, a event-centric pictorial documentation of 1977 in vannin. Runs from Califonia all the way to Canada were covered. Funny how we take that kind of social media sharing for granted now, they had to put in some serious work to publish that yearbook back in the day!