It was a hot day last Saturday, but that didn’t keep folks from turning out for the annual Spring Thing held at the Field Day of the Past grounds in Rockville.

Although the main attractions were the truck and tractor pulls scheduled for 4 p.m., the lawnmower pulls in the morning sparked considerable interest.

The second Classic Car Show also drew onlookers.

And there were some interesting cars to look at.

Take Dave Nixon’s “rat rod.”

Ostensibly a 1953 Chevrolet pick-up, it had parts from 14 different cars.

“I built it with parts I could get cheap or free,” said Nixon, who lives in Gum Springs. It sported Chrysler Imperial headlamps and seats from an MG Midget. Only the fenders, hood and other body parts are Chevy, “But they’ve all been cut on.”

Maybe the most eye-catching feature was the unique air cleaner housing, constructed from dummy .50-caliber machine gun rounds, which Nixon picked up at a previous Field Day of the Past.

He said that he saw them at a military surplus vendor and started wondering how he could use them on his truck.

Jack Parslow from Powhatan brought his 1965 660 Rambler four-door sedan.

“All mine are drivers,” said Parslow, meaning the Rambler has regular and not antique license tags, so he can drive it as often as he wants.

Parslow said he also has a 1951 Dodge Roadster convertible, a 1950 Studebaker and a 1985 El Camino Super Sport at home.

But for daily driving he drives either an S-10 pickup or a Toyota Prius.

Show promoter Steve Shell said there were no divisions in the show, just awards for the top 25 and the Best in Show. Judging was to begin around noon.

Over on the red clay of the tractor pull lane, more than 140 entrants were battling to see how far they could pull a sled with their lawnmower-tractors.

Twyla Bright from Emporia managed to break 200 feet on her Cub Cadet.

“I beat my youngest son,” she said.

Turns out the whole family is into the lawn tractor thing. Her husband Raymond explained how he became interested five years ago when he came to Field Day and watched the tractor pulls, before spotting the smaller lawn tractors.

“I went from one tractor to eight,” said Raymond. “Now the whole family pulls.”

Spring Thing provides a sense of what will be going on at the main Field Day of the Past event, scheduled this year for September 17-20.

To find out more about the fall event, go to their website at www..fielddayofthepast.net

“Squirrel” Dandridge tries to coax a few more feet out of his Cub Cadet in the Lawn Tractor Pull.