Vintage military vehicles on Jefferson Highway journey stop in Mason City

MASON CITY — A convoy of vintage US military vehicles made its way into Mason City on Monday afternoon as part of a 2500 mile journey by the Military Vehicle Preservation Association. The group is celebrating the 15th year of their convoy program by retracing the historic Jefferson Highway route from the Minnesota border to New Orleans.

John Varner of Longville Minnesota says he came up with the idea of convoys in 2006.  “We had a lot of people who had nice military vehicles but they kept them in the shop, or they’d take them downtown for the 4th of July parade, and I said we need to get these vehicles out. Veterans want to see them, we want to honor our veterans, but we also want to show people the vehicles those veterans used to fight our wars. It’s been a tremendous success.”

Varner says the group enjoys taking their convoys through smaller towns like in their route through Minnesota and Iowa.  “The thing that hits me the most is, and I’m a veteran myself, but you really don’t know this country until you drive a convoy of old military vehicles on the back roads at 30 to 35 miles an hour. You can hear the cows moo and the children laugh and the birds sing, but you come into small towns and you just get to meet good American people.”

Varner says they try their best to not clog up traffic on the road with their vehicles.  “The biggest problem we have — they are sturdy and tough, they can do it at 30-35 — the toughest part is traffic congestion at times. We’re really careful. Highway 65 isn’t too bad. Anything more than that and law enforcement gets unhappy with us, and sometimes we’ll get an escort like we did into town Monday, which was very nice of the police department. It’s safe for everybody.”

The convoy is taking a rest day today and they invite people to come see the vehicles at the MacNider Campground near East Park.

On Wednesday, the convoy heads down to Hampton and then has stops scheduled in Hubbard, Nevada and Indianola.