NASS Meet the Officials- Our President

Office of President 2004,2005
Howard Baugues

      I am Howard Baugues. I live in West Terre Haute, Indiana, USA. Terre Haute is 70 miles west of Indianapolis, Indiana, 180 miles east of St. Louis, MO, and 200 miles south-southeast of Chicago, Illinois. I was born in this area, and have spent most of my life enjoying the changing seasons that this area has to offer.
       I have always enjoyed top down driving on a sunny day, and have admired sporty convertibles since my teenage years. Several years ago my wife & I decided it was time to find a British sports car of our own. I was lucky enough to find a 1976 Triumph Spitfire and it became my first Triumph. A year later I had 2 Spitfires and a GT6 in my garage. A year later I had sold the GT6 and bought a TR7 DHC to add to my garage.
       Growing up, I was never a real gearhead. I enjoyed watching stock car races and demolition derbies, but seldom spent much time working on engines or the mechanicals of cars. Only what was needed as a necessity to keep them running. After buying my first Spitfire in 2000, I realized that I would either have to spend a great deal of money on repairs, or learn to fix these cars myself.
       Using the Internet, I found lots of information and people to offer advise, and dove into many repairs that surprised me, and even more, surprised my family. Our family had always sought auto mechanics to handle car problems, not really doing anything other than oil changes ourselves. So here I was, elbow deep in grease & rust, and loving every minute of it. My first Spit required a frame change, and I took to that only a few months after buying the car. By the end of the summer, my Spit was together again running and I had done that without paying a mechanic or body shop.
      During the same time as I was replacing the frame of my Spit, a new club was loosely forming on the Internet devoted to Spitfires & GT6s. The North American Spitfire Squadron was gathering momentum to progress from just an Internet mail list into a real, drive to meetings, type of car club. I wanted to repay the help I had been offered, so I offered my time as an officer and was elected the position of Membership Chairman, which I held for 2 ½ years.
      When the first president mentioned that he would like to step down at the next election, he & I discussed my running for President. Since I had been involved with many of the planning stages of the club, and knew many of the members, I decided to run for President of NASS. I ran unopposed was elected, and assumed the duties of president in January of 2004. I am proud to be a part of this friendly, close-knit, family oriented group of people that centers around the cars and the people who drive this wonderful little relics of British engineering.
I am hopeful that the friendship and momentum will continue to grow and last for many years, and that NASS will become a well-known organization in the classic car circles.