Acknowledged as the “Father of the Corvette,” Zora was a longtime employee of Chevrolet. He became popular as the designer of performance equipment for the ubiquitous small-block Chevy V8, including parts that carried his name, such as the Duntov high-lift camshaft. He also is credited with helping to introduce fuel injection to the Corvette in 1957. Showcasing the Corvette, Zora drove Pikes Peak in 1956 in a pre-production prototype Chevy, setting a stock car hill climb record. He also is credited with helping to bring fuel injection to the Corvette in 1957 and for introducing four-wheel disc brakes on a mass-produced American car. Zora is a member of the Drag Racing Hall of Fame, the Chevrolet Legends of Performance, the International Drag Racing Hall of Fame, the Automotive Hall of Fame and the National Corvette Museum Hall of Fame.

Former auto mechanic Roy Leslie partnered in business and racing with longtime friend Bill Kenz—the Kenz & Leslie parts business in Denver, as well as a streamliner of the same name that set records on the Bonneville Salt Flats. In fact, he had set a new world’s land speed record, and had the quickest speed on record for an American driver in an American car. Roy imparted the integrity and virtue of an honorable businessman.

Winfield carburetors were commonly found on race cars of the 1940s through 1970s, as were cams for Indy Novi engines, all uniquely designed for all-out competition by Ed Winfield. Ed’s innovative design earned him the title “Carburetor Wizard.” He’s considered by many to be a performance pioneer; the Winfield Carburetor Company began in 1924, and its carburetors were an Indianapolis 500 staple. Ed also dabbled in fuel systems and is credited with designing the first harmonic balancer. He was also at the forefront of the high-performance camshaft grinder.

“Honest Charley’s” was one of the first speed shops to distribute a “wish book,” an accessories catalog. “Honest Charley” Card was an innovative marketer and celebrity of the speed and custom equipment trade. Charley, a life-long car guy, grew his local speed shop into a successful coast-to-coast mail-order business. As a pioneer of the retail business, he was one of the first to publish a parts catalog—back in 1948. He also was among the earliest adopters of computers, proud of the IBM 360 his company used to track inventory and orders.

A speed equipment industry pioneer, Paul developed the earliest flywheels and clutches for all-out racing and high performance. He owned and operated Schiefer Manufacturing Company; it became the largest manufacturer of specialty drivetrain components in the world. Paul was also instrumental in the formation of SEMA and some of its earliest initiatives. He was the recipient of the first SEMA Hall of Fame Award in 1969. He so much embodied the directives set down by the Board of Directors to honor the founders of the industry that the award was originally called the “Paul Schiefer Old Timer's Memorial Award.”

Profiles of SEMA Hall of Fame inductees are not typically love stories. But you cannot tell the journey of Jim Bingham without it being one: Love of father. Love of wife. Love of aftermarket.

It began in Indiana. Bingham grew up on a farm in Enos, which was small-town life to the fullest.

“I went to a two-room schoolhouse for the first eight grades, and there were only two of us in my class,” Bingham said.

His first employer was his dad, Leonard James. At the age of nine, Bingham was driving a hay baler on the family farm. By about 13, he was doing everything, acting as Leonard James’s right arm.

“I was his best bud,” Bingham said. “I was everywhere he went. I was always assisting him in whatever he did, and I think that’s where I learned to help people.”

Bingham went to nearby Morocco High School, and he pondered a career as a civil engineer building roads and bridges. But after a tour of Purdue, he told his father his plan, “and I could see the look in his eyes,” so Bingham stayed on the farm, then enlisted in the U.S. Army and served three years, specializing in missile defense.

Outside the farm work and the military, Bingham had brief stints piecing together electronic circuit boards, working at a steel mill, putting up farm buildings across America, and as a specialty collection teller at a bank. But around 1966, he had an itch to come back to the farm. Thanks to that decision—as well as an opportunity to go along with his father to look at some farmland—he met his future wife, Linda. Soon, she would act as his right arm.

By 1968, Bingham realized that he wasn’t making it financially by farming and joined a construction company that was building highway I-65 in Indiana. But it was not what he wanted to do.

“I always thought it would be neat to look up parts,” he said. “Whenever I went to a parts store or an implement dealer, I thought the guys who went through catalogs had a really neat job, an important job.”

He answered a help-wanted ad for a counterman trainee at Lang Auto Parts and got the job.

“Lang had performance parts, and when those customers would come in, the other guys didn’t want to wait on them,” he said. “They thought it was a fad, and because I was young and those customers were young, it was my job to wait on them. I didn’t know what headers were or even intake manifolds.”

But Bingham did recognize supply and demand and suggested that the owner expand the store to ensure that parts were always in stock. The owner did not share Bingham’s vision, but a drag racer named Don Wiley did.

“If you took our business plan to a bank today, they’d laugh you out,” Bingham said. “But I’ve always been a risk taker.”

By now, Bingham was 26 years old with a wife and twin daughters. So he and Wiley immediately found a building—directly across the street from Lang, their competition. They opened Winner’s Circle Speed and Custom in 1970 in Kankakee, Illinois.

“That first summer, we were so determined, our hours were 8:00 a.m.–10:00 p.m.,” Bingham said. “We were young and willing to work tons of hours.”

The business took off fast, and they opened a second store in Joliet later that year. A few months later, they had a third in Peoria.

Bingham and Wiley parted ways about a decade later, and now Jim and Linda own three retail stores: Joliet, Peoria and East Moline. Linda is the controller and has been working at the company since day one.

“I think it’s improved our marriage,” Bingham said. “She raised our kids, she’s been my bookkeeper, and she’ll sometimes stay behind with the business to make sure there are no problems when I travel. God brought me the best woman in the world.”

Bingham’s father passed away in 1993. “All of a sudden, the light started clicking,” he said. “I’m next and haven’t done what I want to do.” That translated into helping get Route 66 Raceway in Joliet built, followed by Chicagoland Speedway, also in Joliet. Bingham is one of the owners.

He attended his first SEMA Show one year after Winner’s Circle took flight, and through the years, he has volunteered with the SEMA Membership Committee and various other committees, and he has been a board member for the Performance Warehouse Association. He has been active on the SEMA Board of Directors and received the association’s Chairman’s Service Award.

One of his greatest passions is his involvement in the Hot Rodders of Tomorrow Engine Challenge.

“I’m selfish—I love this industry and I want more people to come to this industry,” he said. “I want them to go work for performance people.”

In fact, Bingham currently has four members of the Hot Rodders Joliet team working for his company. And he is lucky enough to have members of his family at his side, too. His son Rodney James has taken the reigns of the Challenge, and grandson Noah works in the store.

Despite his significant contributions, being inducted into the SEMA Hall of Fame was not on his radar.

“I thought it would be neat, but I didn’t feel I was on that path,” he said.

Deep down, he is still simply an industrious farm boy. Yet he will have been in the aftermarket industry for 45 years in June, noting, “I’d like to make it to 50!”

Joel Ayres has a reputation. A shrewd businessman and salesman, he has had a successful aftermarket career for more than 40 years. But his reputation is not hard-as-nails or barbarous. Joel Ayres is known for being one of the nicest guys in the industry.

His father, Boyd Lee, was a farmer (who later joined an upstart company called Winnebago RVs), so Joel was born on a farm in Forest City, Iowa, later moving to Waterloo, Iowa. He grew up with four brothers and a sister and loved school (an honor-roll student) and sports—although at 5 ft., 10 in. and 125 lbs., his football career did not last long.

Ayres said that his family had always been around racing and cars. For example, Boyd would take them to Tunis Speedway to watch races every Sunday night. Ayres refers to himself as “the least mechanical of my family,” yet when his older brother Dean became a stock-car racer after high school, Ayres would sometimes help in the pits.

At 16, Ayres got his first car, a VW Bug, and he piloted a ’69 Mustang while at the University of Northern Iowa, although “our family was a pickup-truck family.” Joel intended to study education, with the goal of becoming an elementary-school counselor, but he switched to business.

“I’ve actually had a little regret that I didn’t teach,” Joel admitted.

By now, Boyd had started his own company, Ayr-Way, which manufactured various items that included fiberglass truck caps. So Joel, his younger brother Jerry and his older brother Jim went to work for their dad. Boyd sold the company in 1978, but Joel and Jim had to continue in their positions for another year as part of the sale. When competitor Rigid Form called, Joel said yes to a job offer, and he moved up from sales manager to general manager over the years. He also oversaw a chain of nine truck-accessory retail stores in the Midwest.

Ayres eventually landed in California, working for truck-cap and tonneau manufacturer Leer, first as a sales manager and then as national marketing director. The company became part of Truck Accessories Group (TAG), where Ayres stayed for 20 years. In 2010, he moved to Tākit Inc., the maker of Bedslide, as vice president of sales and marketing and as a partner.

Those who know Ayres understand why he was perfect for a job offered in 2015: executive director of the Automotive Aftermarket Charitable Foundation. The organization provides financial assistance to those in need within the aftermarket industry from problems such as sickness, catastrophe or accident. The foundation is more than 50 years old, yet Ayres became the first to hold that position. And it speaks to the core of who Ayres is: that nice guy.

“My volunteer work started when I was very young,” he explained. “My whole life has been about volunteerism and charity work. It’s been my passion.” He’ll tell you that his father “gave me my business and selling side, and my mother and stepmom gave me my loving, caring and charitable side.” As such, he cofounded the first Big Brothers of Northeastern Indiana and has been a volunteer teacher and had a nearly lifelong involvement with various children’s charities.

“Someone told me back in my 30s, ‘You can make an impact every day on people’s lives that you work with, and that has a ripple effect. You may not be out there curing anything, but you can say the right thing, be the right example and make a difference,’” Ayres reflected. “It finally hit me that I could be in business and didn’t have to be a stereotypical businessman. And that’s why I’ve become good friends with all my competition. It’s not a war or a battle; it’s a game. And when the whistle blows, you share a beer.”

His colleagues and peers learned that attitude quickly, as he helped the truck-accessory aftermarket industry grow by becoming a founding member of the Truck Cap Industry Alliance that became the Light Truck Accessory Alliance (LTAA). Beyond that, he was “off to the races.” His involvements with multiple SEMA councils, committees and task forces are too numerous to list, but they have included the SEMA Board of Directors for multiple terms, the SEMA Businesswomen’s Network (SBN) board liaison and the SEMA Show committee. “I love the industry,” he said. “I’m a hand-raiser, and I just enjoy it.”

But he managed to mix business with heart as only Ayres could do. He is perhaps most associated with SEMA Cares, the charity arm of SEMA: He was instrumental in its formation and was its original chairman.

His devotion to the industry and community has resulted in many accolades, including the LTAA Hall of Fame, the SBN Athena Award, the Professional Restylers Organization Jim Borré Lifetime Achievement Award and the SEMA Person of the Year. Still, Ayres feels unworthy of his SEMA Hall of Fame induction.

“I’m still in a cloud,” he confessed. “To think about the legends who are in this—the people I grew up hearing about or people I’ve known—it’s just…wow. I shouldn’t even be here. I’m very honored and very proud. The biggest achievements in my life are my children and grandchildren, but as far as the industry and this association, this is huge!”

You may not know very much about inductee Gary Ronald Hooker, which is a bit remarkable, given that Hooker Headers is one of the aftermarket industry’s most iconic names.

Hooker’s story began in Sioux City, Iowa, but the family moved to Pomona, California, when he was about five years old. His father was a lay minister, so Hooker grew up in a very religious household. Because the family was poor, he didn’t have much to play with, but a neighbor usually had a copy of Hot Rod or Popular Mechanics on hand, so he was very interested in cars from the earliest age.

“At eight years old, I could name any car,” Hooker said. “From when I can remember, I was also always mechanically inquisitive.”

Proof in point: At age 10, he bought his first bicycle for $10 and had to rebuild it, which “was a natural thing.”

His high school had an industrial-arts department that included auto shop and machine shop, “so I took advantage of that.” He also began to rebuild engines for friends—although his real passion was sports. He played baseball, football and basketball. (As an adult, he has been an avid skier, a dirt-bike rider, a cross-country runner, a multisport endurance athlete and an avid backcountry explorer.)

Hooker also had an affinity for design. “I drew cars a lot,” he said. “I’d even make up cars. I was always modifying them in the drawings.”

From that, an interest in racecars was born. His first car was a ’40 Ford with a flathead engine fitted with a ¾-race cam. He paid $175 for the car, thanks to a part-time job. He tore it apart and did a full restoration.

After high school and junior college, Hooker volunteered for the draft but was talked into joining the National Guard, where he did six months of active duty. After that, around age 20, he went to work as an electronics technician for General Dynamics, which meant that he could afford a new ’62 Chevy 409.

Two hours after he brought it home, the cylinder heads were off. And then history happened: Hooker couldn’t afford to buy headers, so he made his own. His secret was to make the headers longer and the tubing larger than what was already available.

Prior to racing the car, Hooker took it to Jack Bayer to have it dyno-tuned, and when he arrived, Bayer had just finished with the dyno on a customer’s car he had built—with the same motor as Hooker’s. But Hooker’s car made more horsepower.

“Jack said to me, ‘It’s got to be those headers,’” Hooker said. “’Can you get me some of those?’ I told him, ‘No, those are the only ones I’ve made. But if you give me a ride home, we can take the headers off my car and put them on your 409.’”

That night, with Hooker’s headers, the customer’s car raced a couple of mph faster and a tenth quicker.

“I more or less went into business right then,” Hooker said.

He sold the car to buy equipment to start building headers—while still living at home. But he rented a small shop in 1964, and racer Elwin Westbrook came in to share the space. Elwin built racecars while Hooker built headers. Within a few months, “six of the top 10 Super Stock racers had my headers.”

This was also around the time when he had a booth at the first SEMA Show. His wife, Gail, was eight months pregnant (they went on to have three children) and worked the Hooker Headers table, even though they didn’t have catalogs yet.

“We weren’t really even in business,” Hooker said. “We went by the finance company and borrowed money so we could go to the show.”

Not long after that, Gil George knocked on Hooker’s door asking for a job.

“Gil and I were collaborators and did some amazing things with designing and building headers,” Hooker recalled. “These rich guys would drive their Jeeps out in the morning, and Gil would take the right side and I’d take the left side, and we’d be done by noon. I charged them $150, and that kind of fed our families for a week.”

In the summer of 1965, Hooker rented a larger shop, but faulty welding cylinders exploded one night, and it burned to the ground. Hooker had no insurance. His neighbor, Bill Casler, who was already known for his racing slicks, “came to my rescue and we formed a partnership. He put in money and bought half the business.”

From 1966 to 1969, Hooker Headers grew from a $100,000 business to $3 million.

“By about 1970, we had established ourselves in our industry,” Hooker said. “I think I was successful because I changed early on from having an emphasis on racing to an emphasis on building the product. It was always a customer-driven company. We tried to have direct contact with the customer. That was a philosophy that was developed early, and we stuck with it.”

Hooker sold Hooker Headers to Holley Performance Products in 2000.

Gary Hooker is a man who will constantly reference others in the industry and within Hooker Headers who helped him find success. “Collaborating energy” is what he calls it.

“A lot of people in the industry don’t even know there’s a Gary Hooker,” he said. “People know about Hooker Headers because of many skilled people who were there at the right time. This SEMA Hall of Fame award is a salute to those people who worked together each day to do the thousands of jobs that led to the success. People come into your life, and they aren’t always necessarily friends. But they touch your life. I feel like I don’t deserve this honor. But those people do.”

Chip Foose isn’t writing his autobiography (yet), but if he were, the first line might read, “My career is an extension of my father’s.” That’s because the earliest memories this well-regarded designer and acclaimed builder of custom vehicles has are, of course, car-related.

Douglas Sam Foose was born in Santa Barbara, California, and had “huge cheeks.” That made his mom instantly begin calling him Chipper or Chip, like a chipmunk; it wasn’t until day four that “Douglas” appeared on his birth certificate.

His first memory of the automotive industry was linked to his father, Sam, whose career in the 1960s and early 1970s took him from building high-profile Hollywood studio cars and hovercrafts to a company that did government safety testing and developed safety equipment, including airbags. Sam eventually went on to open his own shop, called Project Design. By the age of seven, Chip was already a fixture there.

“I like to think I was helping my dad, but I think I destroyed a lot more than I actually helped,” he said.

Age seven was also a big year in Foose’s life, because he met Alex Tremulis, designer of vehicles such as the Tucker. Tremulis was working with Sam, and when Chip saw his designs, “even at that age, I knew I wanted to go to ArtCenter College of Design and design cars for a living. I didn’t know who he was, but I absolutely fell in love with his artwork.”

Drawing was actually nothing new to Foose—he was already at it by age three.

“My father was a talented artist himself, and he would draw at home and I would sit next to him and copy whatever he was doing,” Foose recalled. “When he was finished, I would copy it and draw it over and over. My goal was to be as good as him.”

By the age of 14, he was that good, so when Sam had a design idea, he had Chip draw it.

As a youth, Foose played football, ran track, and did freestyle BMX—wheelies and jumping were his skills—but he was most passionate about design and remembers when he knew.

“I was 11, and my father was building a family van, and we were custom painting it,” he explained. “He wanted to add some curves to the panels, and I was crying because I didn’t want him to do it. I was emotional about what we were doing design-wise.”

As Foose got older, he became more hands-on at Sam’s shop, as an apprentice to various employees and also doing “lot of sanding for years and years. And I remember I’d waste so much paint just making colors, because I loved mixing. He had a mixing room, so I’d just go in there and put colors together.”

Foose did make it to ArtCenter on a small scholarship, but had to leave halfway through because he couldn’t afford the tuition. He was still working with his father, but he had also started his own business—a design studio, doing illustrations for magazines, until one of his part-time clients became a full-time job: Stehrenberger Design. While Foose worked for the company, he also began dating his future wife, Lynne. When the topic of marriage came up, she said he had “potential,” but she wanted a husband with a college degree.

Returning to ArtCenter, Foose’s senior project was creating a Chrysler-sponsored niche-market vehicle.

“I did something completely taboo at ArtCenter—looked at the past,” he said. “We were taught to only look forward. In this case, I blended hot rods and musclecars to create what I called the Hemisphere.”

That taboo design became the inspiration for the Plymouth Prowler. Foose was only 26. Boyd Coddington saw his potential too and hired him to do some work. “It was my hobby, so I never even gave a bill to Boyd for two and a half years,” Foose said.

Soon, he had a job offer from Ford and another from J Mays, who wanted Foose on the Beetle’s redesign team.

“I was deciding between Ford and Volkswagen, and I let Boyd know I was leaving, but then he made me a better offer than both of them did,” Foose said. He worked with Boyd for eight years until the company folded.

“I remember the final day, we had just loaded everyone’s toolboxes, and I had made sure the customers’ cars got to different shops and that everyone at Boyd’s shop had a job,” Foose said. “I was the only one who didn’t have a job. I had $700 in the bank and a $1,500 house payment due. That same day, my wife handed me a paper bag, and inside was a tiny T-shirt that read, ‘I love daddy,’ because she was pregnant. So that was the day we started Foose Design.” Again. “It’s been a roller coaster ever since, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”

Foose Design had been building cars for about two years when Foose was approached about doing a new reality show called “Monster Garage,” starring Jesse James. “They told me the first car was going to be a Mustang turned into a lawn mower,” he said. “But I’m trying to build rolling art, so I didn’t see the value. It was the best ‘no’ I’ve ever given.”

The Discovery Channel then decided it wanted to do a show about Foose building a new 2002 Ford Thunderbird for the SEMA Show. His drawings equated to a four-month build, but the car didn’t arrive until the 11th hour.

“I would work 40 hours straight, then sleep for eight, then another 40 hours,” he recalled. “I did that for six weeks, and the last six days were no sleep. I lost 27 pounds building that car.”

But he made the deadline, and J Mays, then with Ford, awarded it Best in Show. Out of the experience was born the television show “Overhaulin’,” which debuted in 2004.

Foose has always made time for charitable work, whether it’s to sign a T-shirt for auction, build Pinewood Derby cars or volunteer with Childhelp and Victory Junction Gang Camp. Also close to his heart is raising funds for Progeria, a disease that took the life of his younger sister, Amy, at age 16. Foose serves as the vice chairman of the Progeria Research Foundation’s California chapter.

His decades of unique work have been lauded many times over. He has won the Ridler award, the America’s Most Beautiful Roadster award, the Good Guys Trendsetter award, and inductions into the Grand National Roadster Show Hall of Fame, the Detroit Autorama Circle of Champions, and the Hot Rod Hall of Fame—its youngest inductee at the time.

And now, he’s being inducted into the SEMA Hall of Fame.

“It’s quite an honor, but it also makes me feel like I’m getting old! But to be honored in the SEMA Hall of Fame—that’s where all my heroes are,” Foose said. “If you look at the inductees, they followed their passions as well. They didn’t get into this for the money. They got into it because they loved it. We all have that in common.”

And what might the final sentence of his autobiography read? “Thank you,” Foose said, “to everybody who gave me the opportunities.”