Our Story
Club History
TREASURE STATE CORVETTES, INC.
The Basic History
The organization grew from a group of Corvette owners in Helena who in the late 1960s just stopped and talked “Corvette talk” when they met on the street. Then that group began meeting together at somebody’s house once a month.
In November of 1972 at one of those meetings, they established some formal organizational rules. There would be a President (Lloyd Meyer), a Vice-President (nobody remembers), and a Secretary/Treasurer (Dave Johnson) and they decided to call themselves the Treasure State Corvette Club. The Charter Members also included Bob Clarkson, Charlie Dickert, Tom Hutchison, Doug Melton, and Gordon Rice. Interestingly, they also decided to set the dues for those Charter Members to forever be $5 per year. “Forever” is a long time and this dues provision was superseded by inflation.
The first official club event was attending the Second Annual Big Sky Corvette Meet (1973) in Virginia City. The organization hosted the Big Sky Corvette meet in 1980 (just days after Mount St. Helens blew and the ash would have been a problem, except it rained most of the week-end), hosted the meet again in 1992, 1999, 2006, 2012, and again in 2018. Helena is scheduled to host the event again in 2023.
In 1973 club members with other ‘Vettes from Montana went to Edmonton for the Trans-Am races. They had so much fun in Canada that they went back the next year to Calgary Corvette Club’s “CU in September” and a week-long tour of the Canadian national parks on the way home.
In 1974, the club joined 34 other ‘Vettes from western Montana to attend the World’s Fair in Spokane (Expo ’74). Ask any of them about the interstate police escort.
The organization cruised along until the threat of litigation and taxes convinced the club to incorporate on December 17, 1979 and become Treasure State Corvettes, Inc. The incorporators were Robert Balkema, Jerry Hart, Mike Mundt, Robert Olson, and David Johnson, the latter was named the corporate agent. They stated in the Articles of Incorporation that the purpose of the organization was to (1) encourage planned trips, (2) provide and regulate events and exhibitions; and (3) encourage careful and skillful driving on public highways.
Over the years, the club membership has varied from the original 7 to as many as 50.
In recent years, the club has participated with other Corvette clubs to give the kids at Camp Make-a-Dream the dream of a ride in a Corvette come true. The event is widely anticipated by both the kids and the drivers.
TSC history.wps