There are people out there who would argue that a car is nothing more than an outdoor appliance.

An oven with wheels.

A former college professor of mine was one of those people. Your vacuum cleans things, your refrigerator cools things, and your car, well it simply moves things. That’s what people like that old professor say.

I — who will readily admit to not being as big a car buff as most of the spectators who show up on Fort Street Saturday — argue the point by saying this.

It’s what our cars "move" that matters. They move memories.

From that family wagon we remember as little kids to that first pile of junk we owned after high school, they represent periods in our life, their images loaded with the stories our lives tell.

Hey, getting from here to there is important, I’ll grant my old prof that much. But sometimes, getting from here to there is half the story, the part that we don’t see in scrapbooks but that lives only in the memories of the people on board.

An appliance?

Try telling that to Tom and Diane Spiker of Riverview, who emailed to tell me about a 1968 Camaro Rally Sport that Tom purchased in 1968.

He nabbed it from Fred Hall Chevrolet in Flat Rock for $2,970. Still has the sticker.

The Spikers would eventually take that car to Niagara Falls in 1971 on their honeymoon, and to Cedar Point later that year.

Tom raced it at the Detroit and Milan dragways, and by the late 1970s, decided to strip it down and restore it completely.

You might see the Spikers this weekend at the Cruise, and if you do, know that riding in that car represents more to them than an easy way to snag groceries. It rekindles memories of cruising places like Trenton Big Boys and Southgate McDonald’s in the 1960s.

An appliance?

Try telling that to Suzanne Lees of Lincoln Park, who just in February bought the 1982 Limited Edition Corvette for which she had long hungered.

How many memories can she have built in just a few months? Truth is, Lees’ boyfriend back in the early ‘80s owned the same car.

"I was really irritated that he owned one and I didn’t," Lees remembers with a laugh. "I’ve wanted one of these since the day it was manufactured. There’s not a thing on this car I don’t like."

Owning it is a dream fulfilled, hardly something you can say about a steam cleaner. Because loaded in the trunk, under the hood, inside the fabric of the seats and beneath the layer of newly applied paint are stories that maybe only the owner knows.

Don’t tell Alice Bash of Lincoln Park otherwise.

In the 1960s while living in Pennsylvania, she and her husband visited a family friend who had a brand new 1963 Studebaker Avanti. They fell in love with it, even though it wasn’t theirs.

The owner had it stored away in a garage later in the decade, and it sat there until he passed away more than 20 years later. The garage once fell, landing on the car.

Upon the owner’s death, his estate was left to Bash’s family, and the car was offered to the Lincoln Park-residents. They almost declined it was in such rough shape.

But they accepted, had it tailored to Downriver, and spent the next five years having it restored.

It’s become a life’s pride, a road-worthy relic that draws wide eyes because of its rarity.

Have you ever said that about a toaster?

I could go on forever with stories like these after readers sent numerous tales in response to Heritage’s classic car series previewing the third annual Cruisin’ Downriver.

I could tell about Debbie Jenkins of Gibraltar and her 1969 427 Corvette, all original. Or Mark Prince’s restored 1972 Oldsmobile 442 W30, or Grace Nabazney’s 1971 Plymouth Satellite, or A.J. Grebinski’s 1988 Mustang GT.

I could go on for hours.

Every vehicle has stories to tell, stories of high school kids loading in and going to the drive-in theater (remember Fort George?), college kids piling in and "road-tripping".

And whether you’re 60 years old and a car ignites memories of cruising Fort Street, or you’re 20 years old a car reminds you of that trip to Daytona, the thing carrying the memory is the same.

It’s the car you were in.

Let me put it this way: I remember the station wagon my parents owned when I was five, my friend’s IROC we drove to Daytona Beach when I was in high school, the Granada that became my first car after college, and the Jeep my wife and I took camping with our one-year-old son a few years ago.

I can tell you all kinds of details about all of those cars.

But for the life of me I can’t remember the brand of can opener I have at home right now.