Leland Hotel phone booth gets new home in classic car museum on Ashland Road
Ring-ring-ring.
Well, there's no dial tone yet, but local classic car collector Johnny Matthes is hoping to get the phone from a piece of Mansfield's past in working order.
Matthes on Nov. 4 purchased a 1927 phone booth which once stood in the lobby of the Leland Hotel.
The Leland Hotel stood at the corner of Walnut and Park Avenue West and had phone booths on every floor, Matthes said.
"The story is when the Leland Hotel was torn down in 1976 it was the only (phone booth) that survived," Matthes said.
Other phone booths were thrown out, he said.
Matthes restored the wooden phone booth, complete with the original light, fan and folding door, after purchasing it at the late Dick Taylor's estate auction in Wooster.
Matthes' friend Ed Freiheit is working to get the phone hooked up.
"This is way older than I've ever dealt with," Freiheit said.
Taylor was a good friend of Matthes
Taylor's widow Mary Lou was very attached to three items at the auction: the phone booth, a pedal car and a Mail Pouch sign, and she wanted the items to remain local.
Matthes purchased the phone booth and a 1950 red Austin J40 pedal car, the latter which Matthes described as "the most sought after pedal car in the world."
Dick Taylor had the pedal car assembled from over 200 parts by a car club he belonged to. Members restored it in a day, starting in the morning. The tires were specially ordered from London. Members worked on putting it all together while Taylor sand-blasted it and did the body work on it. It was finished by dinner.
Matthes said Great Britain's King Charles had an Austin J40 pedal car when he was a child.
Matthes' mini car museum, with 24 cars to date, includes paying tribute to the late Taylor with an outfit Taylor wore to car shows complete with car-themed shirt, white trousers, white belt and white Sass shoes that the family graciously donated at Matthes' request.
The late Taylor, who died in 2021, and his brother Robert owned Taylor Brothers Construction building homes for over 40 years in Shelly Acres, Heatherwood, and Morchester Hills, including Heatherwood Plaza/Apartments and Shelly Acres swimming pool. He was in the Air National Guard and later a pilot owning his own plane.
Richard and Mary Lou were collectors of antiques, especially vehicles which he personally restored to national prize winners. They were life-long members of the Antique Automobile Club of America (AACA), and he was building chairman of the AACA Library and the AACA Museum in Hershey, PA. He was the first person to be president of all AACA entities: board of directors, library and museum, according to his obituary in 2021. Taylor was the contractor of the museum.
And the third item Mary Lou hated to see go to auction was a Mail Pouch sign which Matthes' brother-in-law Randy McMillan purchased.
"She (Mary Lou) started crying, squeezed his face and kissed him," Matthes said of his brother-in-law. "Those were three things (of her late husband's) she didn't want to part with, but knew she had to, to stay with friends and local."
Phone booth at home among cars, signs and Mansfield memorabilia
The phone booth now has a home in Johnny and Sandy Matthes' private, eclectic museum on Ashland Road, not far from their car lot and mattress and furniture store.
Johnny Matthes has added a 1976 phone book to the booth and outside it, a display board of menus from the Leland Hotel and other items from the Leland from days gone by.
Each classic vehicle in his collection has its own story including a 1960 Ford Galaxie Starliner. Matthes said its former owner spent over $100,000 to restore the car with its all-new, custom leather interior and drove it down Route 66, the entire length, and put 4,000 miles on the car and brought it back and put it up for sale and Matthes bought it.
Matthes' place to relax
Matthes said his museum is a place where he comes to just relax.
"It's a place where you can go and you don't think about any of your woes. It cheers me up," he said.
The Mansfield resident said six of the cars in his collection he purchased from the same Carlisle auction house in different years.
"When I get over there I fall in love with these things and I can't let them go," he said of his purchases, which fortunately his wife is very supportive of.
Matthes bought a big Excursion from the auction this year; it was once owned by Saturday Night Live's Pete Davidson. It sits outside his nearby car lot.
Collecting will continue to be his hobby
Matthes said his first car was a white Buick purchased 36 years ago.
"The rest of them just followed me home," he said.
Inside the museum Matthes showed visitors a 1966 Oldsmobile Toronado he bought in May. There's also a police car that could come right out of The Andy Griffith Show.
Matthes is awaiting a Westinghouse sign he bought. He's a big Mansfield sign collector. It has been restored and will be arriving soon to the museum to hang from the ceiling on chains attached to sturdy steel beams. "This sign is humongous. It's a two-sided, lit sign," he said.
He also owns a car he calls "a beast."
"That's running 550 horsepower," he said of the black, 4-door,1982 Chevy Impala that the previous owner had completely redone including a brand new engine.
It goes at least 130 mph, he said.
His collection includes a rare Yugo which has 14,000 miles on it; a soft green Ford Pinto from California, classic bicycles, a menu board from Darie Dolly in Ashland, and an extensive photo collection from Mansfield Raceway.
He collects small, state highway patrol cars and his "smalls" include pencils and pens from past Mansfield businesses.
And the collection is ever growing.
lwhitmir@gannett.com
419-521-7223
X (formerly Twitter): @Whitmir
This article originally appeared on Mansfield News Journal: Johnny Matthes' home away from home is a place to relax, enjoy history
