It all started with a lime green Dodge Charger sitting gleaming in a Red Deer car showroom.
Jamie Hogg bought that car for then-16-year-old son Trevor, who was getting muscled out of driving action on the family Dodge Neon by his mother Joy and older sister Stacey. They had gone out to buy a used pickup truck but then they saw that car at Southside Dodge Chrysler.
“We walked into the showroom and there was this beautiful green Charger. And that was it. That’s how it all started.
“He took it home and showed the girls. And everybody’s jaw just dropped. It’s a pretty pimp-ass car.”
“I couldn’t believe it,” said Trevor. “It was crazy.
“It was a good day.”
Inspired by the new wheels, dad Jamie started researching Dodge’s new line of Chargers and decided he had to have a rare Charger SRT8 Super Bee sporting Detonator Yellow paint and 425 horses under the hood.
“I found the very last one. They only made a thousand in the world. And (Southside Dodge) found the very last one for me somewhere in Quebec.”
It wasn’t long before his wife got a little Charger fever, and so a purple one was added to the growing family fleet. It didn’t seem right to leave out her daughter: enter Charger number four; this time in red.
Always a fan of older cars, he started thinking of expanding his collection with some classics. A 1968 HEMI-powered Dart came next, then a 1968 Barracuda.
“Then I started to move cars and sell cars. I bought a bunch of them one time at an auction and sold them all at the next auction as kind of hobby and to have some fun.
“Then I weaned the herd down to 10 or so now.”
He warehouses the cars over winter. His collection includes another rare SRT8 Charger Super Bee, this time the 2008 model; an ’06 SRT8 Charger that can crank out 450-horsepower and a 2009 SRT8 Challenger. For his wife’s sake, he broke the Dodge chain by picking up a 2002 Chevy Camaro. He’s also got a Dodge Viper in snakeskin green at home.
His last purchase, just over a month ago, was a ’69 Six-Pack Super Bee Dodge Coronet — one of only about 800 made. The car is actually called a ’69 and a half because it was made mid-way through the model year and meant to hit the road right out of the factory.
Firing up the cars, Hogg can hardly wipe the grin of his face as the engines reverberate in the storage bay.
“I really enjoyed the fact that I had the opportunity to give my son a wicked, cool car to take to high school.
“Once I started getting into cars it just kind of snowballed. Next thing you know I was buying new ones and old ones, cool-looking ones.”
He likes to buy cars and than has them souped up and accessorized in the shop.
The summer is when it really gets fun. He and the family take a bunch of cars down to the car show that springs up every Thursday night near Real Canadian Superstore. He’s really keen on taking part in that event because it acts as a fundraiser for the Red Deer Food Bank.
He and his son also like to take the cars out to the Castrol Raceway near Edmonton Friday nights to let ’em rip.
For the last two years he has taken one of his cars down to California to drive in a five-day rally for a charity that helps developing countries.
When he’s not behind the wheel of his cars, Hogg, runs his won companies, Jaco Line Contractors and Jaco Environmental Systems, which test transformers for PCBs.
“I’ve got a family business. The kids work for me. My son is an apprentice and my daughter is in the office, in the administration side of things.”
A self-confessed “gearhead,” Hogg is no stranger to high-powered rides. He drag raced snowmobiles at a top competitive level for a dozen years before quitting about five years ago.
He won the top fuel class in the world championships of grass drag racing one year in Minneapolis, Minnesota with his Hogg Wild racing team. A few years ago, he the World Series of Ice Drags in Sault St. Marie, Ont. he picked up a second-place finish one year in the top fuel class.
“Before snowmobiles, it was trucks. So I’ve always been involved in motor sports at some level over the last 25 years.”
He’s actually now looking to get back into the snowmobile drags — this time as an owner. He is having a machine built in Valleyview that should be ready for racing next year.
pcowley@www.reddeeradvocate.com