Mike Dingman is “Possessed” by his obsession for cars.
“Possessed” is the name of a car that was given an award as America’s Most Beautiful Roadster at the Grand National competition in Pomona on Feb. 2. Dingman, senior vice president of asset management at ValleyCrest Landscape Cos. in Calabasas, co-owns the car with his wife, Dianna.
“All of a sudden, TV cameras were pointing at you and flashbulbs were popping,” said Dingman, 51, of the moment of victory. “My wife and I, we felt like we were at the Grammy Awards. It was surreal.”
One reason Dingman was surprised to win was because of the formidable competition; another finalist was a car built by Chip Foose, star of TLC show “Overhaulin’” and winner of six previous Most Beautiful Roadsters.
Possessed was completely custom-made for Dingman by an Oxnard body shop. The body started as a piece of flat sheet metal that was formed to look like a 1933 Ford Roadster. Every bolt, nut and screw in the car was machined by hand.
For the next year, Possessed will be a “trailer queen,” a car that tours the country at auto shows but never actually drives on pavement lest a stray rock mar the paint.
Dingman plans to attend as many of the shows as he can while fulfilling his duties at ValleyCrest.
“At the end of the year, I promised my wife we would drive the car down Malibu Canyon one morning to breakfast,” he said. “It will be my Sunday cruiser. I want people to see the car and enjoy it.”
Invested With Cultural Relevance
When Keith Wasserman decided to start a commercial real estate investment company, he wanted to give it a name that would embody its spirit and be recognizable to investors.
His choice? Gelt, which is the Yiddish word for money.
Wasserman, 25, founded Gelt Inc. of Tarzana in December 2008. The company focuses on multifamily real estate investment.
“A lot of people in the industry are Jewish and it helps having a nice Yiddish name and something that’s creative, funny and memorable,” he said.
The entrepreneur, who is Jewish, said he remembers his father, Steve Wasserman, and grandmother, Esther Wasserman, speaking Yiddish to each other when he was growing up. He also thought it would be neat to use the language – a fusion of German, Hebrew, Slavic and other tongues that was once the dominant language of European Jews – when it came time to name his firm.
“I wish I learned it because it is a dying language,” said Wasserman, adding that he only learned the language’s colorful expressions and curse words.
Wasserman has two partners in Gelt. Neither is Jewish, but they like the name just fine, he said.
Staff reporters Joel Russell and Daniel Miller contributed to this column. Page 3 is compiled by Editor Charles Crumpley. He can be reached at [email protected].
