Corky Coker
Joseph “Corky” Coker lives and breathes antique cars. His new Honest Charley Garage show, part reality TV and part documentary, tracks Mr. Coker as he treasure hunts vintage cars, rebuilds and restores them, and races them.
In the first episode he buys a 1959 banana-yellow Jaguar, enters a Marmon Wasp exhibition race, and rebuilds a Detroit-made 1911 Lozier from original photos. The show is antique cars “A to Z,” said his daughter, Casey Coker Jarvis, executive director at Honest Charley Speed Shop on Chestnut Street.
It’s evident that Mr. Coker wants to see the old lifegiving cars alive themselves: perfectly restored to purr and prowl around the racetrack, the streets of town or the countryside on a beautiful day.
“It really feels like you’re living,” Mr. Coker says in the first episode.
“And it’s just fun and cool,” continued Ms. Jarvis. “Driving the way the original racecar drivers drove, wind in your hair, you can feel the road under your tires. You feel every movement in the car,” she said, describing leather gloves on the stick and peering through goggles. “Sometimes you have a windshield, sometimes you don’t,” she said.
Mr. Coker has the attitude of a big cat as he visits a remote shed to buy the Jaguar. He is unhurried but cannot take his eyes off the car, which is in excellent vintage condition: lightly driven with original paint, preserved in a barn. His trained gaze inputs rusty scrap metal as the finished product of future months.
“I’ve been raised in the old car hobby,” Mr. Coker says on the show. He has a big twangy voice and handlebar mustache, wears denim and corduroy, and he plays the banjo.
Mr. Coker’s father, Harold, a Hamilton County Commissioner for 20 years, founded Coker Tire Company in 1958. His son joined the company in 1974 to develop the antique tire division. Coker acquired original tire molds and blueprints for almost every make and model antique car, a requisite for hobbyists who want to keep their cars on the road.
“Car people are some of the best people because they’re so passionate, and they’re so friendly,” said Ms. Jarvis.
“It’s the best type of hobby. Anybody can do it,” she said. She described a three-year-old wielding a wrench and a 90-year-old pulling spark plugs in the shop.
“The Jaguar has a great story to it,” said Ms. Jarvis. In the show, Mr. Coker promises the seller he will return with the restored car to take her for a drive, her scarf trailing in the breeze the way she has imagined.
Mr. Coker meticulously replicates the Marmon Wasp, the car to win the first Indianapolis 500 in 1911. He is a geek about the history of the drivers and the historic appearance of the rearview mirror, which untethered the driver from a partner and lightened the load. In later episodes he’ll visit WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca in California for the annual Monterey Motorsports Reunion, and the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for an Indy Legends Tour.
Off-camera, the Honest Charley team is rebuilding a 1922 Duesenberg, installing a straight-eight engine on the original extended frame. The maker won many Indianapolis 500s in the 1920s.
“Our cars are great today because of how they were made over a hundred years ago,” said Ms. Jarvis.
After selling Coker Tire in 2018, Mr. Coker turned his attention to Honest Charley Speed Shop, an 11-employee garage which offers nose-to-tail antique car restoration services. Coker Tire Museum, also on Chestnut Street, displays Mr. Coker’s antique car collection.
The shop’s namesake, Charley Card, was a Chattanooga hot rodder who got his start in 1948 selling parts out of his trunk. He went on to have the first mail order speed shop in the U.S. Charley also opened a restaurant across from the Read House but couldn’t staff the cash register. He requested that diners “be honest,” and the nickname stuck. Charley’s children ran his business until 1990, and Mr. Coker acquired the brand in 1998.
“We love the history of Chattanooga,” Ms. Jarvis said. “It’s the coolest city in the world.”
Ms. Jarvis took on full-time work with her dad in 2024.
“He’s very wise,” she said. “He loves people and he’s fun to watch interact with people. He brings joy to people.”
“I love messing with him,” she laughed. “I like keeping him young.”
Ms. Jarvis speaks for antique cars and for herself when she says, “It’s very important to know your own history. It’s made you into who you are today.”
Honest Charley Garage episodes began streaming in February, with new episodes every week. Episode 3 airs Feb. 20.
Watch on YouTube: Honest Charley Garage channel or Hagerty channel
Watch on Samsung TV Plus: Hagerty channel
Watch on Instagram: thecokermuseum
Honest Charley Speed Shop CEO Corky Coker and his daughter, Executive Director Casey Coker Jarvis, were both "raised in the old car hobby"