Syracuse.com - Shehadi Rugs store owner has passion for collecting rare, antique boat motors

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Inside his 3,000-square-foot, heated and air conditioned "car barn" is an eye-opening collection of more than 100 outboard boat motors stretching back to 1914. Watch video

Stephen Cannerelli/The Post-StandardThis cut-a-way from a 1953 Johnson motor is part of Steve Shehadi’s collection of antique boat motors at his Skaneateles home. Shehadi started his massive collection in 1974.

There’s a small sign on the wall at the Shehadi Oriental Rugs store on Erie Boulevard in Syracuse that reads, “I buy outboard motors.’

Steve Shehadi, the store’s owner, isn’t kidding.

Check out his home on Skaneateles Lake. Inside his 3,000-square-foot, heated and air conditioned “car barn” is an eye-opening collection of more than 100 outdoor boat motors stretching back to 1914.

“About five or six of them are the only ones known in the world. I can’t say ‘only,’ because maybe there’s something in somebody’s barn somewhere that nobody knows about,” he said.

The boat motors are the 59-year-old businessman’s most recent passion that over the years has prompted him to amass antique cars, boats and a number of mechanical devices. His two-level car barn is jammed with various types of motor and engines dating back to 1880. In addition, he has two other 1,500-square foot buildings on his property to handle the overflow.

Giving a tour this week of the car barn, Shehadi concedes there’s no real theme, just “groups” of mechanical items.

“See that. It’s a scale model of a 1890 steam engine that ran a factory,” he said. “It’s called a Walking Beam. It ran like a sewing machine. Jay Leno has one 12-feet tall. It was on the History Channel.”

The car barn contains a lot of big “stuff,” Shehadi said, including his 1914 Model T with acetylene lights, a couple of hydroplane racing boats, a 1923 Buick and a 1931 Gar Wood antique touring boat that’s been on the poster of the Skaneateles Antique and Classic Boat Show for two years.

“Everything in this building is on wheels so it can be moved around,” he said. “And when you own things like antique cars you get into real estate situations when you have to put things away. I used to have more cars, but I never really drove them, so I just started selling them off. That’s where the funds for this other stuff came from.”

His antique outboard motor collection takes up much less space, he said. Each one is labeled and mounted on special display racks. In recent years, he’s taken a sampling from the collection in a trailer and displayed them at the Skaneateles boat show, along with entering five or six of his antique boats.

Shehadi said he grew up in a modest home near Syracuse University, and his family had a small camp on Skaneateles Lake. He majored in nutrition and competed in gymnastics. He said as a boy, though, he always loved playing with bikes, mini-bikes, go-carts — anything mechanical.

At age 26, he bought his first house in the area around Syracuse University and eventually amassed 14 properties. In the early 1980s, he took over control of the rug store from is father.

“After 26 years, I started selling off the properties and that got me started on collecting cars, and later the boats,” he said.

Today, he’s more about the outboard motors.

His two daughters, Gabrielle and Madison, pitched in a couple of years ago to work on the restoration of a 1960 Elgin, 9-foot hydroplane. both also assist their father each year at the Skaneateles boat show.

“Eventually, these kids are going to inherit all this stuff,” he said. “Everything is tagged, where it came from, what we paid for it. That way, these guys can figure it out when I’m gone.”

Shehadi emphasized that what he loves most about collecting boat motors is the history, the stories behind the manufacturers. He also savors the idea of restoring restoring beat up, rusted old motors that he got for a bargain.

“I’m not a sports guy. I don’t watch football. My whole thing is taking things apart, restoring them, putting them back together — or finding someone else who’s really good at that,” he said.

Walking down an aisle, he stops in front of a row of motors. “Look at this guy — a 1914 Motorgo rowboat engine. Completely restored. The early motors were called rowboat motors. They changed the name to outboards in the early 1920s.”

And there’s his beloved Elto motors. He owns all six made by the company in 1938, ranging from the ½- to the 8 ½ horsepower model.

“Look at this one, a 1923. It was in a garage near Doug’s Fish Fry in Skaneateles. It was disaster when I got it. I had it completely restored,” he said.

He points to his tiny, 1939 Clarke Troller, which looks like a kitchen blender. “It’s the smallest manufactured outboard motor in the world. Look at those spark plugs. There’re like little toys,” he said.

Shehadi is also proud of his brass Evinrude motors.

“These are very rare,” he said, putting his hand on a 1923 model. “The entire lower unit is made of brass for salt water. And look at the upper part, it his a little battery light, a place where you plug in a spot light. What is really unique is that you push this and the lower unit spins around for reverse. None of these early motors had transmissions

For Shehadi, collecting rare boat motors is like collected rare stamps or coins.

“You’re always looking for one you’re missing, one that’s better than the one you have — and you’re always looking to upgrade,” he said.

Speaking of signs, there’s one in the car barn that pretty much sums things up.

It reads: “If heaven doesn’t have outboards, I’m not going.”

View the full article on The Syracuse Outdoors Blog