Photos by Mike Lamb ABRA Auto Body owner Chet Lockwood, second from left, reminisced on the history of the business with general manager Trent Johnson, far left, and Owen Prellwitz, center, and Mark Fonteyn. Below: An ABRA Auto Body employee works on a vehicle.

MARSHALL — Chet Lockwood sat inside the conference room at ABRA Auto Body to reminisce on the history of the business now located on East College Drive, off of Highway 23.

“Fifty-five years, that’s when we began,” said general manager Trent Johnson.

“Is that Prestige that it started?” Lockwood, who is the current owner, asked.

“Yes, originally, Prestige Auto Body was bought out by ABRA,” Johnson answered.

“Do you remember Prestige? That must have been 55 years ago?” Lockwood asked

“Owen would know when Prestige started. Owen worked for them,” Johnson said.

Johnson called up Owen Prellwitz to join the group in the conference room.

“We got another historian on the way,” Johnson jokingly said to the group.

While waiting for Prellwitz to arrive, glass manager Mark Fonteyn provided some history.

“When ABRA started it was January of ’95. They were kind of getting the building set up and then I came over. And after a few months I came over in March 7, ’95. And been here ever since,” he said. “Thirty-one years.”

At that point, Prellwitz walks in.

“We’re taking a trip down memory lane, and you’re invited,” Johnson tells Prellwitz. “We’re talking about the history of ABRA. When did you start at Prestige?”

“1987,” Prellwitz answered.

“Do you know the history of Prestige? When it started?” Lockwood asked.

Prellwitz recalled when Prestige changed to ABRA, it was in 1995.

Prellwitz and Fonteyn shared that Prestige was located at the corner where the Hy-Vee gas station is now located. And the collision center then moved to the East College Drive that is now the location for the Restore in 1999.

“Then we moved here in March of ’21,” Lockwood said.

Prellwitz share his memories of semis being worked on in the 1970s.

Ben Holm and Gordy Thomson were the original owners of Prestige, according to Prellwitz.

“Ben bought Gordy out in ’90,” he said. “And ABRA came along in January of ’95.”

Lockwood shared that he bought the business in 2016.

“It was corporate until 2010,” Prellwitz said.

“Then Jim Brust bought it,” Lockwood said.

Prellwitz recalled how vehicles have evolved from metal bumpers to plastic.

“My worse bumper to take off was a Cadillac,” Prellwitz said. “There was so much in taking it apart and putting it back together. It was crazy. I don’t miss the (metal) bumpers.”

A July 11, 2016, Independent article reported on the sale of ABRA Auto Body & Glass from Jim Brust to Lockwood.

“I was considering options,” Brust said of the decision to sell the franchise. “This was one that worked.”

Lockwood Motors took official ownership on July 1, 2016. At the time, Lockwood said ABRA offered great repair processes and services and had knowledgeable employees. He planned on keeping up that level of service.

Lockwood also said Lockwood Motors will be more of a “one-stop shop” and be able to offer services form repairs to cleaning and body work. He also said it will be convenient that the Marshall ABRA location is close to the Lockwood service shop and the Shine Center.

“The body business is a natural fit to the other side of the car business,” Lockwood said during the recent conference room reminiscing. “It’s a little different business model than it was 50 years ago, that’s for sure. You are working with the insurance customers to try to keep everybody happy.”

He said the different Lockwood Motors locations work together all the time. If customers lose their vehicles to total losses, he can sell them another one.

“If there are some heavy mechanical stuff, we take it over there (Lockwood Motors) and body and equipment stuff, we bring over here (ABRA),” he said.

“The biggest thing for me, at least, is just the last 10 years, the amount of technology on these cars. The ADS (Advance Driver Assist systems). Your blind zone detections and your adaptive cruise controls. All that technology that has to be recalibrated.”

Lockwood says he enjoys checking in at the ABRA location.

“I come here to hide,” he said jokingly.

“I’m incredibly proud,” he said.