Modesto is celebrating lowrider culture. Here’s when, where and what to expect
Lowriders are officially getting a day in Modesto.
The City Council has proclaimed the fourth Saturday of September as Lowrider History Day, a new annual observance.
At Tuesday night’s meeting, the proclamation was accepted by Jerry Thompson of the Modesto NorCal Lowrider Alliance, Francisco Mireles and Dolores Chacon of the NorCal Lowrider Community, and Johnny Garcia, CEO of the Stanislaus Latino Chamber of Commerce.
“Car culture is at the core of Modesto’s identity,” said Mayor Sue Zwahlen. “As the culture expands, it continues to transcend boundaries and generations of Modesto diverse communities.”
Mireles said he’s been part of the lowrider scene since getting his driver’s license at 16, when he and his father began working on his first car.
Lowriders still run through his whole family. His dad still owns a lowrider truck, his brothers have cars, and his kids ride bikes. Even his wife, who wasn’t a fan of lowriders, now has one.
He said he’s hoping to break the longstanding stigma around lowriders. “It’s not just gangs and violence anymore. You got families involved in lowriding. You got women involved in lowriding. It’s a multigenerational thing,” Mireles said.
He said that seeing agencies, like the Modesto Police Department and California Highway Patrol, back them now would have been unheard of in the 1990s.
“That’s monumental,” he said.
First festival on Saturday
Saturday will kick off with a free community event in downtown Modesto, hosted by the NorCal Lowrider Community in partnership with the Stanislaus Latino Chamber of Commerce. This marks the first of what is intended to be an annual History of Lowriding Holiday Festival in the city.
The family-friendly event will be held from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. and will showcase a variety of cars, from lowriders to hot rods, plus Aztec and folklorico dancers, mariachi performances and lucha libre wrestling.
“We try to make this more of a community but also a cultural event,” Thompson said.
As part of the celebration for Hispanic Heritage Month and the inaugural History of Lowriding Holiday Festival, the State Theater will offer a free screening of the 2017 film “Lowriders” at 2 p.m.
According to the State’s website, the film is about a young street artist in East Los Angeles who is “caught between his father’s obsession with lowrider car culture, his ex-felon brother and his need for self-expression.”
A festival after-party will be at The Doghouse Taproom in Ceres from 5 to 11 p.m., featuring a DJ and live music.
“We’re excited to make this as big as we can for the first time,” said Domingo Perez, who has been lowriding in Modesto since the 1970s.
History of lowriders and cruising in Modesto
Lowrider culture emerged among Mexican Americans in Southern California after World War II. Enthusiasts would lower their cars and add elaborate, colorful paint jobs, chrome trim and custom interiors.
The Chicano movement of the 1960s and 1970s further shaped lowrider aesthetics, using car customization as a form of cultural pride and self-expression. Signature features included candy paint, velvet or custom upholstery and hydraulic systems that allowed cars to bounce.
“We took pride in fixing up our cars and our bikes with friends, family and forming core memories further ingraining the lowrider culture in the community, social clubs, holidays and special occasions,” Chacon said.
Groups of lowriders would take their cars through town , cruising “low and slow.” Both lowriders and the cruising scene have long been an integral part of Modesto’s cultural identity.
George Lucas’ 1973 film, “American Graffiti,” set in Modesto and featuring cruising along McHenry Avenue and other area streets, helped cement cruising as a key part of the city’s identity and inspired the annual Graffiti Festival and car show.
In 1988, California passed a law allowing local governments to enact anti-cruising ordinances, effectively restricting lowriding and cruising. Two years later, in 1990, Modesto’s City Council implemented a citywide cruising ban.
Perez, who cruised at that time, said some police officers gave them a bad time.
In July 2023, Modesto’s City Council voted to lift the cruising ban and remove its anti-cruising signage. Three months later, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill 436, eliminating statewide restrictions on lowrider cruising, which officially took effect in 2024.
Thompson, a lifelong Modesto resident, became involved in efforts to lift the cruising ban through his work with the California Lowrider Alliance.
Though he has been part of car communities for most of his life, he hasn’t been deeply active in the lowrider scene. Still, he knows many lowriders and has always tried to support them. He said both he and the local lowrider community are deeply appreciative of the city’s proclamation and ongoing support.
“It was a big accomplishment,” Thompson said about the ban being lifted. “We’ve been trying to get this lowrider community out there because they’ve had the stigma for years, and this is finally starting to show the fruits of everybody’s labor to break that stigma that they’ve had for decades.”
Thompson said that, unlike other areas of the state — especially in Southern California, where lowrider communities still face challenges — the Modesto Police Department has been supportive and periodically meets with the lowrider community.
“They listen with intent, and also the lowrider community listens back with the Police Department with their concerns,” he said.
He said that for certain events, they notify the police in advance, and most of the time, the department is supportive.
“There’s some bad apples out there [among lowriders]. They’re still trying to make the community look bad in a way, but majority of them have made those strides, and they are working and improving, so I think that’s the positive thing,” Thompson said.
This story was originally published September 25, 2025 at 12:03 PM.
