The concept of longevity isn’t foreign to Lyric Auto.

The business, which was started to service foreign-made automobiles, is marking five decades in operation this year.

“I think it’s pretty cool,” owner Julian Schrader said of the milestone.

Schrader said the business was opened in downtown Bowling Green in 1972 by Lyle Yackee and Rick Kern – the name “Lyric” is a combination of their two first names. The original purpose was to service Volkswagens. That expanded into working on foreign cars of all types.

Schrader said that in 1976 the business moved to its current site at 12593 Kramer Road.

Schrader was contacted about purchasing the business in 2019 by Rick and Ann Kern, and has owned it ever since.

“History-wise,” Schrader said, “they specialized in foreign automotive, all auto repair needs, and then I took it over and I do anything, all makes or models now. I do just about anything automotive-wise that I can.”

Schrader said he started working in the automotive industry in 2000, working with an area business and getting into towing.

“I just thought it was going to be a little gig to get by,” he said. “I was going to be a chef. I canceled that and I started working on cars there and been doing it ever since.”

He said the variety of cars that he’s able to work on at Lyric was a prime motivation for moving there.

“I like the broad spectrum of what I work on here, what we work on. … I work on all old cars, a lot of Beetles, some old Volkswagen vans, MGs we see a lot, Triumphs, old kind of cool cars from overseas,” Schrader said. “That’s probably the main decision why I was able to leave, I guess, because I needed a mental challenge, and the variety of cars and learning about different things, a different carburetor in every single one. My mind was definitely getting bored.”

His interest in mechanics was originally sparked by working on bicycles, he said.

“I kind of grew up with a little bit of mechanical background,” Schrader said. “It just progressed from there.”

With the variety of vehicles he sees, Schrader said that researching the makes and models he services is part of the job.

“I definitely have to research them and learn about them,” he said. “I tell the people that I’m training ‘figure out how it works and you can fix it.’”

Schrader said that, except for one bump early on during the pandemic, the coronavirus hasn’t slowed the business down. He said they closed down in April 2020.

“But other than that, it wasn’t terrible. I don’t have to have contact with many people and we just tried to make it so (the cars) were dropped off,” he said. “We just tried to wipe it down and be as safe as we could. But all in all, we never really missed a beat except for that April.”

Schrader is also seeing legacy business at Lyric, servicing the vehicles of generations of customers..

“It’s kind of cool that I meet grandchildren that the original people, their grandparents came here with their old Volkswagens, BMWs, Mercedes, whatever,” he said. “I probably have 10 people that introduced me to their grandchildren, some of them that are married with children themselves.”

Schrader also said he’s got plans for Lyric’s next 50 years.

“I’m hoping to include towing into it,” he said. “I’d like to expand and do a little more of custom, fabrication, restore old cars, a little bit of that.”