LA Car is Stoked About Its New Editor

By Roy Nakano

Doug Stokes once served as an investigator for the Los Angeles County Library, going door-to-door, asking library patrons if they would kindly return their overdue copy of Call of the Wild or The Complete Book of Sailor Knots.

“The library cop on Seinfeld—Bookman—comes to mind here,” says Stokes. “Of course, I was nothing like that.”

The job gave him a heightened knowledge of every community and street in the region. Little did he know that it would help prepare him in his latest venture: taking over the editorial reins of LA Car—the Monrovia-based publication shop of Los Angeles and its car culture. Stokes, a former Monrovian, has lived in nearby Duarte for 39 years.

Between that library cop job and now, Stokes raced cars, directed the International Kart Federation, was the PR guy for Mickey Thompson, Team Suzuki, Honda Racing and an environmental program for GM, helped launch the Los Angeles Grand Prix, Perris Auto Speedway and Irwindale Speedway, served on the board of the Motor Press Guild and edited its publication, MilePost, and ran Autobooks—the Southland’s premiere automotive bookstore.

While Stokes does have a keen understanding of the region’s car culture, he also seems to have friends and colleagues in virtually every nook and cranny of the automotive industry. For this writer, there isn’t a place we can go where someone doesn’t shout out ‘Hey, is that you, Doug?’”

“He‘s already the publication’s most prolific writer,” says Automotive Design Organization Executive Director John Grafman, who also serves as a senior editor for LA Car. “Doug’s wit and insight shine clearly in his writings.” Stokes’ work has not gone unrecognized. He is the recipient of the American Auto Racing Writers and Broadcasters Association’s Jim Chapman Award.

Stokes has kept busy writing freelance articles and first-person car reviews for a number of regional and national publications. “I figure that I’ve published well north of 300 automobile reviews and over 50 book reviews, since writing my first one for Inland Business Magazine in 1980. I’ve been reviewing automobiles for 25 years, and really enjoy my LA Car assignments.”

Come September, Stokes will be the one assigning articles at LA Car. Starting in 1997 as a regional automotive E-zine, LA Car has evolved into an automotive article service for other publications.

With titles like “The Best Cars in Rush Hour Traffic” (LA’s light rail system won), “Six Degrees of Reparations” (the publication challenged its readers to name one car company that didn’t have a skeleton in its closet), “From Diamonds to Dusty Cars” (dusty cars as the new badge of honor in California’s drought era), and “Zen and the Art of Inconspicuous Consumption” (the cheapest new car money can buy), LA Car articles have been posted in publications in print and online, and reported on in local radio and television news programs.

“We look forward to going where Doug takes LA Car,” says senior editor-publisher John-Fredrik Wright. Stokes chimes in, “In all my past endeavors, I have gone about my business without receiving nor causing any major injuries. I had slightly more good sense than racing talent, and consider making that discovery early-on a good thing.”

The writer is the Executive Editor of LA Car. To read a brief biography of Doug Stokes, go to lacar.com.