We’ve been closely following the battle by car enthusiasts to drive their legally imported cars amid threats from an unelected, quasi-governmental organization trying to stop us. Texas has just become the first state in recent memory to approve the registering of imported kei cars and trucks ,and now we want to celebrate with a shirt and a sticker from our pals at Blipshift.
Actually, because it’s Blipshift, we have a lot of options! In addition to the sticker, there’s a fitted tee for just $22, a tri-blend shirt for $26, a hoodie for $42, a women’s tank for $22, and some other goodness.
These will be available for the next two weeks and then they’ll be gone! Act fast and buy here. Also, if you’re a member, there’s a special bonus: Put both the sticker and any shirt/hoodie/tank in your cart and enter the code: STEVEMARTIN (David does not know who this is) and you’ll get a free sticker!
The flag is also symbolic because it represents the first flag ever for the soon-to-be nation (then state) of Texas. As the story goes, Mexican President General Santa Anna was starting to worry about those crazy Texians and sent some troops to collect the one cannon held by the residents of the City of Gonzales. Authentic Texan explains what happened next:
“Come and Take It” was a motto adopted by the Texas rebels defending the cannon. Two days earlier, Sara Seely DeWitt and her daughter, Evaline, hastily designed and created the Old Cannon Flag, which today is known as the “Come and Take It” flag, from a wedding dress belonging to Naomi DeWitt. It depicts the small, Spanish-made cannon with a black, singular star above it and the words “Come and Take It” spanning the width of the battle flag underneath the cannon.
[…]
At daybreak, fog blanketed what would become the battlefield of the first contest — some say skirmish — of the Texas Revolution. With Stephen F. Austin in command of the First Army of Texas Volunteers, the cannon loaded and the “Come and Take It” flag waving high, the army of brave Texas men sprung a surprise attack on Castañeda and his troops. The Mexican side was outnumbered by manpower and firepower.
On Oct. 2, the small cannon, mounted on a wheeled base, was fired during the clash between the Texan volunteer army and the Mexican troops sent by Santa Anna to retrieve the cannon. Castañeda and his troops pulled away, marking victory for the Texan side.
Whether you’re in a state like Georgia, which has banned the cars, or a victorious state like Texas, proudly wear the shirt/sport the sticker and let people know that, as enthusiasts, we aren’t going to sit back and let regulators screw up our hobby.
As Texas Representative Gene Wu said: “I would encourage every car nut and gearhead to reach out to your elected officials during this year’s election cycle. Let them know you exist and that you matter.”
Just do it in a cool shirt, right?
Here’s another:
“Don’t Tread on Me….Seriously, don’t tread on me….”
And for the picture, you show the side of a Suburban, a Kei car, and then a Hummer H2 in a row.
Kinda messed up that you are profiting off the success of the advocates in Texas.
I don’t understand why you find fault with this.
Please explain?
For profit company profiting off the hard work of a non profit advocacy group that is attempting to raise money for their advocacy work by selling a version of the same thing. Shows up on the sus radar for me.
You should have started with that.
As the founder of Texas Kei Truck Advocates, I want to clarify that we don’t have any issues with the Autopian’s version of the Kei truck Gonzales flag. In fact, we had our own version of the “Gonzales Kei” design that we were planning to unveil with the official formation of our car club, Lone Star Kei. However, given the overwhelming positive response to the Autopian’s Kei truck Gonzales flag, we decided to release our version earlier than planned to capitalize on this momentum and help raise funds for the next crucial step in our advocacy efforts – getting a bill to the governor’s desk.
We are incredibly grateful for the Autopian’ support throughout our advocacy journey, and we believe that by working together, we can make significant strides in promoting and protecting the rights of Kei truck enthusiasts nationwide.
Well said. And I do thank you for the effort that you all put in to fight the good fight.
Best to you all.
David you need someone to bring a big smoker to your next event and feed you all, just hit me up, I’m local
Find me on Facebook *yum*
The “.COM” is killing me.
The DeWitt family went on to be a very integral part of Cuero (about 20 miles to the south). While Gonzales, the home of the “Come And Take It” battle (there’s a museum and a historical collection of buildings there) is in Gonzales County, Cuero is the seat of DeWitt county. (History of Cuero). The patriarch of the DeWitt family was an empresario for the Mexican government before the whole mess with Santa Ana.
Cuero is home to the “Fighting Gobblers” high school football team. The town was once a huge source of turkeys! And each fall the turkeys would be brought into town from farms to be loaded onto trains for processing. Thus they had a huge festival called “Turkey Trot”. That’s all long gone and the big industry now is fracking and cattle.
Oh yeah, definitely need one of those.
You could try “From my cold, dead hands…*”
*there’s no heater and my body is the crumple zone.
Cool
Ordered before reading everything, bought 2 stickers and a shirt anyways. Put the proceeds from that second sticker in the RV fund.
Same – ordered once I got far enough down the page to see the link. Two tees, one for the 3-year-old.
You guys messed up, it should say
Come and taKEIt where the KEI is in bold or something. Come on dudes, all the letters are right there, in order!
I second this!
Disagree. It’s nice wordplay but it kind of takes away from the original source material and the joke.
I don’t need people constantly telling me my shirt is wrong like it was printed in engrish
George Takei: “Oh my!”
Brilliant!
Got mine, wish there were more colors.
Kinda funny when you consider how much we rant about cars mostly coming in boring colors.
Agreed. I was hoping for a black one but the original Texas flag is white, so I get it.
This is fantastic. Ordered.
I can’t wait for my wife’s eye rolling.
“STEVEMARTIN (David does not know who this is)”
Wow David. Wow.
Now there’s a Tales from the Slack I want to read.
DT is a wild and crazy guy for that.
I understood that reference (unlike DT)
Done and done. A long sleeve and a sticker, come and take em!
Jumped the gun on this. I ordered from Matt’s Twitter post before I knew about the sticker promo code. Bummer 🙁
I’m sure if you shoot them an email they will help you out.
Did it yesterday minutes after posting this. They hooked me up.