Across from the hall from the autos classroom, a mural of a car takes up an enter display case. The vibrant orange back of the car pops out from the gray walls around it. Its license plate reads “In memory of our friend Brian Froehlich.”

The mural, which went up on Feb. 28, is the result of almost a year’s worth of work done by senior Schuyler Sykes. Sykes made the mural to remember fellow Auto Club member and North student Brian Froehlich, who died in a car accident in 2022.

“It is a memorial,” said Sykes. “I created [the mural] so that his friends, including me and his family, could have a place to remember him because he died unfairly.”

Sykes knew Froehlich from the Autos III class they had together and their shared participation in Auto Club.

“It was insane to me because I knew Brian,” said Sykes. “We used to cause some shenanigans and he would tease me and stuff. It was a shocker. It was so surreal.”

According to Sykes, the mural is of Froehlich’s favorite car, a Nissan G-TR Nismo. 

“I went to his public funeral service and his sister stood up and brought her testimony and she mentioned some things that Brian loved.” said Sykes. “We all knew he loved cars, but she mentioned that his favorite car was the Nissan Nismo GT-R.”

To contrast with the blues and grays of North’s hallways, Sykes decided to paint the car bright orange.

Sykes designed the mural as part of his Eagle Project for his Boy Scout troop. 35 Boy Scouts, family members and people from his church helped Sykes paint his design.

“One of the rules [Boy Scouts] has is that you can’t do 80% of the physical labor, you have to lead others,” said Sykes. “The Eagle Scout project is proof that you can lead others into making something fantastic, doing a great service. So although I did do all of the planning, throughout that nine months, but, when it came down to it, I probably only did 30 or 40 of the 200 hours it took to paint it.”

Autos teacher and adviser for Auto Club Steven Pravica offered a previously unused display case to Sykes for the mural. After painting was complete, Sykes installed the mural with the help of other Auto Club members.

“It’s not about the art, it is about the meaning behind it, which is Brian Froehlich was a good kid.” sad Sykes. “He didn’t deserve to go out the way he did and I don’t want his name to ever be forgotten.”