Graham Jaehnig/Daily Mining Gazette The Upper Peninsula is this year’s destination of the North American Vintage Bentley Organization’s 40th annual meet, which began in downstate Bay Harbor.

CALUMET — British-manufactured Bentley automobiles are legendary the world over, both for performance and for luxury. Bentley, in short, are known the world over for their sleek looks, design and engineering.

But what brought so many Bentleys to the western Upper Peninsula?

They were seen by several people throughout the area, including Houghton, Hancock, and as far north as Copper Harbor.

William Farnsworth, of Wellesely, Massachusetts, explained the reason for the sudden explosion of vintage Bentleys is an annual event.

“It’s the North American Vintage Bentley Meet,” said Farnsworth. “This is the 40th year of the event. It started in Stowe Vermont, back in 1981. And we’ve just been trying to continue this every year, get the old cars together, go out and drive around in a certain area.”

In 2015, the North American Vintage Bentley Organization’s annual meet took them to Bradford, Pennsylvania, where Alex Davis, reporter for the Bradford Era newspaper found Farnsworth.

Farnsworth, Davis learned, is following in his father’s footsteps.

“He has been to maybe 15 to 20 meets, while his father has attended all but three or so,” Davis wrote on May 22, 2015. “The cars are the excuse to get the people together,” Farnsworth said.

At the 2015 event, Farnsworth displayed a 1928 Bentley 41/2 Litre.

“This year, it’s been hosted by people who live ‘up here,’ well, not the Upper Peninsula, Bay Harbor,” Farnsworth told the Daily Mining Gazette, “and we were coming up here to the Upper Peninsula to visit the area, see an area we haven’t seen before.”

Farnsworth said the time planned for the U.P. tour is five days, and includes Bentley automobiles ranging in vintage from 1921 to 1931 and into the 1950s.

Headquartered in Crewe, England, the company was founded as Bentley Motors Limited by W.O. Bentley in 1919 in Cricklewood, North London, and became widely known for winning the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1924, then from 1927-29 and again in 1930.

While Bentley Motors Limited remains a British manufacturer and marketers of luxury cars and SUVs, it has been a subsidiary of the Volkswagen Group since 1998.

The North American Vintage Bentley Organization’s members come from different areas, but Farnsworth said he, along with three others came from the Boston area.

“Three of us came together,” he said. “We trailered our vehicles and came up together.”