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OXNARD (KABC) -- There's only the slightest hint from the outside that there was something special inside an Oxnard industrial building.

But something even beyond special: the Mullin Automotive Museum.

It opened in 2010 by the late Peter Mullin and his wife Merle. Peter Mullin wanted to celebrate rolling beauty -- automobiles as art.

"Because they spoke to him, for their design.

He was an art major in college, and he only turned to business when he realized if he became an artist he would probably starve to death," said Merle Mullin.

Successful in business, Peter Mullin prized French cars from the Art Deco era of the 1930s.

Fittingly, the museum space was like stepping into a glamourous auto salon in Paris nearly a century ago.

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There are cars, of course, but also every detail embodies the era. The lighting, the signage, the décor. And the museum didn't just feature automobiles, b