The Jalopy JournalMy Story
Editor’s Note: After some consideration, the folks here at The Jalopy Journal World Headquarters decided that it would be beneficial to feature a new and different voice on the blog every now and then. Hearing the news, I decided to go out and chase my all time favorite writers and offer them the job. It took some arm twisting, some poker starin’, and maybe some pretty pathetic begging… BUT, welcome Jay Fitzhugh to The Jalopy Journal.
I first worked with Jay some ten years ago when we started a half-assed quest to find Roth’s Mysterion. We never found it, but I did find someone to admire. Like many of you, I’ve been reading Jay’s work in The Rodder’s Journal for years and I can’t wait to read more of it right here on TJJ. Enough of my blathering… Let’s here it from Jay.
Somewhere after puberty, when the realization came that I was a car nut, my dream job was to become a ‘magazine guy’. My father supported the car interests and helped fund a 1940 Ford coupe project four months after high school graduation. My uncle and I joined Free State Street Rods in 1975, where we helped host the very embryonic NSRA East Coast Nationals. The Street Rod Nationals in the seventies were wild and exciting, with car action events like jousting, trailer obstacle course, trailer packing and on and on. This is what caught and drew my attention to hot rods, more so than muscle cars, racing or sports cars to which there was equal exposure and involvement.
Free State Street Rods membership were divided north and south between suburban Baltimore and suburban Washington D.C., with me being a northern member. One name on the roster from the south was Steve Coonan. He was a year older, and while I can recall knowing who he was and meeting him, we had little, if any interaction. Soon Steve was off to California chasing his dream as a magazine photographer.
I remained in Baltimore with Free State Street Rods up into the eighties. The desire to photograph and write never really left me, but went into remission. Several bands, college, courtship, marriage, a day job and children all took priority, although cars were always there, and hot rods were always at the center. I lived my journalistic dream job vicariously through Baskerville, Senter, Dees, Oddo, Ganahl and Coonan.
The first writing attempt for me was with the revival of Hop Up as a monthly little book. Hop Up had a cool display at the LA Roadster Show the year that I took my dad out for Father’s Day. Having collected flathead speed equipment for several decades, my story on Tom Thickstun made the inaugural issue. But after issue two, the magazine had publishing difficulties and the writing career was again on hold.
Several years later, Steve and I reconnected. He asked about my writing intentions, having seen the Thickstun piece. Could more like it be produced? We talked about some preliminary research on Kinmont brakes that had been started, but was on indefinite hold. And that was it. Soon after, The Rodder’s Journal was introduced to a big reception at the Louisville Street Rod Nationals. As a charter subscriber, while I definitely wanted to participate, I became an eager and anxious reader for a couple of years.
By chance. a friend had purchased a small block Chevy from a fellow hot rodder in Virginia. He needed help getting it loaded into his truck, and I went along for the ride. It turned out that the hot rod seller was TRJ Senior Contributing Editor Ken Gross. After the engine was secure, Ken and I discussed writing and The Rodder’s Journal. It was Ken’s encouragement that brought about the resumption of the Kinmont research, which led to my first story with TRJ in issue #7. (Thank you, Ken. It was the push that I needed.)
It turned out to be no picnic, having a very probing and challenging editor with Pat Ganahl. We would have these last minute phone calls on a story point, or worse, a photo that had been one of ten submitted months prior with the story. Pat had a knack of contacting me at inopportune moments, but we always worked through the stories together. While Pat would always make me prove myself, it was Steve that floored me. After five or more feature stories had been published, over dinner one night in Paso Robles, Steve suggests that I take a coarse in writing. So much for that ego, but he was right. And so was Pat. I studied to become a better writer, and am still studying.
As it stands, TRJ has published twenty-five of my feature stories over more than a decade, which have included three covers; The Flint Roadster, Competition Coupes and The Mighty Ardun Returns. Getting to write has become an important part of who I am as a person and a hot rodder. The process has facilitated meetings and friendships with the core of the hobby, from contemporaries to the elders.
Photojournalism, on the other hand, is not what I had expected as an eager teenager or an eager adult. It can be cordial, but is definitely competitive and ego-centric just under the surface. This includes peers, car owners, shop owners, et all. It has been long, hard work, but I am very proud of the accomplishments made predominantly with Steve, Pat, Geoff Miles and Greg Sharp. My story focus has been to investigate topics that have rarely been featured, or inadequately covered. Most require six months to complete. Several, like the Ardun story, have taken over a year. I always have several active stories being researched simultaneously.
Linking up with Ryan at The Jalopy Journal is a new chapter. Ryan and I got started years ago when I was searching for the Mysterion, and shared some photos of Starbird’s T-Bird Electra. He has come a long way. I hope I can help keep the ball rolling.
Long Live Rods and Roth,
Jay
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