The Red Roadster - Part 4

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The Red Roadster - Part 4


Dancing in the Desert

The way things turned out, maybe it should have been called “Lost and wandering in the Dez”
Not that we were lost to any great degree, just that once you start out cross country in this great nation of ours, at least on the western side of it, you’re going to be crossing a desert somewhere. And maybe a whole lot of desert. That’s kinda how it worked out for us.

We’d had the two roadsters up and running, fresh paint, new and refurbished running gear since last October and not gone far with them. A couple of trips to Arroyo Verde, one trip to the Pomona dragstrip as spectators at the Winternationals and just running around town was about it.
Both roadsters were good running, dependable and trouble free little cars. Bobby’s had been ironed out long ago and all mine took was a bit of tinkering.

Gail was the one who came up with the bright idea of a long road trip in the roadsters. She thought it would be a good idea to get out of town for a while and since we all liked going places in the roadsters, a two car caravan would be fun. It didn’t take too long for Bobby and I to figure the destination should be Bonneville. Mecca for hot rodders nationwide. We knew our hot rod history and figured life wouldn’t be quite complete without a pilgrimage to Bonneville.

We’d never been there and I hate to admit it, we never even got close. We didn’t really know anybody who had been there. We’d talked to a few dry lakes guys now and then and to hear them talk it was like another world. That was enough for us. Our minds were made up.

Course the small fact that Bonneville ran in August when the lake dried out enough for cars to run on was conveniently overlooked. We knew it could be hot in the desert in August, but what the heck, we figured we’d been in the San Fernando Valley and even the San Joaquin Valley more than a few times in the summer, so going to Bonneville in August couldn’t be too bad.

Rebecca and Gail were excited about going. The little girls wanted to go too, but decided staying home with Pearl, Sarah and Nana wouldn’t be too bad. They had plans to visit Little, Abby and Bonnie Sue as soon as they could. With that taken care of it was off to the races.
In more ways than one.

Synchronizing vacation schedules was the toughest part. Especially for me. My problem was there were only five guys working a 24 hour shift and only one guy could be on vacation at any one time. I eventually got it squared away when one of the senior guys decided to take his vacation earlier in the summer.

Roberto, a long time hot rod enthusiast anted to join us. Trouble for him was, summer was one of the busiest times of all at the machine shop. Bud and Vicky wanted to go as well, but Bud was stuck at work and there was no way his company was going to let him off in the middle of August. A small bummer there. For a while there we figured we could use Bud’s 37 sedan to haul lots of stuff.

Now that we were down to the two roadsters we had to think about what we were taking along and how we were going to do it. My roadster had a regular trunk and with the external gas tank, there was a fair amount of room in the back. Not so true for Bobby’s rumble seat model. Even with the external gas tank, the rumble cushions took up a lot of room. That part neatly solved when Bobby took the cushions out.

A spare tire was a concern. Especially so since both our cars ran different wheel bolt patterns front and rear. We ended up doing the same thing Bobby did for Bud’s mismatched wheel patterns on the 37 Chevy. We got another 6 x 15" slot mag from the junkyard. It wasn’t always easy to buy just one mag wheel at the junkyard since they were usually sold in pairs. Made easy this time because the wheel on the opposite side of the wrecked Ford was damaged.

Bobby knocked a new set of holes in the wheel drill jig he’d originally made for Bud’s 37. Now we had a drill jig that covered most of the standard, at least standard for hot rods, bolt patterns. With the solid back slot mag drilled with three different bolt patterns to match the three different wheel patterns in use on our two roadsters, we had one spare that would work on either car. I gotta admit though, the poor little wheel looked like somebody had gotten after it with a machine gun.

It was a good idea though. Trunk space in the roadsters was definitely at a premium. Even the tools were split up to an extent. As were some of the spares we carried. Not too many spares though, one electric fuel pump with some fittings and lines for whoever needed it, as well as v-belts and upper and lower radiator hoses for each car.

The best part for Rebecca and I was the borrowed top that Bruce, the blonde haired Deuce brother from Pole Creek loaned us. We tried to buy it from him, but he didn’t want to part with it. He was generous in offering it to us for the trip though. It was in good shape and the exact same shade of tan that was originally on Bobby’s roadster before he got the new black top.
Toss in a couple of sleeping bags, two small tarp’s - to go over the no side windows tops on both cars - a couple of suitcases and small makeup case for the girls in each car, a small icebox, a couple quarts of oil, new oil and fuel filters in each one and the spare tire at the bottom of my trunk, the roadster trunks were pretty much full.

The girls did good in packing their stuff. I think we did worse. Even though we wore the Official California Hot Rod Uniform of T-Shirts, Levis and tennies, we overdid it a touch. You know how that goes. A pair of new Levis, in case we went out to dinner in a nice restaurant. A couple of pair of old, well broken in everyday Levis. A pair of clean, but stained and maybe torn Levis in case we had to get serious about working on the roadsters. A stack of clean T-Shirts, underwear, socks, cut off Levis for shorts, some button down shirts, along with a sweatshirt, jacket, raincoat, a pair of loafers, a new ball cap and our suitcases were stuffed.

I didn’t have a clue what the girls put in their suitcases. All I know is they were freshly turned out every day, looked great and smelled good. Even so, they had their warm clothes packed and I don’t know what else they had in there. Key point was, their suitcases were not as stuffed as ours were. They say “Vanity, thy name is Woman”. Maybe so, I’m not so sure here.

The big day finally arrived. The little girls were at our house to stay with Pearl and Sarah.
We had a good chunk of money to carry us through as well as credit cards and checkbooks. The roadsters were tuned to the teeth and loaded to the gills. We had three weeks of vacation staring us in the face, the sun was shining and the road was open. Not much more was required.

Pulling out of home early on Friday morning, Bobby took the lead and we dropped in behind. Running out Canyon Road, past the old favorite for street racing, Prado Road, through Via Lindero and Pole Creek, headed east brought back a lot of memories. It was pleasant and easy going for a while. Once we got into the true desert out near Palmdale we were really thankful we had a top on the car. Rebecca and I were fairly tan from just running around in the topless roadster and from taking the kids to the beach, but even so, three weeks in an open car would have been tough. I know, a lot of guys and gals have done it. In our case, we had the top so we made use of it and were glad to do so.

We stopped in Palmdale to gas up and check the roadsters over. I think the gas station guy, a tall and freckled kid who looked to be 18, was a touch surprised at two roadsters pulling into the gas station at the same time. One hot rod, let alone a roadster being a seldom seen event for him.
While we were there we unsnapped the rear windows on both cars and snapped them to the underside of the top runners. It helped a lot. Airflow with the back window open was about the same as when the top was off. We had shade, which was the important part. We’d learned long ago the bright sunshine in the dez could eat you up.

Things weren’t as bad as I thought as far as heat in the car went. I’d taken Bobby’s advice and ran the jute padding and carpeting as far up the firewall as it would go in an effort to stop heat coming in through the firewall. What really helped was the cowl vent. A lot of guys filled them in, but I figured it sure couldn’t hurt with the big engine up front. Bobby’s roadster had a cowl vent too, but it was pretty useless at low speed. The heated air that came out of the hood louvers dumped right into the cowl vent making for some toasty feet. The vent helped at highway speeds due to the change in airflow pretty much stopped air from coming out of the hood louvers, but in town at slower speeds it was pretty much useless.

I figured the open hood sides on Bobby’s roadster helped contribute to the cool interior of his roadster. Maybe, seems like a lot of heat would get carried away with part of the big Hemi heads sticking out in the breeze. Even so, there was a lot of hot air coming out of the stock hood side louvers on my roadster. You could stick your hand out the window at low speed and get a feel for the 90 degree ambient air at shoulder height and when you stuck your hand down low, where the air coming out of the louvers hit it, it felt like it was 20-30 degrees hotter.

Bad part for us was the lack of weatherstripping in the doors. Something I didn’t think I needed. Bobby’s roadster had the doors weatherstripped a long time ago. Something I’d noticed and never thought too much about. Until now anyway. With the top on and the back window closed, it created a low pressure area inside the cockpit and the hot air off the hood side louvers got sucked right into the front and rear gaps in the door. Not as bad when the rear window was open, but if you wore shorts - as the girls did - you could really feel it. The heat problem was solved to a great degree by some stick on weatherstripping we bought at a Barstow hardware store. It wasn’t the coolest looking stuff in the world, but it did work.

We refueled and had a light lunch in Barstow while we were there. Lunch, just a sandwich and an apple from our own ice boxes. We figured we could save a few bucks as well as have a healthy lunch, at least one that wasn’t going to attack you further down the road, if we brought our own food along. We were doing ok on the gas too. Even running 70 or so, both roadsters were pulling down about 16 mpg. Not too bad when you figure they were loaded down pretty good, about as aerodynamic as a brick, running mildly built engines and weren’t really equipped with highway gears. Bobby had gone to the trouble to replace the 3.78 Olds rear axle diff with a set of 3.40's. Higher would have been nice, but that’s all we could find on short notice.

My roadster ran a 3.50 diff and fairly tall tires. Even so, both roadsters were pretty well matched in the rpm department as far as the overall gear ratio went. Which was good. I’d hate to be driving a car with short gears and trying to keep up on a desert highway with a car running a set of long legged highway gears.

We pulled into Las Vegas about five o’clock. First thing up was finding a room. We figured we’d have problems once we saw all the traffic in Vegas and thought maybe we should have made reservations. It worked out ok though, we got a couple of nice rooms on Fremont street a couple of blocks down from the El Cortez. We’d been told the El Cortez was a good place to go for a late dinner. Late dinner or not, we didn’t care, we checked in, parked the roadsters in the covered carports, got our suits on and hit the pool. After crossing the dez in our roadsters with temps well over a hundred degrees we were a touch overcooked. We did ok, drank lots of water and stayed well hydrated. The cars ran well too. Once mine got to 205 degrees in the dez, it settled in and stayed there for the rest of the trip. Bobby’s car ran a little cooler at 195. Both cars had S-W mechanical temp gauges that were fairly accurate, but I think the extra heat in mine was heat soak from the automatic trans. Bobby’s four speed had better air flow around the rear of the engine and all that, but it was probably a moot point with the wide Chrysler sitting up front.

After a swim, and the only thing that drove us out of the pool was hunger, we changed and headed for the El Cortez for dinner. The dinner room had a line outside the door, but it was moving pretty fast. Gail wandered over to the slot machines, stuck a couple of quarters in and won $200. right away. Both girls were tickled and so were we. A nice reward for what was so far a fun, but hot trip. Gail wanted to buy dinner for us all, but Bobby and I told her to keep the money and buy something she wanted with it.

After a good dinner, we wandered out to the gaming tables. Gail gave Rebecca half her slot machine winnings and they sat down at the blackjack table. Seemed reasonable to us, both girls were good card players and we figured they’d do ok there. Bobby and I wandered over to the craps table and after losing a few bucks, decided we weren’t the gamblers we thought we were. We stuffed coins into the quarter slots for a while and went back to check on the girls. Rebecca still had the same size pile of chips she’d started with, but Gail had a whole lot more. In the end, Rebecca broke even and Gail was $300. ahead of the game at the blackjack table and they still had the $200. from the slot machine.

Gail was ready to quit and no argument from us. It was late, well after midnight and it had been a long hot day. Las Vegas was fun and hospitable, but we figured we should get an early start next morning.

An early start was right. We hit the Continental breakfast at the hotel, must have wasted a whole 20 minutes there with fruit, rolls and coffee and hauled out of there at six in the morning. Town was quiet considering all the traffic the night before.

Once we were fueled up and headed out on I-15 for Salt Lake City we started making good time. The air was fresh and cool. It didn’t take much imagination to figure it was going to get hot later on. Even so, we enjoyed what we had and took each mile as it came.

There’s some beautiful country leading out of Las Vegas headed north. Desert country for sure and maybe it doesn’t appeal to everybody, but we liked it. There’s a lot more to the desert than most think. All you have to do is pay attention. Springtime is the very best. Especially after a series of spring rains. The desert floor is abloom with masses of colorful and many times very tiny wildflower’s. Those who think the desert is barren and devoid of life need to take a closer look. A lot of rich history, but kinda hard to take in from a roadster cutting across the dez at seventy or so.

Even so, the view through the windshield of a roadster on a long trip is like nothing else. You are so much a part of what you see that it’s hard to explain. Street bike riders know, and the hot rod coupes come close, but there’s just something about a roadster. They have a mystique all their own.

An early lunch and refuel at St. George, Utah and we were headed north once again. The girls were doing ok. They’d done more than a few miles in a roadster, enjoyed it and they were enjoying the trip. A little longer than anything they’d done in a roadster before and for that matter, a little longer than anything we’d done in a roadster. We’d run all over Southern California and up into Central California’s San Joaquin Valley in Bobby’s roadster, but so far this was the longest trip we’d undertaken.

We decided to refuel again in Cedar City. A little before it was really needed, but the map showed mostly small towns along the way and we figured better safe than sorry.

Once we slowed down for Cedar City and got into traffic, my roadster started overheating. The trans was shifting a little strange too. With the lightweight car it had always shifted at a fairly low rpm with a light throttle setting. Once I saw the vacuum gauge indicating zero I knew exactly what had happened. We caught up to Bobby and Gail and motioned them to follow us into a market parking lot where we parked and shut down the engine.

It was obvious the roadster had popped a vacuum line and once I told the girls repairs would be quick and easy, they headed into the market to stock up on ice, water and soft drinks. We still had plenty of lunch stuff from home and it was fairly well iced down courtesy of the Las Vegas hotel ice machine. Even so, a little more ice never hurts. The loose hose was easy to find. A minor oil leak from the bottom part of the dipstick tube where it entered the trans had the vacuum modulator pretty much oiled down which allowed the friction fit hose to slip off. The oil leak, nothing major and nothing to worry about. Just one of those minor leaks that dirty up the car, but create no real problems.

I added a small worm drive clamp to the hose that I should have had on there before and that was the end of the loose hose problem. I probably should have used the carburetor full time vacuum bib for the vacuum advance, but with the rear mounted distributor, the T-400 modulator virtually right below it and the tap to the vacuum gauge all at the rear of the engine, I elected to run all the vacuum lines off of one fitting at the base of the carb. I didn’t mind necessary lines or wires going wherever they were needed, but I liked to keep the top of the engine as clean as I could.

Once the distributor vacuum advance can had full time vacuum back on it, the overheating at idle and traffic went away, the T-400 went back to shifting as it should and we were back in business.

We settled in for the 250 mile run to Salt Lake City. Aided by the girls being more than willing to drive. Both of them liked to drive and especially liked to drive the roadsters. They liked to click off the miles too. More than a couple of times Bobby or I woke up to find the roadsters spinning down the highway at 75 or so. The girls figured they wanted to make time and these were just the cars to do it in. We tried to have them keep it under 70 as we did because we didn’t like spinning the snot out of the engines, but the girls had minds of their own sometimes. It didn’t seem to hurt anything, the big Olds in my car and the Chrysler in Bobby’s had fresh bearings, carried good oil pressure on the highway, around 48-50# in both cars and the engines, aside from spinning along fairly good, weren’t working very hard at all. Just loafing along in our light weight cars. I gotta admit though, at least in my roadster and Bobby’s too, both cars settled into a smooth running groove right at 75. Everything seemed to come together and that’s where the car liked to run on the highway. The smooth running bit something I noticed with different cars over the years. The Ranchero liked 67 mph. No faster, no slower. It did ok at other speeds, but it was just right at 67. Same with the Olds powered 50 Ford coupe. It liked 58 or so, but would run 65-70 all day long with no problem. Just gotta pay attention and learn what your car likes.

The run to Salt Lake City was a good one. It was still hot out, but nothing like it had been on the desert floor. We’d seen service station temperature gauges there hovering at 108-110
degrees f. The temps in Utah were right around 98-102 depending on the altitude. It helped that most of the trip was right up against several National Forests. With lots and lots of trees. A sharp contrast to the muted colors and vast open spaces of the desert floor.

We really enjoyed the drive to Salt Lake City. The desert was nice, but hot as mentioned.
Driving in Utah was different and the lower temperatures gratefully accepted. Finding a nice motel in Salt Lake City was no problem either. Dinner at a nice restaurant, although we probably should have brought dress slacks along for the guys and maybe dresses for the girls, but folks at the restaurant didn’t seem to mind. Tourists and their many times strange mode of dress was probably something they saw almost every day. Nothing that a shopping trip couldn’t cure, but we didn’t have a clue where we could put it. Space on the roadsters was at a premium.

This time around, we did things a little smarter, got fueled up, bought rolls and fruit in town the evening before, figured we could get coffee on the run and head for Wendover and the salt flats really early. No one complained about turning in early. The long drive the day before, the short night and the longer drive today found us all in bed at eight o’clock. Even so, rolling out at four in the morning was still tough. Which made me wonder how come all this fun stuff, hunting, fishing, the races, whatever, starts so darned early in the morning?

I guess the best answer to that is the one Little gave when he was a little guy. “It just does”.

We got out of Salt Lake City at five in the morning. For a Sunday morning, kinda busy we thought. Five in the morning at home, and especially on a Sunday saw the occasional fisherman, stayed out late or called in early oil field worker, the occasional cop car and that was it. The Salt Lake City folks started their day early.

The 120 miles or so to Wendover was a quick trip, just under two hours of easy driving.
At least we’d had the smarts to fuel up the night before. Arriving in Wendover signaled the end of the easy part even though we didn’t know it right away.

We had a great breakfast at a little roadside cafe’. After that, we figured we’d be smart and register at a motel right away. Right off, we could see Wendover was smaller than we thought it would be. A small fact obvious to anybody who had done a little research. It was obvious to us, and especially to the girls, that not much research had been done at all. There wasn’t a room available anywhere. And there wouldn’t be for several days.

Well, we figured we had some choices. We could stay a day, head back to Salt Lake City and get a room. The almost two hour drive each way wasn’t too appealing. The girls could take one car, head back to Salt Lake City, get a room and we’d join up in a couple of days.

Bobby and I didn’t care for that one much. If something happened to them, we wouldn’t know a thing about it or where to find them. The girls weren’t too wild about it either. Besides, they liked hot rods too and wanted to see what Bonneville was all about. They didn’t come this far just to sit in a motel room.

With the ice boxes and sleeping bags we’d brought along we were in pretty good shape.
We’d just get some more food and ice and camp out. Easier said than done sometimes. We hit a grocery store, bought some steaks, beer, salad stuff, bread, coffee, five gallons of distilled water in one gallon jugs, a small barbecue and some charcoal. As well as a great big blue speckled coffee pot. Rebecca called it our Cowboy Coffee Pot. A good name for it. We got the food put away in the iceboxes as well as a few beers iced down. We figured those would be good at the end of the day.

I don’t know how we stuffed the barbecue and coffee pot in the roadsters. I do know we had gallon bottles of water sitting on the passenger floorboards in each car. Once all that was done, getting out to the salt flats was easy.

The salt flats were quite a place, nothing new to anyone who’d been there before. A lot of history written there as well. Most of it in the quest for speed, but a lot of it about the early day pioneers. Quiet too. Except for the cars and campers with race cars on trailers driving in. And the race cars booming down the course.

When the cars were shut down and the wind wasn’t blowing, it was quieter than anyplace I’d ever been. Strange, but not eerie. The quiet just added to the majestic presence of the huge expanse of perfectly flat salt.

To our surprise, we found the salt was not as smooth as we thought. The basin floor was very flat, but wind and water from the winter rains leave small salt ridges everywhere which necessitated dragging the course with a big steel drag to knock it all down flat. The course was well laid out with signs indicating the pits and such. There were patrol cars too. All in all a pretty well organized affair.

We parked on the outskirts of the pits and could see the course fairly well. Specially after we put the top down on my roadster and sat on top of the seat back. With a blanket over the upholstery we didn’t have to worry too much about getting salt all over the seat cushions.
Even so, the floorboards got pretty much salt covered. The girls liked sitting in Bobby’s roadster in the shade of the top and figured they could see about as well as we could. After a few hours of sitting in the sunshine and walking the pits, Bobby and I were getting a touch sunburned. That was enough for us. We planned to spend several days here and didn’t want to get burned out on the first day. It was back to my roadster where we put the top up, got inside and watched the cars go down the track through the bug spattered windshield.

It was a long day, but it went quick. The sun was low in the sky before we realized how much time had gone by. The racing came to a halt and we figured it was time for dinner. We lit the barbecue off, cooked the steaks on it, made a simple salad and toasted the bread on the barbecue. An ice cold beer with dinner was just the right touch.

We were fortunate in having a port a potty not too far from where we were parked. Almost civilization in a manner of speaking. The girls were troopers and we didn’t hear any complaints from them. We had more than a few visitors too. Seems there were only a handful of street running hot rods on the salt and we had the only roadsters there.

The sun sure takes it out of you in the dez, even more so on the salt flats. It wasn’t long until we had the sleeping bags laid out on the tarps, crawled inside and fell asleep. I don’t think we realized how hard the ground was until we woke up in the morning. Bobby and I were both 34 at the time, but dragging out of the sleeping bags, we felt like a couple of leftovers. It took a while to get the creaks and kinks out. The girls did better than us, they weren’t complaining about it.

Rebecca lit the barbecue, put coffee in a clean white sock, tied a knot in it, threw it in the Cowboy Coffee Pot, filled it up with water and when it boiled over the coffee was done. It took a while, but it was some of the best coffee I ever drank. Including the great coffee Earl used to make. Breakfast was simple. Ham and cheese sandwiches all around. Good stuff to us, we were in the great outdoors, hungry and had great coffee to wash it down with.

The salt flat cars were something to see. One of the very best parts was seeing some of the cars we’d seen featured in the magazines over the years right there in person. Hearing them run was even better. The cars running fuel sounded like nothing else on earth. The sound they made seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere at the same time. You could feel the sound waves before you heard them. These great sounds were truly the signature of the salt flats. The gas powered cars, coupes and roadsters as well as late model stuff could be heard from a long ways off as well. They had their own distinctive sounds.

We had another great day wandering the pits and watching the race cars run as they ran down the black line. The day turned out to be a short one though. Around four o’clock, the wind came up, racing was curtailed and clouds started rolling in. When the sky was completely covered with gray and black clouds, we started hearing the far away boom of thunder and saw the occasional flash of lightning way off in the distance. It looked like we were in for a good storm, but some of the folks we were camped next to told us to just wait and see. As they put it, a lot of times the desert storms would threaten and then dissipate as it got dark. True for awhile. Around dusk a light rain started and people started pulling up stakes and leaving.

We weren’t dumb, we’d read about how fast the salt flats could flood in some areas. There wasn’t too much to pack, so leaving on short notice was easy. We followed the folks who’d been our neighbors off the salt. They’d been there before and we figured following them out was probably a good idea. They drove their camper laden pickups a few miles down the road and parked with some other campers. We ended up parking the roadsters on the outer edge of the group next to our salt flats neighbors.

From what we could tell, we were still on the edge of the salt flats, but on a high spot.
Protected by the winds coming off the salt to a small degree by the dirt banks between us and the salt flats. If nothing else, we figured the rain would give the roadsters a good wash job and get rid of some of the salt. The roadsters did ok in the rain. I’d been a bit worried about Bobby’s with the louvered hood top and lack of hood sides, but he’d gone to the trouble to stick some new plug wires on and waterproofed what he could. The big Chrysler didn’t miss a beat. Neither did the Olds in our roadster. Helped considerably by the no louvers hood top and the factory louvered hood sides. The Olds was well shielded from the weather. The only problem was rain trying to come in the side windows. And maybe I should call them openings. There were no windows at all, just a set of pivoting windwings. They helped a lot, mainly while we were driving and rain stayed out pretty well until we stopped. Then the wind pushed the rain right into the car. Windwings were installed on both cars. Bobby had done his long ago, and he thought they worked so well in keeping the wind and rain out that I’d stuck a set on my roadster right away.

Even so, it was obvious we were going to spend the night in the roadsters. One thing we’d planned for. Sorta. We pulled the tarps out of the trunk and bungeed them over the tops to keep the rain out. The sleeping bags were left in the trunk. They were packed inside big plastic trash bags. We figured if the roadsters did leak water into the trunk - and they did, but not too bad - at least we’d have dry sleeping bags.

Dinner turned out to be easy. We planned to cook hamburgers, but cooking in the rain could have been tough. Nicely solved by our neighbors inviting us to use their barbecue that was set up under an awning attached to the side of their camper. They were well equipped with folding chairs and everything required for extended camping. They got chairs out for us and they ate their dinner inside the camper. They invited us in, but it looked like it would be crowded with six of us in there. The neighbors, Kenny and Martha, were a nice couple for sure. Recently retired, traveling the country a bit in their camper before they returned to Oregon where they planned to build a new home in the country. Kenny was like us. He’d done the hot rod thing for quite a while, was between cars right now. The plan for the new house was a large shop to pursue the hobby in. Like us, Bonneville was on his list of places to go.

They offered to let us sleep in the camper, but would have been too crowded for all of us and we elected to sleep in the roadsters. Martha made a point to tell the girls the camper door would remain unlocked if they wanted to come in and use the bathroom. We were included as well, but it was easy for us to step around the corner so to speak, but a very nice thing to do for the girls.

We got back to the roadsters well after dark. It was raining a little harder now, no lightning though. That was the big thing we were worried about. Especially me. I’d seen the results of lightning strikes when lightning hit power lines and also saw the results of a couple of lightning strikes in the switchrack at a power station. Serious stuff for sure.

We got the sleeping bags and laid them out inside the roadsters. After a bit of a struggle getting in them, we tried to fall asleep. The rain started coming down harder and it was interesting hearing the rain hit the tarp that was stretched over the cloth top a few inches over your head. It was cramped to say the least. Easier for me than Rebecca, she let me stretch my legs clear across the floor and snuggled up next to me on what was left of the seat. I felt a bit guilty about taking so much room, but she insisted she’d be fine.

It was pleasant wrapped up in the sleeping bag, warm and dry inside the roadster and hearing the rain pouring down outside. I’d just about fallen asleep when we heard a light tapping on the passenger door. We pulled the tarp back, flipped on the flashlight and there was Gail standing outside in bra and panties, soaking wet and holding a bar of soap. She told us to turn off the light in no uncertain terms. She wasn’t worried about us, but didn’t really want to put on a show for the whole camper group. They probably couldn’t have seen her anyway because we were a ways away from the last camper over which was Kenny and Martha’s. Gail told Rebecca she was tired of being dirty and sweaty and the rainstorm was an opportunity to get cleaned up. Rebecca giggled a little bit, but it wasn’t long until she got out and joined Gail. The plan was, we’d get the towels and clean clothes out of the suitcases, let the girls stay on one side of our roadster to clean up and Bobby and I would clean up on the other side. It didn’t take long to get soaped and rinsed as hard as it was raining. The tough part was getting dried off in the small confines of the roadster.

It worked ok though, Rebecca shoved the sleeping bags over behind the steering wheel, got inside, dried off and dressed. Then she sat on the sleeping bags while I did the same. The upholstery wasn’t a problem, it dried up just fine with a towel. The tough part was getting the sleeping bags laid out and getting back inside them with both of us inside the roadster. This time we had them zipped together. It worked out well, in more ways than one.

We woke up with rain still drumming down on the top. Waking up was the easy part. I’d fallen asleep with my neck on the door and slid down in the seat. Leaving Rebecca not much room at all. To top it off, my hand was asleep and it was tough to get it all together, get the raincoat out of where I’d stuffed it between steering wheel and dash and get it on. That was the hard part, getting out of the car was relatively easy.

Right off, I smelled coffee and saw Bobby and Gail sitting under the awning having coffee with them Kenny and Martha. I wandered over and Martha was kind enough to pour me a cup and a cup for Rebecca as well. The cup for Rebecca pleasantly received when I stuck my head under the tarp and asked her if she wanted coffee. Just a soft sweet smile and a nod of her head. I handed her the cup and went back to the camper awning.

It wasn’t long until Rebecca joined us. We pooled what hamburger we had as well as the rest of the bread, Martha supplied the eggs and potatoes and cooked up one heck of a breakfast. Considering we were out in the middle of nowhere, it was as good as any restaurant breakfast we’d ever had.
Kenny told us that radio broadcasts indicated the rain would last all day and into the next. That made us stop and think about what was next on the agenda. We’d spent two days at the salt flats, seen most of the cars run and waiting around for a couple of days with only the roadsters for shelter wasn’t all that appealing. Fun for a while, but we were ready to hit the road. We had three weeks off and only used four days out of it so far. Kenny and Martha were ready to hit the road too. They weren’t sure were they were going. Their plan was to head east while Martha looked at the map for the next interesting place. Not too bad a scheme we figured. We thought we’d better figure out where we were going before we left. It was still early when Kenny and Martha left. We had the roadsters packed up and ready to travel.

Yellowstone Park was a good one day drive and looked to be a good destination. Except for Rebecca, none of us had ever been there and she’d only been there as a little girl and didn’t remember a whole lot about it. It didn’t take too long to backtrack the 120 miles back into Salt Lake City. By the time we got there the rain had stopped, but it was still fairly cloudy.

We decided to be smart about it this time and not run ourselves into the ground. First thing we did was replenish our ice boxes. Next was to call Idaho Falls, Idaho and make motel reservations. A little civilization this time around. The girls hadn’t complained about roughing it at the salt flats, but staying in a real room with a real shower and a real bed was something they weren’t going to complain about. Lord knows we weren’t.

We knew Yellowstone had lots of camping available and a tent looked like a good idea. Once we found what was probably the largest outdoor store in Salt Lake City, we bought a few things to make life easier. Namely one of the Thermos Pop Tents that slept four and four of the thin, but comfortable closed cell foam pads backpackers usde. A small propane camp stove with a couple of small propane bottles, a cooking kit and a cast iron skillet rounded out the camping stuff.

We went to the department store next door and bought some big towels. The towels were used as pads underneath the cardboard tent box which we bungee’d to the front of our roadsters trunk just behind the top. It worked pretty good there and you could still see out of the mirror. I had three mirrors on the car anyway, I’d gotten used to the right hand mirror on the Ranchero and felt lost without it when the roadster was first running.

Bobby and Gail got the camp stove packed away in their roadster by the simple expedient of smashing down the sleeping bags and suitcases and shoving it in. Even though they didn’t have a spare tire in their car, I had it in mine - the one spare fits all as we liked to call it - they had to be careful with the rumble seat. With the cushions out it was easy to get something stuck under the trunk lid and then you couldn’t swing it open or reach in to clear the mess. They’d been through it a couple of times already, so they were very careful how they packed the trunk. Bobby and Gail were able to pack away their foam pads, but Rebecca and I had no room for ours. Neatly solved by a little clever thinking from Rebecca. She unrolled one, set it on the seat back and bottom cushions and sat on it. Gail thought it was a good idea and did the same thing in their roadster with the remaining one. It worked out well, the pads were thin anyway and it gave the girls a much more comfortable seat. When they drove, they moved the pads over and used em there. The girls could drive the roadsters ok with the non-moving seats we had, but they did better when they were a little closer up.

We stopped to fuel up the cars and once again attracted a small crowd of onlookers. Like most of them said, seeing one California hot rod, a roadster especially was one thing. Having two come in at once kind of put the frosting on the cake. Aside from the salt flats and the occasional Camaro or Mustang, we didn’t see much at all as far as hot rods went. That didn’t last long though.

After the cars were full of gas and the fluid levels checked, the girls decided they wanted to drive and we could navigate. Ok with us, the girls were good drivers and we had a lot of confidence in them. Sometimes though, they could really get to rockin down the highway. With the strong running roadsters it was easy to keep gaining speed because they did it so easy. Bobby and I were used to listening to the rpms, exhaust note and wind noise as an indicator of speed. The girls depended on the speedometer for the most part and most times they didn’t really watch it that close. After a while, they’d be flying down the highway. They weren’t careless or crazy, it’s just the way it worked out on the long and lonesome desert highways. Bobby and I were guilty of rolling past the speed limit a few times ourselves. Well, more than a few times. Most times, we found ourselves cranking it on when there was a bit of traffic on the highway. Kinda gets interesting leaving Las Vegas going south and falling in with the usual 75-85 mph traffic. It’s safer just to keep up.

So there we were - as the saying goes - fat dumb and happy - as the other saying goes - just cruising along at 65 or so, enjoying the sights and dozing off now and then. We’d just crossed the border into Idaho, everything seemed to be going just right and it was looking to be a calm and quiet drive north.

Right up until I heard the unmistakable sound of a built up engine running a multi-carb setup start that moaning, sucking the hood down the engine sound when the driver put his foot in it. It only took a few seconds until a blue highboy coupe pulled up even with us and kept right on pulling away. He passed Bobby and Gail too. No race, or even an implied offer to race, but I’ll bet he enjoyed seeing the California roadster guys wake up.

About all I really caught about the coupe was that it was blue, no fenders, mag wheels, no hood sides and the wide rocker covers from a Chrysler Hemi sticking out the side. It’s long hood showed that it wasn’t a Ford although it did resemble a Deuce coupe a little bit. Wasn’t a Chevy either, but looked like one of those too. We didn’t know what the heck it was. It was a good looking car though. Interesting part was the Kansas license plate. I never did think California had a lock on righteous looking hot rods, but it was starting to look like the guys from Kansas really had an eye for it.

Bobby and Gail must have gotten curious though, it didn’t take long for the red roadster to start pulling away from us. I didn’t say a thing to Rebecca, she put her foot in it and before long we’d both caught up to the blue coupe. He was clicking off a flat 80 on the long lonesome highway. Ok with me, there was virtually no traffic on this quiet Tuesday afternoon. We made an interesting looking caravan for quite a ways. All three of us just rocking along at 80, clicking off the miles and enjoying our hot rods to the max.

As fate would have it, we crested a grade and went around a sweeping corner, still clicking off 80 per and there stands one of Idaho’s finest. A state trooper writing up a ticket on a dark blue Lincoln. I figured we were screwed now. The interesting part was, nobody backed off the throttle at all. We just kept on running at 80. The real interesting part was when the trooper looked up, saw three hot rods bearing down on him, smiled and gave us the thumbs up. Darndest thing I ever saw. Welcome to Idaho. Friendly state and nice people. At least we thought so. Even so, we got the message and all of us kicked it back to 70. Not for long for the coupe guy though. About five minutes down the road and he starts pulling away from us again.

It was obvious Bobby and Gail didn’t want to push our luck, they stayed right at 70 and let the coupe slide away. Fine with me too. Not too many troopers are gonna let three hot rods cranking off 80 or so get off scot free. I figured we probably saw the only one in Idaho who would.

Rolling into Pocatello about one o’clock, it seemed like we made good time. We’d been cranking it up on the highway a bit and then cooling when we slid through the small towns along the way. All the time keeping an eye out for the blue coupe, but we didn’t see it.

We pulled into a small gas station in town to fuel up and the old guy who ran it came out and asked us if there was a hot rod thing going on somewhere. We told him that we hadn’t heard of anything. He thought it was funny that he hardly ever saw a hot rod and now here was three of them inside of fifteen minutes. Before we could ask him he told us it was blue and it was a Pontiac. A 1931 to be exact. He knew because he owned one just like it many years ago. That made sense, from what little we saw of it, we weren’t sure what it was. I was leaning toward the Dodge-Plymouth camp and Bobby thought it was a Chevy, but the long hood fooled us both.

Leaving Pocatello we took it easy and cruised the fifty miles to Idaho Falls running along at 60.
I don’t know why the big rush before. We’d told ourselves early on we were going to take it easy, get to Idaho Falls, lie around for a while, have a nice dinner and do what looked like a two hour or so drive into Yellowstone the next day. Once we found our motel, that’s what we did. We swam in the pool, rested up, walked down the street a few blocks to a great steakhouse the motel manager told us about and had dinner there.

The steaks were great, at least for Bobby and I. The girls ordered seafood. Bobby and I were simple guys, if it said steakhouse on the outside, that’s usually what we ordered on the inside. The girls had their own thoughts and opinions, knew what they liked and would order whatever sounded good to them. Regardless of where we were. They told us we should have tried the seafood and were really missing something. I don’t know about that, the steak I had was great. Bobby had no complaints either. We turned in early as well. The last few days had been a little wearing to say the least. Sleeping in a real bed was a treat. Kinda funny how we don’t appreciate some things until they’re gone.

Rolling out early, we hit a small café on the outskirts of town for breakfast. Seems like the small local café’s really put out good food. They piled it on and kept on bringing the coffee. I think we made points with the waitresses. They decided our cars were cute. The girls thought that was nice and it was. A compliment is a compliment although neither Bobby or I had ever thought of the roadsters as cute. Neat, fast, well built, quick. We liked those comments. Even so, cute was one we could live with, the two waitresses were nice ladies.

After the more than serious breakfast, we decided lunch could wait until late. Real late. The run into Yellowstone got more stupendous as we drove. The closer we got to the park the more amazing it was. All thoughts of clicking off the miles and speeding down the highway were forgotten. Doing 50 was good enough. We weren’t the only ones either, seemed that most were content just to cruise and take in the view.

We did ok in finding a campground. I think the little fact that we were there fairly early on a Wednesday helped. With so many people towing trailers, driving campers and motorhomes, it meant that tent camping was not as popular as it used to be. We were wrong on that one. The tent campers were as numerous as they’d ever been. Either that or Yellowstone was more popular than we realized. After we checked in, the Ranger sent us down a winding road toward the end of the campground. The campground, a really beautiful one with lots of trees, barbecue pit, table and a small stream nearby. We parked and started setting up camp. The first time around for the Thermos pop tent. Man, what a slick tent. One good pop and it was open and ready for a few stakes in the ground. I’d fought with tents before and sometimes it gets to be a good wrestling match. This thing was cool. In less than two minutes we had a shelter. The hardest part was getting it out of the box.

About five minutes more and we were set up. A lot different from the tent camping we’d done when first married. We’d looked at a few sights on the way in and still figured we were on vacation so no rush to start looking around. It was enough just to lie around for a while and take a couple of walks on the trails around the campground.

Once the sun dropped behind the mountains, we started the barbecue. We’d skipped lunch due the big breakfast. The girls were ladies at breakfast, as they always were. Bobby and I were the ones who overdid it. Usually we were a couple of sensible guys, but toss a great breakfast in front of us and we’d do our part to make the cook proud. After dinner, we were sitting around talking and enjoying a bottle of red wine Gail had brought along. Enjoying the peace and quiet and marveling at the clear air. It wasn’t long until we heard the familiar sounds of an engine with a roller cam come idling up the road. Lo and behold, here was the blue Pontiac coupe. The couple inside smiled as they went past and they pulled into a camp spot a just a little ways from ours. That was interesting. I wanted a close look at the mystery coupe anyway. We figured we’d give em a little time to set up camp and we’d walk over and see what we could see.

 

Continuation of Dancing in the Desert


It wasn’t long until the couple in the coupe came walking into our camp. Seems they had the same idea we had. They introduced themselves as Kerry and Cheryl from Inman, Kansas. A little ways south of Wichita as Kerry put it. They were both in their early twenties and on their honeymoon. A pretty good twist I thought. The three of us had to have the only three hot rods in Yellowstone Park and here we were all parked in the same campground. Kerry and Cheryl especially thought it was funny that the four of us had also driven hot rods on our honeymoon. Quite a coincidence.

Kerry liked our roadsters, especially the highboy styling on mine, but it was the Chrysler engine in Bobby’s that really intrigued him. Bobby told him the complete story of the engine, how it came to be and how it was built. Leaving the girls together at camp, we walked back to Kerry’s camp to take a look at the Pontiac. A well done car, quite different from anything we’d seen at home and we liked it. It ran parallel leaf springs up front with the axle on top of the springs which put a pretty good drop on it. Drum brakes all around, which I forgot to ask about, a nine inch Ford rear axle and best of all the roller cammed, four carb 354" Chrysler engine.
The carbs being Stromberg 48's, the same carb as the famous 97's, but with a slightly larger venturi.

He was running a milder grind than Bobby was, about 270 degrees duration, but even so the engine still spun up some good rpms. The other interesting touch was, the Dodge overdrive three speed transmission. Like he said, a four speed would be nice, but maybe later. The car was done pretty much on a budget and the three speed would be it for a while. If he changed at all. Kansas is pretty flat and he liked the overdrive.

Kerry built the car over a four year period sticking to a pretty tight budget. It may have been a budget on the money end of it, it was obvious he didn’t spare the work. The bodywork was beautiful and straight and it had a great medium blue paint job on it. He had no idea how fast it was. He hadn’t raced anybody with it and in fact it was four months back when he fired it for the first time. So he was taking it easy and babying the three speed. He was afraid a serious drag race start would shell the gears in the transmission. After Bobby told him of his experience with the Packard trans in his, Kerry figured it was probably a good idea to keep on taking it easy in low gear like he had been doing.

It was interesting talking to Kerry. His experience had been that hot rodders were few and far between in Kansas. There were quite a few in Wichita, but he didn’t know any of them. In the small town he lived in, he was it. The way he figured it - and so did a lot of other Kansas kids - hot rods were everywhere in California. Maybe they were. Sometimes it seemed that way and sometimes not. It seemed like I wouldn’t see any for weeks and then I’d see three or four in one day. Like anything else, you had to be in the right place at the right time.

We had a nice evening talking to the newlyweds. They were nice kids. Kids . . . that sounds kinda funny. Here we were, Bobby and I anyway, at 34 and calling a pair of 22 year old’s kids.
We didn’t feel old, I like to think we didn’t look old either. Lord knows the girls didn’t, they still looked like they were 20 years old. We knew we were lucky to have the two of them for our wives.

Plans were made to meet in the morning and visit some of the sights in the park. Once the fire burned down and we could see the moonless night sky clearly we were stunned at all the stars we could see. Montana is the one they call The Big Sky Country. Wyoming is called The Cowboy State, but we thought it ought to be called the Clear Sky Country. We’d never seen such a clear sky. Anywhere. We stayed up late and nobody said much at all. We marveled at the stars wheeling through the night sky and I think all of us realized how truly small we were.

Morning dawned bright, not necessarily early, just bright. I was the last one up and I probably would have slept some more except for the sunlight hitting me right in the eyes. Nature’s alarm clock for sure. The girls were starting breakfast and had already been to the camp showers. Same with Bobby. I just had time to run down to the showers, do a quick clean up and get back in time for bacon and eggs with biscuits and coffee. Sometimes the girls just amazed us. They cooked some great stuff at home, and watching them knock out stuff on a little two burner camp stove was sorta mind boggling. Bobby and I could run a barbecue ok, but Roberto was the barbecue artist in our little group. When it came to flat out cooking, the girls had it all together. It was amazing that we weren’t a couple of seriously fat guys. Kerry and Cheryl walked up to our camp, had some coffee with us and we decided where to go and how to do it.



We decided to take two cars and the obvious one for us was Bobby’s roadster. It took five minutes to unbolt the top and toss in into the tent. Another few minutes to take stuff out of the rumble and lock it in the trunk of my roadster. A couple of sleeping bags and the foam pads made for a pretty comfortable rumble seat. We must have made quite a sight rolling down the two lane roads in Yellowstone. One bright blue Pontiac coupe and one bright red Deuce roadster. Both running Chrysler Hemi engines. The tourists we talked to at the parking lots were enjoying our cars as much as we were enjoying the park.

I’m not going to list all the stuff we saw, but two of my favorites were the Morning Glory pool and Porcelain Basin. Yellowstone is such an amazing place, you just have to go see it for yourself. We spent four days there, saw a lot, didn’t see enough and figured we could spend a couple of weeks there and not do it justice.

Sunday morning and I was first up. Bobby was up shortly after. We left the girls sleeping, started coffee and hit the showers. We’d decided we’d give them a treat and cook breakfast.
They were up when we got back, drinking the freshly brewed coffee they’d found on the stove.
I don’t know what it is that makes a cup of coffee in the great outdoors such a special thing. We were all coffee drinkers and did appreciate a cup of coffee, but campfire coffee is the very best. Especially when it’s made by somebody else.

We’d invited Kerry and Cheryl to come up for breakfast and we’d pooled the last of the groceries. It turned out pretty good, but nothing like the girls cooked. It was simple, just scrambled eggs with bacon bits, not too burnt sourdough toast off the camp stove and more coffee. Even so, the girls ate their share and enjoyed it. An added pleasure for them since they didn’t have to cook and clean up.

Kerry and Cheryl were leaving too. They had a couple of weeks off, already used most of one and needed some time to get moved into their new place when they got home.

We cleaned up, started packing the roadsters and put the top back on Bobby’s roadster.
The temporary rumble seat had worked well. The voice of experience here, the girls had decided to drive the park on Friday and Bobby and I found ourselves in the rumble seat. Not bad though, you could see a lot from there. Kerry and Cheryl were packed before us and we heard their coupe rumbling up the road before we saw it. They drove by and waved goodbye.

What a great sounding little car. A good looking car too. Not many guys had the imagination to stick a Chrysler Hemi in a 31 Pontiac coupe. It turned out well though and for sure it was a one of a kind hot rod. Kind of sad to see them go. We felt we’d made some good friends.

Even so, the four of us were still here, the road was open and we had two good running roadsters. Not much else required as far as we were concerned.

We’d been talking about what was next on the agenda. This was turning into one totally unplanned trip, but a good one. So far we’d seen a lot and done a lot. The very best, was driving through a great part of the Western United States. Every country has it’s special places. We’re blessed in this country because we have so many of them.

We left Yellowstone a bit later than planned. The consensus was, we’d head for Coeur d’Alene, Idaho to visit Earl and Lucy. We figured we could make Missoula, Montana by the end of what looked to be a long day of driving. Not so far distance wise, just that with our starting out around eleven o’clock we figured it would take the rest of the day. Interesting part was when we made our first stop for gas. Rebecca and Gail called Earl and Lucy to tell them we were on the way. She called home to see how the little girls were doing. Doing fine was the answer. In fact, more than fine. They were having a grand time with Pearl and Nana. Sarah was in on it too, although she stayed home with the two year olds. The rest of them, Bonnie Sue included had piled into Nana’s big Buick, driven to Arroyo Verde and did one of their big shopping trips. I call it a shopping trip, but it was more of a clothes buying extravaganza for the little girls. The two year old’s were pleased as well. Everybody picked something for them. Not toys, just clothes. Seems like the two year old’s liked clothes way better than toys anyway. I know the nine year old’s did.

It didn’t take as long as we thought it would to get into Missoula. Seems like the folks in Montana turn up the wick a bit and really get to flying down the road. Sorta reminded us of our short caravan with the Hemi powered Pontiac. It was getting onto dark when we pulled into town. Finding a nice motel was easy and the recommended restaurant was just fine too. Another early night for us. We didn’t have too far to go to get to Coeur d’Alene the next day and we wanted to get there fairly early. Don’t know why, it just seemed like the thing to do.

We pulled out early in the morning. Coffee and rolls did it for us, we figured we’d stop on the road for lunch if necessary. We never did stop, except once for gas. We rocked into Couer d’Alene about ten thirty in the morning. After a couple of false starts and getting lost once, we found Earl and Lucy’s place. To say that it was nice would have been an understatement. The house was a two story, five bedroom, three bath log cabin. The modern style log cabin. It looked great. One of the bedrooms was used for Earl’s office and another one for Lucy’s sewing and crafts room. It seemed like a big old house for the two of them, but it suited them well. The nice part was the 20 acres it was on was backed up to the National Forest at the back and one side and the other side had a cattle ranching neighbor. For the most part, they had no neighbors. The closest house was a mile and a half away. Lot’s of trees, quiet and a nice view. Not much else a person could wish for. Earl and Lucy were enjoying their retirement and were busy with something every day. We spent an enjoyable couple of days with them, but we were getting antsy about getting home and seeing the kids as well as seeing some more country on the way home. We’d kind of gotten on a roll with the cruising through America bit. The Western side of it anyway.

We left Earl & Lucy at eight o’clock Friday morning bound for Boise, Idaho. Three hundred and ninety five miles away. Another nice drive through nice country. It seemed like it took quite a while though. Especially when you figure in several stops. We arrived in Boise about 6 o’clock, found our motel right away and got our stuff inside. Bobby and I walked down the street to a pizza place and brought back a large pizza for the four of us. We ate pizza, watched a couple of movies and turned in.

Departing Boise in the morning, we went northwest for a while on Hwy 20 stopping in Burns, Oregon to top off the roadsters. The gas station guy was nice enough, but he’d probably seen it all by now. Two roadsters at once didn’t even faze him. We made sure we were full to the brim because it looked like the next gas stop would be at Lakeview, Oregon. Well within the range of the roadster tanks, but it looked like there were no other gas stations between the two towns.

After leaving Burns we came to a “T” intersection at a little place called Riley. Turning south there onto Hwy 395 we felt like we were really headed home. This was the first highway with a name familiar to us that we’d been on for a while. Go far enough south and we could turn west for home.

The interesting part was right after we turned onto 395. There were half a dozen pickups with horse trailers, ramps down, horses out, saddled and ready to ride. The group of cowboys saw us, waved, nodded and smiled. A couple of them took off their hats and waved them at us. We thought it was cool and the girls were tickled and were waving back until we were down the road a ways. Just one small part of America enjoying another small part of America. We are a diverse culture, no doubt about that.

We made it into Lakeview without any problems. Feather footing it all the way. We’d been running at 60-65 and keeping a light foot on the throttle. Enjoying the sights too, this was a beautiful part of the country. Especially nice was passing Goose Lake after leaving Lakeview. We’d passed Lake Abert north of Lakeview and it was big enough, but it seemed like it took forever to get by Goose Lake. The plan was to hit Alturas, California for dinner. Earl told us about the good cooking at the Niles Hotel and we were looking forward to steaks and prime rib served at the 1880's era hotel.

I swear, sometimes fate can hear you thinking. My fault for marveling at how well the big Olds engine was running as we clipped along south Interrupting the pleasant thinking was the Olds stumbling a couple of times, running bad and then conking out entirely. The silence was deafening. Not that the Olds was loud, once the engine quit it was kinda strange coasting along the highway with the only sounds being the tires humming on the pavement and the air blowing through the car as we slowed down.

Bobby had been keeping a pretty good eye on us and it didn’t take him long to notice we’d dropped back and pulled over. As luck would have it, we came to a stop a few hundred yards short of a small forested area with trees near the road. I figured the shade would be nice for working on the car in the 100 degree temps, but the roadster just wouldn’t coast far enough.

 Bobby had the same thought I did. He dug a rope out of his roadster, tied onto mine and pulled us up into the shade. The only spot where we could get well off the road was a wide dirt road entrance to a cattle ranch. We parked out of the way as well as we could and set to figuring what was wrong. My first thought was the fuel pump had died.

Popping the air cleaner off and pumping the throttle showed absolutely no gas. Checking the gas filter showed it was not clogged. Looked like the fuel pump was it. Nice part was, we’d planned ahead just for this little problem. I got the emergency electric fuel pump and hose out of the trunk. It didn’t take long to get it spliced into the gas line and hung off of one of the firewall bolts. A few tie wraps, some electricians tape, bolt one wire down to a good ground and the other to an ignition switch energized terminal on the back of the alternator and we were back in business.

About the time I had fuel pressure up, checked for leaks and lit off the engine, here comes a guy, maybe 60 years old, down the dirt road driving an old Ford 8N tractor. No accessories, no disc, just a bare tractor. Surprisingly it was in excellent shape. Most farm tractors we’d seen were always bashed up and the paint was usually faded. This tractor wasn’t restored, it was just well taken care of. You could tell it was a working tractor, the rear tires were at the point where they needed replacing.

The guy introduced himself as Henry. He turned out to be the owner of the cattle ranch we were parked next to. He’d seen the roadsters down on the highway from his house up on the hill and watched us tow back up to the shady spot. Figuring he could help, he fired up the tractor and drove on down. He said he had to get the mail anyway and besides, it gave him a chance to look at the roadsters. Henry liked hot rods, hardly ever saw any, would like to build one someday and thought having two of them show up at once was a definite rarity.

He told us he had a roadster just like the ones we were driving. We thought for a minute that he’d said, he used to own one just like it. We’d heard that a few times on our travels. Probably true too, by the time you figure out how many owners the average roadster has had, one roadster can get spread over quite a few owners. He corrected us though, he said he owned one just like ours, actually more like Bobby’s since it still had all the fenders.

Before we could ask about it, he invited us to come up to the barn to see it. Going up the hill on the dirt road wasn’t going to hurt our roadsters. It was graded smooth and the cars were mud and bug splattered anyway. They looked a little worse for wear, so some more dust didn’t matter.
True to his word, he had a Deuce roadster sitting under a tarp in the barn. Absolutely straight and rust free. Only thing we saw wrong with it was that mice had ruined the upholstery and the top was pretty rotten. The rest of the car was all there and in good shape. It looked like all it needed was new tires, a new battery, some gas and you could fire it up and drive it away.

I say rust free, true for the most part true, no rustouts, just a touch of surface rust on the fender tops and the hood and trunk flat areas where the dust attracted moisture. Nothing a quick run over with a fine grit sanding disc, some Metal-Prep and some primer couldn’t take care of.


We were totally in awe. We’d seen several Deuce roadsters, but this was the first totally stock one we ever saw. In fact, it was the first stock Deuce of any kind we’d ever seen.

There were a couple of like condition Model A coupes and one very nice two door sedan in the barn, but the Deuce roadster was the crown jewel as far as we were concerned.

Henry had a few extra pieces for the 32 too. Extra fenders, bumpers, hoods, running boards, headlights, taillights, top irons and the like. We implied that we would be interested in buying the roadster, but Henry just smiled and said no. He’d probably been asked to sell it more than a few times by now. He said he’d sell us some parts though.

Henry had other cars stored outside. Down the hill on the back side of the barn was a small field just loaded with cars from the late twenties and early thirties. The field was completely out of view from the highway since it was quite a ways up the hill as the house and barn were. You had to travel down the hill a ways to get to the cattle ranch proper. We hadn’t paid much attention to it when we came up, but the dirt road coming in had a fork that went back to the ranch area. There must have been forty or fifty cars sitting out in the field. Most of them sitting down in the dirt on their flat tires and a few in the low spots were sunk in the dirt down to their frames. Regardless, quite a bonanza for a restorer or hot rodder.
Henry hadn’t sold anything out of the field because the few who had heard of it or flown over it, he wouldn’t allow on the property. His dad had purchased the cars right before WW2 broke out. He correctly foresaw the need for scrap metal, and bought quite a few cars, some wrecked, usually not, but for the most part, not running. A few of the cars had been his dads. He’d parked them in the field when they quit and bought another one. When they quit though, they had a lot of miles on them. Trouble for Henry’s dad, he forgot to take into account how expensive it would be to get the cars to the salvage yards or steel mills. He’d got a touch mad about that and decided to leave the cars where they were. Henry picked out a few nice ones and towed them up to the barn where they’d been stored for a long time. His dad passed away in 1960, left the ranch to Henry and that’s pretty much how that all came about.

Our roadsters had been a ticket of sorts to some interesting things, but so far this was the best one of all. We felt privileged just to see all the stuff. Henry was interesting as well as being a nice guy.

Henry introduced us to his wife Elizabeth, or LizBeth as he put it and she invited us to stay for a late lunch. She said it wouldn’t be any trouble at all and she would be glad to have the company. They didn’t have many visitors other than family and she was looking forward to some good conversation. Fine with us and fine with the girls. They were already up on the porch chatting and sipping lemonade when we came out of the barn and went down the hill to look at all the cars.

I say the roadsters were our ticket to meeting people and all, but the girls were the ones who made it work. Seems like they found a new friend wherever we went. Good lemonade too. We were ready for some when we hiked back up to the house. Sitting on the shaded porch, talking with these nice folks and enjoying an ice cold lemonade during the hottest part of the day was most pleasant indeed.

Henry ventured that since we’d built the roadsters that we must be pretty experienced mechanics. We told him we did ok for the most part. His next question was if there was any way to replace a broken valve spring in his 63 Chevy pickup without tearing the engine down. We thought we could do it if he had a compressed air supply and a welder. Henry had both and said he’d show it all to us after lunch.

Lunch turned into one of those amazing country lunches you hear about, but don’t get a chance to partake of very often. LizBeth set out several items she’d canned herself, the very best being the Bread & Butter pickles as well as a Zucchini Relish. All from her own garden, but she admitted the Zucchini relish recipe was from a young gal named Michelle who lived down the road. Homemade bread, a day old, but stored in the fridge was still fresh. Thick slices of ham and all the condiments. One sandwich and some of the side dishes and we were full. We asked Henry if he ate like that every day. Pretty much so he told us. We were amazed he was such a slim guy. The simple answer was that cattle ranching was darned hard work so there was no real worry about getting fat.

It didn’t take too long to replace the broken valve spring in Henry’s pickup. We were fortunate it was on #1 cylinder of an inline six and easy to get to. We knocked the porcelain and internal parts out of an old spark plug, stole the male fitting from a quick disconnect fitting, cut off the threads and brazed them together. Once that was done, the home made adapter was installed in #1 spark plug hole, #1 brought up on compression, air applied and the spring levered down with a lever hooked to a chain around the exhaust manifold. The lever pressed on a piece of water pipe fitted to the spring retainer. We’d torched some access holes in the short piece of pipe and ground it smooth. It worked slick. Once the spring was levered down, a pair of needlenose pliers grabbed the keepers and we were in business. The new spring went in just as easy, a little grease around the valve stem to glue the keepers in place, install and compress the spring, put the keepers in place and back off easy on the lever.

We were kind of proud of ourselves. Henry was pleased too. He had the new spring and gaskets already on hand, but wasn’t looking forward to yanking the head off. By the time we finished, it was getting late in the afternoon. They offered to put us up for the night, but it was enough for us to put up the tent and sleep outside. Henry and LizBeth would have none of it though. They had two empty bedrooms their kids stayed in when they visited and we were welcome to them. We called the motel in Alturas and canceled the reservations.

Looking at it from Henry and LizBeth’s viewpoint they were taking a chance. From what I could see, they figured a couple of polite guys in roadsters who had their more than nice wives along couldn’t be too bad.

We woke up Sunday morning to a big country breakfast. Henry figured we might want to see the workings of a cattle ranch and in fact we did. Right after breakfast. We weren’t about to miss that. We weren’t disappointed either. Breakfast was something else.

Wandering the ranch worked off the big breakfast and the late lunch from yesterday. Henry had a pretty interesting operation going. The ranch was a lot bigger than we thought too. He had two guys who worked for him Monday through Friday and there was enough to do to keep them all busy. Henry ended up working Saturdays on his own and sometimes Sundays too. We spent most of the day there.

Henry wasn’t kidding when he said he’d sell us some 32 parts. I bought the top irons and the still in good shape oak bows for myself. Bobby bought a front & rear bumper including brackets, running boards and a pair of rear fenders. The top irons weren’t a problem, we got em folded away and stuffed in the trunk. The oak bows we taped together and tied them to the tent box sitting on the front edge of the deck lid. The bumpers were equally easy. We bolted them onto my roadster front and rear. All that was required there was removal of the small nerf bars at each end.

The running boards were easy as well. We nested them together as well as we could, padded the frame with towels and tied them to the front bumper of my roadster. Well tied I might add. We used a whole lot of the clothesline rope we’d bought when we got the tent. I didn’t want the wind getting under them and flipping them up into the hard to find grille shell and insert or worse yet, sailing into the windshield.

The fenders were the sticking point though. They were cherry, no dents and Bobby really wanted to take them home. Henry recommended just bolting them onto my roadster, but we’d filled those holes when we decided to go the highboy route.

We took Henry’s advice anyway. The fender wells had a few rock chips and we figured we could drill three holes on each side to mount the fenders, pad the inside where they went up against the body and get home with minimal damage. Enamel paint was pretty forgiving stuff.
It didn’t look like it would be a problem to fill the holes again, shoot some fresh paint on and we’d be back in business. What really made it work were the six pieces of leather Henry cut out of an old harness and punched with new holes. That spaced the fenders out away from the body so damage, if any, would be minimal. Except for the part where we banged the fender into the body which put a pretty good scratch in the quarter panel near the fender. It would be an easy fix and once we got home, we were gonna have the sandpaper and paint out anyway.

It was a funny looking little car when we got through. The box with the oak bows on top of the rear deck was bad enough, but the old mildly surface rusted fenders bolted onto the like new shiny black body along with the lightly rusted bumpers made an interesting combination. The frosting on the cake was the running boards tied on front. All we needed was a couple of primer spots and we’d have been in business as an up and coming hot rod. A strange looking one for sure.
Henry was more than generous. The price paid wasn’t very much at all. He knew - and we told him as well - Deuce parts could be expensive and hard to find. He figured he had enough for what he wanted to do and was pleased he could share them with us. We had a fun and interesting time at Henry and Lizbeth’s place. A couple of more than interesting people for sure.

We rolled out of there late in the afternoon on Sunday loaded down with Deuce goodies, a box of Lizbeth’s great cookies for each car, fond memories and we were still stuffed from the big breakfast. Since we were leaving late and we still wanted to hit the Niles Hotel in Alturas we’d called ahead for reservations that morning.

It didn’t take long to run into Alturas. Since I’m the worrywart in the group, our first stop was an auto parts house where I bought another electric fuel pump, some fuel hose and fittings. Since I was running the emergency pump and it was working just fine, I didn’t want to leave Bobby hanging out to dry in case his fuel pump quit. He felt we should have bought an Olds fuel pump and replaced it at the motel. Making the emergency electric pump available for use in either car. That was such a good idea that I bought an Olds replacement pump too. For some reason prices in Alturas were reasonable, so it didn’t hurt too bad. After that, we checked into our motel and hung out for a while. I figured we were well covered in the fuel pump department and left the roadster as it was. A short swim, an afternoon nap and we were ready for dinner.

We walked down to the Niles Hotel, it wasn’t far from the motel. They called the Niles a hotel, but I didn’t think it had guests or did any hotel type business. The hotel, a big two story wooden building was built around 1880 or so. All wood with creaky and uneven wooden floors, just like you’d imagine a darned near one hundred year old hotel to be. It was like walking into a western movie set.

We lucked out with the seating, they placed us at the far end of the room next to a Koi pond that used to be an indoor swimming pool. It had wrought iron railings and the feeling in that particular area, at least for us, was like being in a restaurant in France prior to World War One.
It had a different feel to it, very European and pleasant, but different nevertheless. It was easy to look around and imagine you were in a French hotel restaurant. The only thing telling you different were folks in typical western wear, levis, cowboy boots, button down shirts and some great cowboy hats. From what we could tell, these folks were locals and for real cowboys. A few cowgirls too. Not too much as far as tourists went, apparently the restaurant was sort of a local secret.

We had a great meal at a more than reasonable price. I think we made a few points with the girls too. The Niles is the one place they always talk about whenever we’re talking about the long trip we took in the roadsters.

Monday dawned bright and early. Bright, because it was bright. Sometimes the California sun just burns down. It promised to be a hot day. Early, because we’d decided to get with the program. We wanted to make Larry and Susan’s house in Visalia and visit with them. The rest of the trip home from Visalia would be an easy four hours. Not too big a deal for us. We were virtually living in the roadsters as it was. Kinda funny how once you get on the road, all the little stuff to keep you going gets tucked in around you somehow. Cozy too, once you’re in. Course sometimes, it takes a bit of arranging to get it all to fit. It was obvious we’d run out of room to store anything long ago.

So here we were, sailing down Highway 395 from Alturas, two loaded to the gills Deuce roadsters, both filthy, dirty, bug splattered, mud patterns in interesting places on my car, all four of us sunburned, windburned and still loving it. There’s just something special about driving these little cars, and after several thousand miles it still hadn’t worn off. For me for sure and for Bobby too I think. Rebecca and Gail were hanging in there ok. We had yet to hear a word of complaint out of them and they seemed to be enjoying the trip as much as we were.

Rolling down the long and virtually empty highway gives you some time to think. We were still a long ways from home and we could still break down. We didn’t see it as a problem. If it broke we’d fix it. If nothing else, the roadsters were easy to work on.

I’m surprised at guys who own similar, just as well built cars and never take em out of town. People used to get in the cars these engines came with and think nothing about setting off for New York or farther. Most times with not much more than an oil change, lube and tune-up.
They usually made it too. So what the heck did we have to be afraid of? Here are the same engines, built with many times better than factory level components, pulling a lightweight car and not working very hard. It doesn’t look like a big deal to me to set out on a long trip. Hot rods could be dependable, proven not only by us, but those who drive them. Sometimes across town and sometimes for days on end.

Sometimes I think I thought too much while sailing down the highway. Even more so in the roadster. Listening to the sweet running Olds engine singing down the highway, the tires humming on the pavement, the top flapping now and then, a soft wind flowing through the car making it’s own special sound and sitting next to a beautiful woman makes life pretty complete.

The world viewed through the windshield of a roadster is a very different place. Instead of watching the scenery flow by, you are part of it. Hard to describe, it’s something you have to experience for yourself. In a small way, like that first airplane ride. It puts a different perspective on anything you see after that.

We rolled into Susanville about when we figured. We were still not on a schedule of any kind except for getting back to work on Monday, a week from today. Folks always seemed friendly at gas stations. Everybody seems to love roadsters. Two at once being a special treat.

We rolled into Reno and were ready for a break, it was getting pretty hot. The cars were fueled up, we got some cold drinks and sandwich stuff for the iceboxes and headed out of Reno west on Hwy 80. We were hot and ready to get out of town. I think we’d caught the beginnings of a heat wave. We didn’t give a thought to staying and gambling. We were ahead from Vegas, at least Gail was, and the most we did was glance at the slot machine in the service station. Once we gained some altitude and got off the desert floor, life was a lot easier.

We found a place to park near the summit and had a quick lunch. Driving through the forest was a nice touch after all the desert scenery we’d been through in the last week or so. Starting down the grade into California, it looked like we were home at last when we saw two very nice 55 Chevy two doors with California plates running up the grade headed toward Reno. They waved, we waved. Car guys seem to get along real well. No matter where they’re at or where they’re from.

Our thinking was, we’d make Visalia some time after dark. We were sorta on schedule, but getting tired. When we hit Sacramento, we realized how tired we really were. Finding a nice motel right off the highway was easy. Enough was enough, it had been a long hot day and we were a touch burned out. We called Larry and Susan’s house and told them what was up. Susan said she wasn’t surprised. Alturas to Visalia was a long trek and stopping for the night was a good idea .

It was another one of those hanging out at the motel, eating pizza nights. We all turned in early which meant we got out of there early too. I know Sacramento’s big flat agricultural valley can get hot in the summer, but it was nothing like what we’d been through north of Reno. If there was a heat wave, it either quit or didn’t reach over the mountains. Either way, we didn’t care. We were headed south on Hwy 99 and figured Visalia was about four hours away.

Four hours did it easy. Including gassing up in Merced. It was easy to see we were back in California. We passed a muffler shop in Merced when we pulled off the highway for gas. Sitting out front, a very nice, bright red 40 Ford coupe. At the gas station we saw a very nice, stock looking 57 Chevy Belair hardtop, bronze in color, white top, parked inside the lube bay. Darned near a dead ringer for Gail’s 57 Chevy at home. Only difference was, Gail’s was dead stock except for dual exhaust and the one at the station had a set of five spoke American Racing mags running blackwalls. Bobby liked the look and I could see the wheels turning in his mind. Gail could see it too. She told him he had two hot rod roadsters and the pickup and she didn’t want anything changed on her 57 Chevy. She liked it just fine as it was. Bobby just grinned.

We rolled into Larry and Susan’s house northeast of Visalia. Kind of interesting where they lived. About 200 homes, isolated out in the country, a few miles northeast of town. It was quiet, had a whole lot of trees and a lot of nice homes. Their house was backed up to a walnut orchard and the lots were big enough that there was a lot of privacy.

We had a nice visit and a nice barbecue that evening. The interesting part was Larry still had his 50 Merc coupe, stock flathead, pipes and little hubcaps. It was like walking into a time machine when we entered his garage. All of us had spent a lot of time going places in the little Merc and it was nice to see it again. The factory paint looked as good as it always did. Larry still drove it now and then as long as the weather was nice which was most times. About the only times he didn’t drive it at all was in the rain and during the foggy season which invariably followed the rain.

Larry was off during the middle of the week since he’d taken a couple of vacation days. We were ready to hang out and visit some more, but Larry and Susan wanted to show us around.
Showing us around required we get in the car and drive some more. Kinda funny sometimes, you drive a long way to get somewhere to visit someone and the first thing they do is toss you into a car and drive you somewhere. Ok with us, it just struck me as funny.



Susan’s big old 72 Buick four door station wagon had some serious room inside. The six of us fit in with no problems. Sweatshirts and jackets were tossed in the back, although I don’t know why we took them. It was T-shirt weather already and it was only nine o’clock. The Buick wagon looked like it could have hauled the six of us and all the luggage required for a week and still have room left over. It was a big car. Susan loved it, she ended up hauling their two girls and most of the girls friends everywhere in it. You could just about get the girls entire soft ball team inside. Aside from the coach and a few extra players.

First stop on the list was Three Rivers about 30 miles east. Interesting little town, tourist oriented to an extent even though a lot of locals lived along the river and in the mountains nearby. Some of the mountain roads wound a long ways back into the forest where some more folks lived. Go far enough back and you start finding small ranches. Next up was a late breakfast at a small restaurant near the bottom of the Sequoia Park entrance. Sitting on an outdoor deck, watching the river run under the old and ornate highway bridge just downstream was most pleasant.

I think the girls really enjoyed it. Almost as much as the dinner at the Niles Hotel in Alturas.
From there we drove up into Sequoia Park. Pretty place, interesting scenery. To me, it seems to be one of California’s small secrets. Granted, a lot of people go to Sequoia, but it doesn’t seem crowded at all. Nothing like the crowd that goes to Yosemite. Yosemite is a stupendous place and it’s probably the most majestic National Park of all. Yosemite had a majestic presence, incredible sights and views, but Sequoia has it’s own special charisma.

We drove down a winding road to the head of the Crystal Cave trail, hiked down the hill and took the walking tour through the cave. The steep and winding trek made worth the trouble due to the scenery and varied plant life. The cave tour, the very best part. There were a lot of interesting formations inside, but the part I liked the best was the blue colored marble on the floor of the small stream running through the cave. We’d never seen anything like it.

After the Crystal Cave tour, we drove up the hill, parked and hiked to the top of Moro rock.
Made easy by steps and stairs cut into and built onto the massive rock itself. Safe too, good guardrails are installed. Quite a view once on top. You can watch clouds start to form as the heat comes up from the valley and streaming mist comes up and over the rock.

The best part was walking through the redwood groves. The trees are absolutely huge and old to the point of being ancient. Some of them, perhaps eighty feet or so around and up to three hundred feet tall. Except for tourists talking and cars driving in and out, it is a most silent place.
The General Sherman tree is awe inspiring. Old and trite words, but they fit well.

We spent the entire day in the park and had a good time. Driving down the hill, we stopped at the same restaurant we’d had our late breakfast in and had dinner. Larry and Susan had shown us a good time and we enjoyed our trip through the park. Dinner was pretty darned good too.

It was more than interesting. I used to drive down Highway 99 and wonder what folks who lived in this big flat ancient sea bed agricultural valley did for fun. The park was one small answer, but Larry and Susan had really found a life for themselves here. There were quite a few golf courses, fishing streams in the park that emptied into Kaweah Lake which was on the road up to the park. There were a lot of small towns strewn across the valley, each with it’s own unique and interesting history.

Best part, for Bobby and I at least, is the old and muchly revered Famoso Dragstrip about twenty miles North of Bakersfield and home to the justly famous “March Meet”.

Larry told us there was quite a hot rod presence in the valley. He’d found Central California hot rodding was on a par with most anything that was happening in Southern California. Many years ago and today. The big difference was, the successful enthusiast magazines were all located in Southern California. No press, no fame, simple as that.

Lot’s of potential hot rod material to be found in the valley too. Especially so, cars from the fifties. Like anyplace else, cars from the thirties and forties had - to a great extent - all been found.

We had a nice couple of days, but we were ready to head for home. The girls were enjoying the visit, it had been a while since they’d seen one another and like always there was one more trip to town for something.
We left Visalia about one o’clock in the afternoon. One thing we were thankful for, summer was still on, no mistake about that, for some reason though, the heat was very moderate. Nothing like the one hundred degree temps of the last couple of days. Even so, comparing them to the heat on the desert before we got to Reno, they weren’t bad at all. Big trick with a no air conditioned roadster is just to keep moving.

When we left Larry & Susan’s place it was only 89 and the max predicted for the day was 92 or so. Good roadster weather for sure. A nice change too, all of our travels except for part of Utah, Yellowstone, a bit near Couer d’Alene and coming down Hwy 80 going into Sacramento was done in daytime temps exceeding one hundred. The coast was starting to look good to us.

We had a nice run home, stopped for gas in Gorman, the little town near the summit of I-5 on the way into L.A. We weren’t headed for L.A., it was turn right on Hwy 126 and head for Pole Creek, Via Lindero and home. We pulled into the driveway of our house around five. Seemed like everybody was there, the whole crowd came out to meet us.

All the little girls were there as well as Bonnie Sue, Little and Abby. Nana and Pearl, Sarah and Michael, my folks and Bobby’s folks. As well as Bud and Vicky, Roberto and Mattie and their two kids. They were happy to see us home, especially the two year olds. Melanie, Megan and Bonnie Sue were glad too. Although Melanie took one look at all the stuff tied onto the roadster and wanted to know what happened to our roadster? It didn’t take her long to decide that since she was part of the family, and the roadster was part of the family that it was ours.

I gotta admit it was a weird sight with all the stuff hanging off of it. Funny part too was all the stuff belonged to Bobby. Except for the top irons. That was alright, he would have done the same for me.

Dinner was a great, the folks had got it all together and we had a heck of a barbecue. You’d have thought we had been gone for two years instead of a little over two and a half weeks. It was a nice welcome home party.

The funny part, at least for Bobby and I, was after dinner. We were telling dad about fixing the broken valve spring on Henry’s pickup. I figured he would approve. He always liked it whenever one of us figured out a good fix for something mechanical. We thought we’d been pretty inventive and maybe we had. Dad, like a lot of other oil field mechanics who’d been around for a while had figured out a lot of good ways to do difficult things with minimal tools. His question was, why didn’t we pull the spark plug, roll the engine over by hand running the piston to the bottom of the stroke, stuff cotton rope into the cylinder through the spark plug hole, when it had all the rope you could get in there, roll the engine over compressing the rope between piston and valves and then change the spring? We didn’t have an answer. It was so simple we never thought of it. Dad never ceased to amaze me.

I guess Mark Twain was right......

 

Into The Sunset

2000

It is said, that time is a river, slowly winding into the sea. They say too, that time flies. From the vantage point of a 15 year old, the slowly winding into the sea fits pretty well. From the vantage point of today, flying is a good description. On streamlined wings. A little too streamlined for my taste, but it’s time’s choice and not mine.

Roberto’s wife Mattie died about five years ago. A victim of breast cancer. I’m hoping they’ll find a cure for this dreadful disease someday, but as far as we were concerned yesterday is not soon enough. Mattie’s passing left a much saddened Roberto, his son and daughter and seven grandchildren. What helped him was his family, for the most part still intact except for his dad and uncle who had passed on. Mama Marrone was still going strong at 80 and delighted in her great grandchildren every day.

We worried for a while about Roberto, he just seemed to retreat into himself and we didn’t see him for several months. Nothing bad, he just avoided people. After a few months passed, he accepted one of our Saturday night barbecue invites and showed up looking pretty much like the Roberto of old.

After about a year of him being the bachelor of the group, Gail and Rebecca could stand it no longer and went into the matchmaking business. They brought some of the ladies - one at a time - from their work, their social groups and church over to the barbecues. Nice ladies all, but Roberto simply wasn’t looking.

After a year of the matchmaking business rolled by and none of the ladies working out with Roberto the girls were about ready to give up. For all I knew, maybe it was Roberto not working out with the ladies. Love’s a two way street, but sometimes it seems like white water rapids.

Like always, fate steps in. In this case, accompanied by the strains of La Boheme, an Opera by Puccini. Sometimes I think La Boheme was mis-named and it should have been called The Two Idiots and Mimi. You’re gonna have to listen to it yourself to figure it out though.

Roberto was a bit of an eclectic about music. You’d find him listening to just about anything from Stevie Ray Vaughan to Vivaldi. Italian Opera was his favorite and he played what he wanted to play when we were in his garage and we learned to appreciate it. We’d been exposed to it for many years and learned to like it.

Roberto’s line dancing, sorta drug store cowboy neighbor wandered over one day while La Traviata was holding forth on the stereo and asked Roberto why he didn’t play cowboy music.

Roberto told him that it was cowboy music, “What else would an Italian cowboy listen to?”

Anyway, about ten years ago, Roberto put together a nice little roadster of his own. Just a simple and clean 29 Model A on 32 frame rails, highboy style, SBC engine with T-350. Pretty much the formula hot rod, but in Roberto’s case and the fact that he was an excellent machinist with access to some terrific machinery made the 29 a knockout. A dark metallic blue, not so much metallic, but a very dark blue and well done paint, small nerfs in the back, medium blue steel wheels, blackwall tires, 47 Ford hubcaps and 50 Ford beauty rings. The flat leather upholstery was black, one of the old style four spoke Bell steering wheels sat on the end of a polished aluminum steering column, a nicely fitted one piece smooth hood top, four rows of louvers on the hood sides, a leaned back flat windshield and a 32 grille shell with 32 insert set the car off just right.

It had the look. In spades. It was one of the cleanest, simplest, best looking roadsters I ever saw. It had a lot of subtle, machined, one of a kind pieces on it. The engine was a very mild 327 running a Crower hydraulic cam, three two barrel carbs and hand made aluminum air filters. That was about it, but it was plenty.

So here’s Roberto, minding his own business, washing his roadster late on a Saturday afternoon. He always washed his cars in the afternoon. With an east facing garage and driveway, that was how he did it. No other choice if you want to do it in the shade. Leastways unless you want water spots. Something you really don’t want on a dark blue or black car or any other color for that matter.

Telling the story in Roberto’s own words is way better than I can do, “I rolled the roadster out into the driveway, La Boheme was playing on the garage stereo, a glass of red wine sitting on the workbench, all the car wash stuff was out and the roadster rinsed down with the hose. Just minding my own business and not thinking about anything special. Trotting up the driveway is a nice looking little red short haired miniature dachshund. About two years old, no collar, no nothing. Just a nice little dog looking very lost. He walked into the garage and curled up on the old piece of shag carpet I use to pad my knees when I’m kneeling on the floor. I was surprised at the polite little dog. Bud and Vicky have two nice little dachshunds and they’re total grumps. I get along with them ok, the family gets along with them ok, but if you’re a stranger it’s bark city and count your ankles.

I walked out to the sidewalk and didn’t see a soul. It looked like the dog was happy and wasn’t going anywhere so I gave him some water in a dish and started washing the roadster.
About five minutes later a young lady about 25 shows up in my driveway. She asks me if I’ve seen a little dachshund and I pointed inside the garage. She looked in, saw the dog half asleep on the old rug, went back out and waved to someone down the street. A minute later a very striking woman walked up the driveway. It was obvious they were mother and daughter, both of them very good looking, both with jet black hair and both with a questioning look on their faces.

I pointed to the dachshund on the rug and the mother went inside, attached a collar and leash and came out of the garage with the dachshund. She introduced the dog as Willy. Willy was usually a good boy she said, but every once in a while he’d slip his collar and take off on his own.
She introduced herself as Anna and her daughter was named Janet-Marie. They lived down the street and saw me cruise by now and then in my roadster and the shop truck.

Anna commented on my choice of music on the garage stereo. She thought it would have been something different and was pleasantly surprised to hear one of Puccini’s best loved operas playing. Turns out she was a bit of an opera fan too.

It was obvious Janet-Marie wanted to get back home, so she took Willy and headed out. I got a lawn chair out of the garage, poured a glass of red wine into a jelly glass for Anna and had her sit down while I finished washing the roadster. I probably should have given her the wine in a nice wine glass, but I’m so used to using a jelly glass for red wine that I never gave it a thought.
It didn’t seem to bother her as far as I could see. I saw that she did not wear a wedding ring.

She didn’t say much, accepted the glass of wine and smiled. A pleasant lady and I was quite taken with her. To the point that I just blurted out an invitation to the Saturday night barbecue that night at Bobby and Gail’s house. To my surprise, she said she thought she’d like that. I told her we’d be going in the roadster, as the friends were roadster owners too and tended to show up at the barbecues driving one or the other of them. Kind of an old tradition.

Fine with Anna, she thought the roadster was a beautiful little car and it looked like fun. She sat there, sipping the wine occasionally and not saying much at all. She was listening to the familiar music and enjoying the moment. It was obvious she was thinking about something and I hoped it was me”.

Roberto, always a gentleman, had the good grace to call us first chance he got to tell us he was bringing a lady friend along to the barbecue. It wasn’t a problem, the girls had sorta slowed down on the matchmaking bit anyway. Truth was, they’d run out of likely candidates. Roberto was their friend too and they didn’t want to introduce just anybody to him. All the ladies they’d brought home or invited over had passed a careful screening process. Unknown to them and maybe even unknown to Rebecca or Gail, but a screening process nevertheless.

Roberto and Anna showed up right on time. The girls - Rebecca and Gail - tried to hide their curiosity, but we knew and so did Roberto. He was kind of proud anyway. Introductions were made and we went back to the patio and the serious business of grilling Bobby’s semi-famous Jamaican Chicken. Famous to us at least. A little famous as well to others who’d tried it at one of Bobby and Gail’s barbecues.. Still spicy as always and best served with an ice cold Mexican beer. Bohemia being a particular favorite.

Anna took it all in, ate the chicken with her bare hands as we did, drank the ice cold beer and enjoyed it all. For us and especially for Rebecca and Gail, we liked Anna and would be pleased if she and Roberto could work something out. Romantically speaking that is. Roberto was, and still is, too much of a live wire to be living in a big old house by himself. He took life as it came, but he enjoyed it too. Not a day went by that he wasn’t grateful for each one.

To make a short story even shorter, it was a two month courtship and Anna and Roberto took off for Las Vegas and got married. They didn’t tell a soul. Just showed up at our house for dinner one Saturday night and said they’d gotten married the previous weekend.

We were all pleased, but especially so Mama Marrone. She liked Anna right from the start and Anna liked her. Easy for sure, we didn’t know anybody who didn’t love Mama Marrone.

-<>-

So here it is, 26 years after our much talked about and many times relived Bonneville, Yellowstone, Couer d’Alene, Henry and LizBeth’s cattle ranch and home tour. A lot of water under the bridge for sure. Even so, we were still hanging in there ok.

Bobby and I were both 60, Rebecca and Gail 29 as always and that’s how we thought of them. Not 29 at their insistence, just the way we saw them. I know people change, but to us, the girls still looked like they did the first day we met them.

Pearl and Nana passed away many years back. We missed them and the little girls missed them. Although the little girls were not little girls anymore. They had little girls of their own.
We were still doing the hot rod thing, I don’t think we’ll ever quit. It’s just too interesting and too much fun. Even though we’d been doing it for many years, it seemed we learned something new every day.

Both Bobby and I are retired, the result of downsizing from both the telephone company and the power company, a good retirement offer for both of us and we walked out the door. Only bad part was Bobby beat me out the door by eight years. He did ok for a while, but eventually decided to go back to work. What helped was being able to go to work at his dad’s oil field supply house. That lasted for about six years, but when his dad passed on, the business was sold. His dad never did retire, he enjoyed the business too much not to show up for work. He’d slowed down a lot, but he still came in every day that he could.

The girls retired too. Gail when Bobby, Little and his mom sold the supply house business.
The bulk of it went to their mom, but their dad left part of it to them. Rebecca enjoyed her work and kept going for a while. She finally got tired of it when she was the one who couldn’t get off work to do something with us, Gail or her other friends. I was glad to see her quit. We didn’t need the money and Rebecca had plenty of other interests to keep her busy.

Little was a Captain in the police department and still enjoyed the work. Abby was at home and they were both enjoying life with their grandchildren. Bonnie Sue was still the only child in the family, but she had three daughters that Little spoiled rotten. Bonnie Sue used to tell Little that he was worse than Nana had been when it came to spoiling the grandchildren.

Bud and Vicky never did have kids, but ended up adopting two. They had their share of grandchildren for sure, six in all. Four girls, two boys and like always, a pair of dachshunds.
Vicky always loved her dachshunds, Bud liked them too. For a while he wanted a big dog, a retriever or something along those lines, but he grew to appreciate and love the two dachshunds, Jackson and Gretel. Gretel I understood, folks always seem to give their dachshunds Germanic names and it fits them well. Jackson I never did figure out. Never did ask either. Let sleeping dogs lie is an old saying for good reason.

Larry and Susan still live in Visalia. They have their share of grandchildren, five at last count.
In a way, just like Don from years ago, four girls and one little boy. I think Larry had a better handle on it than Don’s dad did. Larry was a good granddad, not much flustered him. He was retired from PG&amp;E too.

When Rebecca retired, the last one in our little group to do so, we decided to throw a big retirement party, reunion get together for all of us. Including the children and the grandchildren.
We set it for a day in middle August. Usually a good time for swim parties, barbecues, surfing, sailing or just running a roadster down the coast. June especially and July now and then could be foggy and overcast. The temperatures could be well over 100 in Pole Creek and Via Lindero, but the weather in our little beach town - not so little nowadays - could get foggy and cool.

August turned out to be an excellent choice. I think just about everybody showed up, including my folks, Bobby’s mom, Roberto and Anna with Janet-Marie, Roberto’s kids and grandkids, Mama Marrone and Roberto’s favorite aunt Carmen, his brother Frankie, his wife and kids, Bobby and Gail, their kids and grandkids, Larry and Susan, their kids and grandkids and the same for Little and Abby. Bud and Vicky came, but their kids had to work. They brought a couple of their granddaughters along though. Earl and Lucy are still living in Couer d’Alene and doing ok. Lucy figured the long trip down would be too much for Earl and they stayed home.

There were a whole lot of people there. When Bobby and I had a quiet moment, we took stock of the younger generation and were amazed at all the girls. Where the heck did all the girls come from? Aside from Roberto’s son, Bobby and I had a grandson each, Larry had one grandson, Bud had two grandsons and that was about it for the boys. Rebecca and Gail wandered over while Bobby and I were tallying up the boys vs. the girls.

It was obvious we were vastly outnumbered and I asked them, “Just where the heck did all these girls come from?”

They just smiled and walked away. It didn’t make any difference, Bobby and I had been outnumbered from the first day we met Gail and Rebecca. We figured it was a pretty good place to be. These girls had our number and they’d had it for a long time. The truth was, we were spoiled rotten and we knew it. Neither of us would change a thing.

Life is funny sometimes. When JoBeth and I were in our on again, off again relationship many years ago, we used to talk about marriage now and then. When the subject of children came up, I figured a boy and a girl would be nice. JoBeth was insistent that she would only have two girls. I ran into her one afternoon in Arroyo Verde when Rebecca and I were at Castagnola’s Seafood for lunch. Rebecca had already stepped outside when I spotted JoBeth walking up to the cash register. I recognized her right away. As good looking as she was it would be hard to miss. At first, she didn’t recognize me, but that was ok, a lot of years had gone by since we’d seen one another and I was a little bit taller and twenty pounds heavier. Having a beard probably didn’t help. Turns out she was a commercial illustrator, lived and worked in town and was married to an Arroyo Verde guy. Not too surprising about the illustrator bit, she always had been one heck of an artist. About the time we parted I asked her if she had any children. Two boys was the answer. I told her I had two girls, said goodbye and walked out the door. No revenge intended or implied. Just one of life’s little ironies. The girl who insisted on only two daughters had two sons instead. She was a sweet and kind girl and I’m sure she loved her boys. Sometimes though, you gotta stand back when fate throws the dice.

I think we’d all learned something from Bobby’s long term ownership of his roadster. He’d owned the roadster for 47 years. From the day he bought it at 13 years old with paper route money to today. Bud and I, as well as Little had learned something too. Mainly from when I sold my 50 Ford coupe and Bud sold his 47 Chevy coupe. We’d still like to have those cars back.
Little, taking it all in, decided many years ago to keep the old green 46 Chevy pickup. He still has it to this day. A few changes to be sure, but not too many. It still runs the dependable old six cylinder and powerglide. Although the ‘glide had been rebuilt a couple of times over the years and the engine at least once that I remember.
The little pickup had been improved over the years. The lumber rack was removed long ago. A few years back Little had taken the 6" painted channel bumpers off, found some stock ones, had them re-plated and after a nice seafoam green paint job on the truck, the shiny new bumpers were put on and a completely new interior installed. It was a good looking street rod now. Only thing Little missed after all the work, were all the drivers who used to give the pickup a wide berth. Now, other drivers cut him off in traffic and at stop lights. Now he was sorry he’d pulled the big channel bumpers and fixed the truck up. When it had the original, at least original from Bobby, puke green paint, lumber rack and channel bumpers on it, nobody argued the right of way with him. They figured he had nothing to lose.

Bud still owns his Caddy powered white 37 Chevy four door sedan. It looks as nice as ever.

Larry still has his stock 50 Merc coupe. Only thing he’d ever done to it in the hot rod vein was a set of duals. Kinda funny, he was a nut for horsepower just like us, but he never could bring himself to do an engine swap or alter the Merc in any way. He’d repainted it a few years back, black as it always had been and it still ran the little Merc hubcaps and beauty rings. Larry hadn’t changed a thing on it. It looked just like it always did. In fact, being a totally stock Merc was one thing that made it such a standout. Seems most of the Merc’s, the 49 to 51's that we see nowadays are almost always chopped. Larry couldn’t hardly take the Merc anywhere without someone wanting to know if he would like to sell it.

Roberto has his nice little 29 highboy. I don’t think he’ll ever part with it. He had a late model shop pickup for regular transportation and that was about it. Unless you want to count the 50 Chevy coupe, complete with 409 stroker motor and a blower sitting under a cover in the far reaches of his machine shop. A little deteriorated as far as upholstery and rubber items go, the rest is in pretty good shape and the engine still turns over. Courtesy of a socket welded onto a crank snout bolt and attached to a dedicated ratchet wrench. Whenever Roberto would think about it, he’d give the ratchet a tug just to make sure the engine and blower were still free turning. Maybe once a year a squirt of oil down the spark plug holes and that was about it for the little blue coupe.

It wouldn’t surprise me to see it come out of the shadows and hit the races once again. I’d sure like to see it run. Bobby and I had been leaving some of the car mags around that spotlighted the nostalgia drags and we were pretty sure Roberto had been looking at them and maybe thinking about it.
I hadn’t been doing a whole lot in the hot rod area other than keeping up with our black highboy Deuce roadster. Still running the big Olds and with a nice black top courtesy of the top irons I got from Henry long ago. Rebecca liked her two year old Crown Victoria with the Highway Patrol option package. It ran pretty hard and handled well. I drive a one year old Dodge half ton pickup. Darned thing was as plush as most any car you’d see around.

The 54 Olds was sold long ago to Sarah’s husband Michael. It’s still around and pretty much as it always was with the exception of chrome wheels and baby moons. It looks like a car right out of the late 50's. Kind of a trip down memory lane for sure.

The 57 Ranchero I kept for well over ten years. When I sold it, it went back to the co-worker who originally sold it to me. In a lot better shape I might add. Regardless, he was happy to have it back and I still see it around town now and then.

We still own the yellow convertible. I don’t think we’ll ever part with either the roadster or the yellow convertible. They just mean too much to us. Especially the yellow convertible. I didn’t know it when I first saw it, but it carried my whole life inside the day Rebecca drove it into the Frosty shop.

Bobby, another story entirely, it always was hard to slow Bobby down. Not that we tried, he was always finishing one project and it was on to the next. He still has the Red Roadster as we like to call it. The drag racing roadster, the 31 on home made Model A rails, still in black primer and still running the Y-Block sits in a shed at the back of his property. He’d bought three more Chrysler Hemi engines over the years. He realized right up front they were going to get scarce and he wanted spares for his Deuce. One was a 354 same as the 32. The other two were 392's and Bobby had been gathering parts for them for quite a while. The thought was, he could pull the Y-Block out of the 31, stick in a blown Chrysler and really have a fast ride.

The nostalgia drags were really getting to be something. More than one guy or group of guys had resurrected or restored an old and sometimes famous drag racer and was showing up at the three or four west coast events every year. It was Bobby’s plan to go drag racing again. This time around he planned to be much more competitive. I think he’ll get there. At least if Bud, Roberto, Little and I have anything to say about it.

Bobby still has his 64 Chevy pickup that he bought new. A few changes along the way, most notably a mildly modified big block 454 and T-400. Bobby thought that would make a nice engine for tow car duty. That’s what he said anyhow, I don’t know how he kept a straight face.
They sold Gail’s 57 Chevy long ago. Now and then when they see a nice one, Gail always says she wishes she had it back. She enjoys her new Lincoln with all the bells and whistles. Even so, the 57 Chevy is the one she fondly remembers.

Nana willed Bobby her red Buick convertible. It was in immaculate shape when she died and had very low mileage. It doesn’t get out much, but when it does, many times it has Melanie, Megan, Bonnie Sue, Abby and Rebecca riding along with Gail at the wheel. All our girls as we like to call em, the big girls and the little girls, enjoy cruising the big Buick someplace. Anyplace will do. It makes no difference. They like to ride in it as much as they always did.

As for Henry and LizBeth, the fondly remembered couple from the Northern California cattle ranch, we traded Christmas Cards with them for 12-15 years. Finally we had one returned with the notation that Henry and LizBeth had died within a couple of months of one another. We understood. It was obvious that Henry and LizBeth loved one another and it would have been hard to imagine either one going it alone.

I don’t know if Henry ever got the Deuce roadster running. We never asked. I like to think so. Either that, or there’s a pristine Deuce roadster sitting in a Northern California barn, surrounded by a couple of Model A coupes and a sedan. At least I like to think so. We never went back.

It’s been an interesting life so far and promises to be even more interesting in the future.
Bobby’s little Deuce roadster had ended it’s street racing career many years ago. He finally re-painted the Roadster a couple of years ago. A great fire engine red. Not one of the good looking burn your retina’s out red, but the nice slightly dark, but not too dark, genuine fire engine red.
One very similar to the original red color on Nana’s old Buick convertible that he’d shot on the roadster many years ago. His daughters approved of the new red. As did his granddaughters.
The engine compartment, still not running the hood sides, showed off the mighty Chrysler quite well. The new white top was a nice surprise and it fit the overall scheme of things. The car still had the same stance as when we first saw it and the top was still the same shape. To me, and to the others, it still had the right stuff.

The last time I saw the roadster, Bobby and Gail were cruising down main street late one summer night and Rebecca and I were going the other way in ours. The big Chrysler in Bobby’s roadster just burbling along in third gear, barely above idle. Him, just sitting there and steering, Gail snuggled up next to him like always.

The car looked so great and sounded so great and was what we all aspired to, but Bobby was the first one to reach the goal. The Roadster for sure was his brass ring in life. As my roadster was for me.

There’s just something about owning a roadster. Something difficult to put into words. It’s like a marriage in a small way, you depend on it and it depends on you.

Although neither Bobby’s roadster or mine could hold a candle to our two girls, Rebecca and Gail. They were truly the gold ring in life for us.......

-<>-



I suppose I should say, “The End,” but there’s more to the story.

As my grandmother used to say when she read to me, “Perhaps another time.”


***

 

Definitions


This section perhaps not needed for HAMB’rs, but was added to the book for those unfamiliar with the language we speak as well as a little history and non-hot rod definitions that some may be unfamiliar with.



Arroyo Verde - Arroyo is Spanish for “Brook, small stream, rivulet or gutter”. Verde is Spanish for “Green, unripe or young”. In this context it is used as and translates to Green Canyon.
Granted, not an exact translation as “canyon” in Spanish is “canon”. Languages are dynamic and at times get corrupted. Especially true in California with it’s many Spanish names. Common California usage of Arroyo does mean canyon. No doubt, such usage drives anyone fluent in Spanish to despair, but that’s the way it is.

Babbit bearings - An early bearing system for crankshafts and the like, consisting of a poured “babbit” - a lead/tin mixture - cast into place inside connecting rod journals and main bearing journals.
Not a bad system, but not as strong or near as convenient as the insert bearing system used on crankshafts today.
Interestingly, babbit bearings are still found in very large engines, generators, electric motors, rotating condensers and the like.
Somewhat labor intensive, they take a considerable amount of skill to fit properly.

Bad-Baddest - Slang for very good.
Generally meaning, well built and “very good”, but “very good” with an attitude.

BBC - An acronym for Big Block Chevrolet.
These are larger blocks that can handle a larger bore and stroke than the ever popular SBC.
Common factory displacements being: 396, 427, 454 and 502.

BW - Shorthand for Borg Warner, a company that manufactures many auto parts including complete standard transmissions in many different styles for many different cars.

Chrysler 300-B - One of the very first factory hot rods, if not the very first with the 300 in 1955, 1956 was the B model.
Chrysler Corporation took the very good “Hemi” engine, hopped it up a touch, with multiple carburetion - two four barrels - a little hotter cam and generally heavier duty components.

Church key - A flat piece of steel - also called a bottle opener - with one end that removed bottle caps and the other end for piercing cans. Preferably beer cans. Every self respecting teen age boy that ever was, carried one of these. Even if he didn’t plan on drinking beer. The important thing was, having a church key meant that you were ready. The church key and a pocket knife were all that was required to be a fully equipped teenage guy in the 50's.
Aluminum cans you could open without an opener didn’t come in until about the early 60's.

CID - Cubic Inch Displacement.

Collectors - The large end pipe in a header.
The one where the two, three or four primary pipes terminate.
Two, three or four primary pipes due to the engine cylinder layout and the header style.
Collectors, in the common sizes at least, are about 3 - 4" in diameter and 6 - 18" long.

Dago, or Dago’d - Slang for a car lowered in front only, or lowered more in front than in back.
Usually done on hot rods and occasionally on customs.
The term thought to be derived from a company in San Diego that dropped front axles so the car sat lower.
The preferred way to do it on a solid axle front suspension.

Deuce - Slang for the 32 Ford.

Diff - Slang for differential, the rear axle gears.
Confusingly, low gears have a high numeric ratio and high gears have a low numeric ratio.
To wit: At a constant engine rpm (revolutions per minute) a car with a low geared diff of 4.57 will travel much slower than a car with a high geared diff of 3.25 will.

Duals, Pipes - Twin pipes, meaning two exhaust pipes, two mufflers and two tail or side pipes.
One set run to each side of a V8 engine.
For the six cylinder engines, cast iron headers were used or the exhaust manifold was “split”.
Meaning that an extra outlet was added and a blocking plate installed between the front and rear set of exhaust ports.
Cylinders 1-2-3 dumping into the front pipe and cylinders 4-5-6 dumping into the rear pipe.
Incidentally, the big reason for the disparity in exhaust sounds between the inline six cylinder engines and the V8 engines has to do with how the pipes, or headers were arranged as far as the firing order went.
The six cylinder engines firing order of 1-5-3-6-2-4 meant that an exhaust pulse occurred every 120 degrees of engine revolution.
The pipes got an exhaust pulse first in one side and then in the other.
The evenly alternating exhaust pulses give a very even note to the exhaust tone and that’s where the smooth sound of a twin pipe inline six cylinder engine comes from.
An engine rotates 720 degrees in a four cycle engine to complete the firing of all cylinders.
Alternatively, the V8's have their own sound.
Not quite as smooth as the inline sixes.
Due to the unevenness of the exhaust pulses.
Due to the firing order of the V8 you could have a long wait between exhaust pulses at one point in the 720 degrees of four cycle operation and other times the pulses would be very close together.
A typical GM V8 firing order being 1-8-4-3-6-5-7-2.
GM engines have the cylinders numbered 1-3-5-7 on the left and 2-4-6-8 on the right.
Plot it on a sheet of paper and you’ll see why the V8 sounds the way it does.

Dual Quads - Also called dual four barrels.
The intake manifold and twin four barrel carburetors were factory installed on the Chrysler 300 Hemi engines as a standard feature.
The non-Chrysler 300's had only a single four barrel.

Five window - Denotes the standard model in the 32-33-34 Ford cars, a metal top coupe similar in seating layout to the roadster.
Roll up windows in the doors are standard and some have a roll up rear window.
These are defined by counting the windows only, the windshield does not get counted.
For the five window, the two door windows, the two quarter windows and the rear window are the ones counted.

Flathead - Common slang for the Ford V-8 valve in block engine, although flathead could be and was applied to the flathead six cylinder engines from Chrysler, Ford and others. Always with the six cylinder notation.
As in “Flathead six”.
If you just said “flathead”, everyone knew you were talking about the Ford flathead V8.

French Rake - A local term that described a car that was lowered all the way around, but the front was lowered more than the rear.
Found on the customs of the era and the hot rods of today.
The term not used much at all.
Customs, at least the better done ones strived for an equal lowering at both ends.
Some customs would be lowered more in the rear than at the front.
Many times just an optical illusion due to the visual bulk of the rear body.

Hemi - Slang for the Hemispherical combustion chamber engine.
About the only problem with the hemi head was the considerable weight of the wider heads.
The additional weight required due to the hemispherical combustion chamber as well as a slightly heavier valve train in the form of double rocker shafts on each side as well as longer rocker arms required to bridge the wide cylinder head.
The breathing, or intake of the fuel/air charge was so good in the Hemi’s that the additional weight was deemed worthwhile.

Hurst Shifter - A shift mechanism designed to convert a column shift transmission to floor shift mode.
Not to mention that it was a strong, well made and quick shifting device favored by many, both on the street and on the dragstrip.

Hydramatic - The early GM automatic used in Olds, Cadillac and Pontiac.
A four speed auto with a very low geared low gear.
Many of these were modified - B&amp;M being one of the pioneers and building an exceptionally good one - for drag racing and for quite a few years they were the “hot setup” in drag racing transmissions.

Isky - Short for Iskenderian, the Iskenderian Camshaft company.
Iskenderian cams supplied - and still does - very good racing cams and associated components.

La Conchita - La is Spanish and translates to the feminine gender of “the”. (El is the masculine gender of “the”). Conchita is a popular feminine name like Mary or Carol and my Spanish dictionary shows no translation.

Nerfs - Short tube - vertical, long tube - horizontal or simply nicely patterned flame cut small bumpers.
Originally used by the circle track gang on their race cars.
Front, rear and sides.
Designed mainly to keep the open wheel race cars from getting their wheels together for the most part.
They were also used to save the bodywork.
On hot rods, they are simply used as small bumpers.
Useful in some cases and decorative in others.

OHV - Overhead valve engine.
For hot rods - in most cases - the bigger the better.

Powerglide - General Motors two speed automatic transmission.
Known by several derogatory terms, slushbox and power slide being but two.
Also called the glide’ as a shorthand form of slang.
They lacked quite a bit in the performance end of things, but were actually a good dependable transmission provided they weren’t overly abused.
The ironic part about the powerglide is that today it is one of the very best automatic drag racing transmissions there is.
Granted, with quite a few modifications, but for the drag racers it’s a more than viable transmission.

Prado Rd. - Prado is Spanish for Meadow, Field or Lawn.
In this case the road was named for a large meadow.

Red Ram - The Chrysler Corporation’s name for the small - 241 cid - Hemi V8 used in the Dodges.
The term, “Red Ram” still in common use in the hot rod world.
Mention Red Ram V8 and most any rodder will know what you’re talking about.

Rincon - Rincon is Spanish for Corner, Nook or Narrow Valley.

Roadster - Generally accepted - at least in the hot rod world as a car with a single seat for two and sometimes three passengers, removable windshield frame, folding windshield in many cases, soft canvas folding top, and doors with no roll up windows.
Some had rumble seats for additional passengers and some had the regular hinged at the top trunk lids.

Run the valves - Slang for adjusting the clearances in the valve train.
There are several different ways to do it depending on the cam and lifters in use.
Measuring the clearance between rocker tip and valve stem is not needed too often with today’s performance “hydraulic cams”.
And in fact measuring is not how the hydraulic cam/lifter combo is adjusted.
Several ways to do it, but the basics are: make sure the lifter is on the heel of the cam, all play out of the system and turn the adjuster screw the desired amount so as to pre-load the hydraulic lifter.
The operation of the hydraulic lifter automatically takes care of the required clearances.
Hydraulic Cam being the common term for a camshaft designed to operate with hydraulic lifters.
In most stock engines there is no adjustment available and the clearances are automatically taken care of by the hydraulic lifters.
In the 50's and early 60's the performance cams we generally used were the solid lifter versions.
These required adjusting once a week or as long as several months between adjustments.
It depended on how hard the engine was run for the most part.
Today’s racers running solid lifter cams - depending on the horsepower output of the engine - may run the valves between every round.
Especially so once the engine passes the 500 horsepower mark and is revved beyond the 7000 rpm range.
In many cases the crew chief or owner will go so far as to check valve spring pressures with a small portable valve spring tester each time the valves are run.

SBC - An acronym for Small Block Chevrolet.
An engine that encompassed many different displacements as issued from the factory as well as several other popular ones when they were hot rodded.
Common factory displacements being: 265, 283, 302, 305, 327, 350 and 400.
Hot rodders knocked these out to many sizes with the most common ones being 272, 292, 331, 355, 364 and 383.
There are others, but you get the idea.

Sintered Metal - A finely powdered metal that takes form and holds it after being pressed with many tons of pressure.
In the case of the Velvetouch brakes the powdered metal is mixed with a ceramic binder, pressed to shape and baked in a 1900 degree F. oven which cures the lining as well as binds them to the shoes.

Sleeper - A very stock appearing and sounding car equipped with a very fast engine.
More than a few have been sucked in by these cars.
Not to mention that they are a very good way to run a fast car and not attract any attention.

Stroker crank - Or simply “stroker”, an engine crankshaft that has had the stroke increased by either offset grinding the rod journals or welding additional material directly onto the rod journal and grinding an offset on it.
With the increased stroke - which simply means the piston goes up further as well as down further in the cylinder - the cubic inch displacement of the engine is considerably enlarged.
Which in turn translates to additional torque output due to the increased engine displacement as well as the piston rod now has additional leverage on the crankshaft which adds torque.
All in all, a good modification to make on most engines.
Additional things to contend with is the requirement to run special pistons with the wristpin in the correct place so the piston doesn’t go too far up, as well as most times a special rod length is required.
Stroking the crankshaft can also be done in the opposite direction thereby cutting the cubic inch displacement down.
The common term is “de-stroking” the crankshaft.
Usually done to make an engine fit into a particular class.
Most racing has definite cubic inch limit rules so de-stroking can be utilized to make a specific class.

Suicide doors - Found on the 32-33-34 Fords in the three window coupes.
These doors are hinged at the rear and if they come unlatched while driving they can do a lot of damage to the car, not to mention scaring the occupants to death.
More than likely somebody fell out of the moving car giving the doors their macabre name.
The five window doors are hinged at the front as is the great majority of doors found on modern cars.
Suicide doors are found on the front and rear of many other make and model cars too.

S-W Gauges - Shorthand for Stewart Warner gauges.
An old mainstay for hot rods.
Some of their original designs are still in use today, and imitation being the sincerest form of flattery, many other instrument makers have copied the S-W gauge designs to a great extent.

Tail draggers - Many times described as “lowered in back”.
A popular treatment with some, not seen much in Southern California as it was - in our area anyway - deemed to be a back east or middle west treatment and we didn’t care for it for the most part.
Also done by first time car owners - usually young ones - as it was simple as well as cheap to do.
All it took was a pair of lowering blocks placed between the rear leaf springs and a set of longer spring u-bolts.
After most had been in the car hobby for a short while, or at least exposed to other cars, both hot rods and customs, the lowered in back status soon changed.
Due in large part to peer group pressure.

Teapot Carbs - Slang for one of the early Ford four barrels and manufactured by the Holley carburetor company.
Not favored by most hot rodders as they were deemed prone to catch fire easily in a backfire.
Perhaps true as the float bowls were at the top of the carb.
Plus, most hot rodders had decided they were difficult to tune although more than a few Ford runners made them work very well.

The Dez - Slang for “The Desert”.
Used by dirt bike riders and off road enthusiasts for the most parts.
Tell one of them you were headed for the Dez and they knew right where you where going.

The River - Slang for the Colorado River.
A destination for many in California.
Especially so the group that likes ski boats.
Usually powered by strong running, good looking engines in equally good looking and shiny boats.
Water borne hot rods is one way to look at it.
Same deal with “The Dez”, tell em you’re headed for “The River” and they know right where you’re going.

Three window - Denotes the deluxe model in the 32-33-34 Ford cars, similar to the five window with a metal top these have only the two door windows and the rear window.
The doors are longer in the three windows than they are in the five windows thereby making the windows themselves longer.

Tri-Y - A header system for V-8's where the primary pipes are joined a little ways out and run into a secondary pipe.
The secondary pipes, both of them, then enter a collector.
The collector usually a smaller diameter than the typical collector used on the four into one style headers we are familiar with.
The Tri-Y is, for the most part, the best header design for street driven hot rods.
Overlooked by many as they don’t look quite as “racy” as the four into one design.
Not to mention they are a small volume item and not too many Tri-Y’s, if any at all, are made nowadays.
Even so, if you’re building your own headers it’s a good choice due to it’s characteristically wider torque band and ease of construction.
Not to mention, they take up considerably less space than the four into ones.

T-10 - A four speed standard shift transmission manufactured by Borg Warner and made for many different cars starting with Chevrolet in the 50's and going into the 70's and maybe beyond.
One version was referred to as the “Super T-10" as it had a stronger case and gears.

T-400 - Short for TurboHydro 400, GM’s big automatic transmission that came in many of the larger cars and trucks.
A good trans, popular for many hot rodders and a mainstay for automatic transmissions in the dragracing arena.
The other GM automatic trans, and just as good for street use behind the small blocks is the T-350.

Via Lindero - Via is Spanish for “way, road, track or railroad track”. Lindero is Spanish for “bordering upon, landmark or boundary”. In this context it translates to Boundary Road as it is the border for one of the original Spanish land grants.

Wedge - Slang for the non-Hemi engines, although today with all the research and improvements in cylinder heads, the wedge heads of today flow about as good as the hemi heads of old did.

Y-Block - Refers to the Ford OHV V8 engine that was made between 1954 and 1960.
The “Y” in Y-Block comes from Ford’s design and casting of an engine block that had the sides drop down lower than most other manufacturers engine blocks of the era.
Where most blocks had the sides go down about even with the horizontal split of the main caps, the Y-Block went further down and had a deeper reinforcing rib to the main caps.

USMC - United States Marine Corps.
Semper Fi.

39 Ford box - Or 39 box, common slang for the 32-39 Ford floor shift transmission.
In 1940, Ford converted it’s cars to the column shift transmission making those transmissions into what was called “side shifters” as the shift levers were on the side of the transmission.
A common hot rod trick was to stick the Lincoln Zephyr gears into the early Ford transmissions making for a higher geared low and 2nd gear which gave you a close ratio transmission.
The Lincoln gears were stronger than the Ford which made the swap a worthwhile expenditure.
Once a lower geared rear end was stuck in a car, the Zephyr geared transmissions made them tough to beat in a drag race with a stock transmission, stock rear end geared car.
Assuming the engines were equal.

48 Merc - Slang for the 1948 Mercury car or engine.

94's - Slang for the 94 series of two barrel carburetors that Ford ran on the 49 and up engines.

97's - Same deal as the 94's, slightly different style of two barrel carburetor on Fords 48 and down.
Other numerical designations were the 48's and the 81's, very similar to the 97's. But with differing venturi diameters.

409 - The first of the Chevrolet big block engines.
One made really famous by the Beach Boys song, but as far as the car guys went, one that proved itself time and again on the streets and at the drag strips of America.
Originally derived from the 348 Chevy engine introduced in 1958 that had the same block and heads.
The 348 really deserves the credit as the first Chevy big block, but the 409 is the one most widely recognized as the first.

454 - One of the more recent versions of the Chevrolet big block engine.

 

Stories about dad


As promised, a couple of stories about dad. He had enough adventures in his life to make a couple of books. At least

Here though, just two of them and not too long.

The first when our house in Fillmore, California flooded in 1978. An amazing time to be sure.

The most amazing part for me was the mud. I’d seen news coverage of flooded homes on TV, but I never gave a thought about all the silt a flooding river carries. We had water about four and one half feet deep in the house. Bad enough, but the mud was about one to two feet deep depending. The way the water flowed through the house, the front room had a back wall blow out taking all the furniture, books everything in the front room with it. That part of the house was not as deep with mud as the rest was. What caused the back wall blowout was water rushing in the front door when it gave way and hitting the patio door and two big windows. My biggest regret and one I still have to this day was the loss of family photographs. Everything else is replaceable, but not the photos. I thought they’d be ok up on top of the counter.

The water was about twelve inches deep inside when I left for the last time. I had no idea it would reach the height it did.

Suffice to say, there was a lot of damage and it took about a year to rebuild the house.
Working after work every day, days off and all the vacation days I could put together. Which is what leads up to this little piece about dad.

Dad was always a hard worker. He liked to finish whatever it was he started. He showed up every day that I had off to help. Days that were foggy and cold or temperatures in excess of a hundred. He was right there and I don’t think I could have done it without him.

Even working in the attic a couple of days in a row during a heat wave. We had a fan going, but it was seriously hot up there.

The funny part was, dad was always an early starter. Being retired he tended to get up quite early. Sweetie and I didn’t do too bad ourselves as far as getting started early went. The bad part was dad and mom would start coming over earlier and earlier. It got to the point where we were getting up right after dawn in an effort to have some coffee, peruse the paper like normal folks and maybe have some breakfast before the work started. I say like normal folks, but we were sitting on patio chairs in the front room and using a stack of drywall for a table.

The other bad part was that once dad got there, he was ready to go to work. Which meant that many times we were having breakfast on the run. If at all. He worked too. From the time he got there until dusk, with only a short break for lunch. Time didn’t mean much to him. It was the dark that finally made him stop. Kinda funny, I was 22 years younger and he just flat wore me out.

Many other people, friends and family helped in the initial stages and whenever a job was more than a two man job they came in to help, but dad’s the one that saw it through to the end.
Every day.

I get tired just thinking about it today....

=====================================================================

The other story, equally short, but kinda funny too. Sort of a “The shoe is on the other foot now” kinda deals.

My friend CK lived in Ventura, California and I lived in Visalia, California at the time. CK and I have known one another for most of our lives. Same deal with CKs wife and my wife. In fact, CK introduced me to my wife, but that’s a whole other story.

CK had just gotten his bright yellow Morris 12, a 1938 model - similar to an Anglia in appearance - running and wanted to take part in the annual Christmas Tree Chop in Fillmore, California. Usually a good rod run - actually a car show disguised as a rod run - and it looked to be a lot of fun. I was looking forward to seeing my little brother there with his very nice, very fast Henry J race car.

Thinking dad would enjoy it, we’d seen quite a few of his old friends there - hot rod types and oil patch guys the year before - so we invited him along. I told dad to dress warm and I would bring along a pair of gloves and a knit cap for him. At the time, my roadster had no top and no heater as it does today. The heater, a birthday present from Sweetie, but you’ll notice it’s on her side of the car. I’m still trying to figure that one out.

Anyway, CK and I took off, he went straight to Santa Paula with the SBC powered Morris and I went to dads house on Channel Drive in Ventura. Dad came out of the house dressed in a sweatshirt and light vest. I told him to go inside and get a jacket because it was gonna get cold riding in the roadster. Heck, I was dressed in T-shirt, sweatshirt, down jacket, thermal gloves and knit cap as well as the good for any temperature any time of the year- at least in Southern California - Levi’s and tennies. Temps at the time at dads house were in the low forties. Nothing serious for our friends in colder climes, but for a California kid, especially in an open car, it was cold. Still though, dressed as I was it wasn’t too bad.

Dad insisted he’d be fine. I told him he really needed a jacket. He said he was warm enough and he’d be ok. Ok by me, I can take a hint, especially from dad. He didn’t even want the gloves or knit cap I’d brought along for him.

The plan was, run down the freeway to Santa Paula, meet at a friends house where he’d get his highboy roadster pickup out - a nice little 350 Buick powered 29 Model A roadster pickup with Cushman servi-car pickup style bed on it - and we’d all caravan down the road. The roadster pickup sounds a little different and it is. Looks good too.

The part dad forgot is that Fillmore and Santa Paula are inland and nestled up against the foothills. Meaning, the further you go, the colder it gets. With the roadster running down the freeway at 65-70 dad was starting to get pretty chilly. He didn’t complain though. I asked once how he was doing and he said ok.

We got to our friends house ok, met him, CK, three more guys with their hot rods and we all took off for Fillmore. I was amazed when I saw the roadster pickup go zipping up the on-ramp to the freeway by the airport. The little 350 Buick was a hard runner. I think it’s the one that left black marks all the way up the on ramp, but it was hard to see for all the tire smoke.

Dropping in with these guys we found ourselves clipping along the freeway at a good pace.
I chickened out once we hit the two lane with it’s 55 per limit. I used to live in the area and the part of the road we were on was usually watched closely by the Gendarmes. The rest of the group disappeared up the road pretty fast. They were probably running 65-70 or so. Dropping back to 55 wasn’t because I’m such a good guy, I seem to get caught for most things so it’s easier to follow the rules than to bend them.

Now though, it was even colder. Probably around 34-35 or so. Dad was sliding lower and lower in the seat. He didn’t complain though. I was a bit surprised, he’d owned several open cars in the past, the most notable one his 32 Ford Phaeton. Which he’d traded for his incompletely chopped 36 Ford five window coupe in 1941. Making it, I believe, one of the very first chopped fat fender street cars in Southern California. He did finish the chop job and it was a neat looking little car.

Seems like dad would have remembered how cold open cars can get. Regardless, he hung in there, but as I alluded to at the start, he should have listened to me and at least brought a jacket.
He had a good time at the rod run. Course that was after we stuck about four cups of coffee into him.

Dad’s tough, but he froze like anybody else....


-<>-

Afterword
Granted, an afterword is not too common in a fiction book and perhaps not quite the right thing to do in such a book. That’s ok though, I’m a bit new at the writing biz and figure what the heck? My book, my way. For the most part anyway.

Writing this book was a lot of fun. The majority of it taken from experience, mine and others. The characters modeled after real people. Ones I’ve been fortunate in knowing. Both the people and the characters. Which in many cases are one and the same.

The cars, most of them anyway, modeled after cars that roamed the streets of the old hometown. Some then and some now.

Those who are familiar with Southern California will easily recognize the coastal community the story takes place in. Not named in the book since Sweetie and I couldn’t think of a good name for it. The other named towns - real ones incidentally - Arroyo Verde, Via Lindero and Pole Creek, are for the most part made up names although Pole Creek is a real place in a real town and the Deuce brother mentioned lives very close to Pole Creek. Pole Creek strangely enough, is a real creek.

Other towns named are true and correct.

Some may wonder, why not use the real names of all the towns? I could have I suppose, but the big sticking point is Prado Road as well as Canyon Road. No such place. Either of them.
We had our favorite places for drag racing on the streets, but I decided not to name them. They’re not a big secret, but not a well known one either.

For the purposes of this book and I suppose I should call it literary license, I needed a road such as Prado Road. Canyon Road came into being because I needed a road to get to Prado Road as well as a road to the next town. Once Prado Road came into being I figured I may as well use fictional names for the towns involved. Although the remainder of the streets named are the true and correct names. If that makes any sense. If not, I guess you’re either stuck with an interesting little mystery or in for a bit of map reading.

I guess writing a book is a bit like building a hot rod. Hopes and dreams and wilder schemes.
After a bit of work, they’re on the road. The hot rod anyway. The book gets into print and goes from there. Course, the cool thing about a hot rod is - unlike a book - you can always tinker, tune and change things.

Writings fun, but give me an interesting hot rod any day....



Jay Carnine
Visalia, California
Copyright - July 2000

 

The Black 40 from Part 1.
This is the one that didn't get wrecked.

This same 40 is also a major player in the Pinky book.

 

The best story of yours that I've ever read, and #3 best book I've ever read! I love this kinda writing, it really reminds me of Louis LaMour, you can feel the cold you can taste the beer, very descpitive writing I LOVE IT! If you don't mind me asking, why didn't you get it published?
-Jesse

 

Thank you,

Jay (nosurf)

 

bttt



I got over 200 pages of C9's "Red Roadster" story saved to my hard-drive. Totally cool of him to post this to us here on the HAMB considering this is his bread and butter.

Thank You from the bottom of our hearts C9. You are a Prince among men.

 

Thanks Jay

It's amazing how you can put yourself in the writers locations and scenarios (sp?)!

Your writing brings me right to the point where I can smell the gasoline, the salt air next to the Ocean and see the faces of the characters!!

Growing up in Wisconsin we would take our dates to "Lake Shore Drive" park on a bluff or near a beach to catch the Sunrise over Lake Michigan!

We referred to this activity as "Watching the "Submarine Races""...!!!

Started on my book 2 years ago..., Think I'll dust it off and start typing again!

Thanks for the inspiration!!!!!!!!!

Mark

 

yes, thanks...

made a few slow days at work zoom past!

 

I was so happy when I saw this post come up than I nearly peed on myself! Printed it, read it and I love it. I let my boss see the binder last week and he hit me up first thing this morning "Did you print the rest of that story, yet?" is all he asked me. Jay, you have two really big fans down here in the StreetTrucks Magazine offices. Thank you so much for taking the time to post all four parts as well as the Dad Stories. Next Friday is going to suck without a new post from you and something new to read!

 

Thanks Jay, loved every word.

 

WOW!

thank you jay. enjoyed all of it immensely.



jerry

 

I enjoyed the stories very much, very easy to read and to "see touch feel" what was happenning.
Thanks again

 

C9,
Thank you very much for posting this here.
I read the entire story and wanted more.

Thank you.
Jason Tingler

 

wow, i gotta take a break and finish tomorrow. bttt for everybody else! excellent excellent story, man. thanks.

 

yes thanks C9 for a great read. I now realize I never got the most out of my first roadster and will have to get around to finishing my in progress deuce roadster, sought of spoiled myself in my coupe all these years. Thanks again for posting your great wrok here

 

wow, i stuck it out, read till the end, and it was worth it. thanks, jay. a cool story. kinda gives me some reason to try to stick around for another 23 or so years

 

[ QUOTE ]
If you don't mind me asking, why didn't you get it published?


[/ QUOTE ]


Several reasons.
Main one being I didn't think it would be acceptable to publishers due to the way it was written.
Mostly narrative form and very little dialogue.

The Red Roadster was written nearly four years ago.
The more recent books have more dialogue which helps a lot in character development.
The latest book - Pinky - has the characters developed a little stronger, uses more dialogue and it makes for a better book.
To my way of thinking anyway.

Fwiw, The Red Roadster was 217 pages in book form.
The page count will be a little different due to the way it's formatted for Internet posting.
Boards such as the HAMB will not allow paragraph indents and other small niceties of writing, but it works well once you learn how to deal with it.

If you enjoyed this book, I think you'll enjoy the Pinky book even more.
The black 40 - as mentioned in a post above - is a major player in the book.
All about high school and hot rods, but most of all about a very special girl.
It's 536 pages, written to appeal to both genders and I think you'll like it.

If there's enough interest I can order some more in and give them to the HAMB'rs at my price.
Just let me know.

I'm glad y'all enjoyed The Red Roadster and I enjoyed seeing it out there where it could be read instead of dying on my shelf of books.

Many thanks for all the nice comments.

 

i'd definitely be interested in a copy of whatever you can get, man. missed out the first time due to low funds, i figure i can scrape some together now.

 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
If you don't mind me asking, why didn't you get it published?


[/ QUOTE ]

Main one being I didn't think it would be acceptable to publishers due to the way it was written.
Mostly narrative form and very little dialogue.
Many thanks for all the nice comments.


[/ QUOTE ]

What I did like about how it was writen is it is relateable (sp?)to how hot rodders talk!!

I felt that I was in the same room with you "bench Racing" and having a beer!!

I kept thinking of the format of the movie "Little Big Man"!

It worked for me....!

Thanks

Mark

 

This AWESOME story just had to be brought back up to the first page.

There are so many new folks around that I think would really enjoy it.

 

Very nice Denise . . . and thanks.

You're a sweetheart.

We all knew that anyway, but it's good for you to hear it out loud....

 

The links to parts 1, 2, and 3, and printing info don't work!

 

Me too.

I think you can only search one year back.


I'll dig out the other parts and post em.

 

Found the other parts, but they won't post properly until I get some double lines between all the paragraphs.

Has to do with the differing formats between word processing programs and the format the HAMB uses.
I'll try to have them up this evening....

 

I'm sorry Jay, I didn't mean to cause you alot work........especially at this busy time of year.

 

Not a problem.
Just hangin' out till Sweetie gets ready to head uptown - as well as wait for the garage temp to rise a bit.

Finally found an inch-pound beam-style torque wrench so I can start putting my Auburn locker (9") together.
It's sorta scattered from one end of the workbench to the other.


Anyway, how did you find part 4?

Seems like you can only search the HAMB one year back and the posting is at least two years old.

 

I have secret, magic powers.