You'll hate me for this but the pictures are home in MD. Army has me in AZ. The alleys on Butternut......"Mr.G's" garage? We used to buy cars from there all the time that people didn't want to fix. Then again we dumped a couple in the alley too. At one point we lived on Eastern Ave. just across the line from Takoma park and travelled Butternut to Walter Reed Hospital. After moving to my grandparents house off Piney Branch we still used to circle all the same areas. In that area, we'd race in one district and then sit in another till the police went away. DId the same thing At V. Street. I'll see if the misses can scan and send pictures. Should have ma in the 40' convertible, her Desoto being raffled at the drive in, several of racing her Triumph and the T-bucket.
........Sorry rc., but these guys lived in the Lanham/ Seabrook area on or near Whitfield Chapel rd. (not far from George Palmer Hwy.). Their first names have escaped my memory. This would have been in the late 60's.
The garage at 4th and Butternut was just a two car residential garage that some old lady rented to my boss. It was mostly a place that we stored a couple of small trailers. Our office was a dinky place over top of Chances R. on Georgia Ave down from Shepherd's Park.
Dad and French went to Coolidge and lived at the time on Eastern Ave across the DC line from PG. French work on rte.450 if my memory serves me and the PG area was there preferred stomping grounds. Late 50's-late 60's. Up until recently, french still had the stroked 348 of my dads from back then.
.........These two (Grimes Brothers) would show up at the Capitol Plaza Hot Shoppes (on Rt. 450) in their black primered '55 Chevy (post car) prepared to find a race. If I recall correctly (it's been a long time) the car had an Olds rear and was a pretty serious street driven hot rod. Don't know if these were relatives of yours or if they were in fact your Dad and Uncle.
Spent more time than I should have in the Shepard Park. Used to drink lunch there when I was doing machine work at American Instrument on Georgia Ave. My home was on the 7200 block of Blair Rd in the District, so instead of going back to work, I'd just head on down Blair to home! Lovely ladies at the Park, yesindeedee. Used to hit Cousin Nick's every once in a while, as well. Best times were spent at the Mo, and Kustoms' shop, though. One of the guys I worked with at AMINCO was a gearhead, last name Tabor. Anyone know him? Cannot pull his first name up to save my ass. Last time I saw him he was working out of a small one-car in the Bladensburg area building a slingshot, I think. That was around '72. Used to drive a early fifties Chev panel as a beater.
I think if my memory is right (and that's doubtful) Shep Park as it was fondly referred to finally met it's demise when someone who had been tossed out came back and threw a molotov cocktail in the front door and the place went up in flames killing one of the patrons inside. The neighborhood association had been trying to shut it down for years before the incident.
Kenny Tabor? I have a buddy (Joe Venuto) who used to be friends with him. He had a one car garage on the corner of Rt 1 and East West Hwy in Riverdale, where I sometimes hung out in the evenings with Joe. I think by then Joe had pretty much taken over the garage and Kenny wasn't around much.
Yes, I think it was Kenny. He was a wild man, no doubt. I made the mistake of being along for a ride in the panel truck when he took it out for some off-roading out at Santee. Myself and another guy were thrown around like rag dolls 'cause there was only the driver's seat, and not much to grab onto. Lotsa beer=no fear...Charley
Mom used to load my brothers and I into her Impala wagon (complete w/396 and wood paneling) to go retrieve my father and several of his co-workers who would escape from Walter Reed to drink their lunch their. It did get torched in 77 by a customer with a can of gas. Below is a mural of Sheperd Park by a DC artist. Have fun spotting people cause he used real patrons.
That is very cool, R.C. I was in the basement/rec. room of a retired D.C. firefighter a number of yrs. ago giving him an estimate on some insulation work and he had a framed print of this mural behind his bar. It was the first time I had ever seen it. Do you by chance remember the name of the artist? I would like to try and get a copy....................Thanks a bunch, Don.
I hope you don't want the full size print cause it is over six feet tall and 19 feet wide! The artist is Fred Folsom and the painting was called "Last Call (at the Shepherd Go-Go Bar)". I attached a link to his site. His contact info is there and he's still in MD. http://www.fredfolsom.com/artwork/vartwork2.htm
I don't remember if I posted this before or not. Queens Chapel Drive-in and Mo: http://www.historicaerials.com/aerials.php?scale=4E-06&lat=38.9551025443125&lon=-76.969882&year=1980
Burger Chef - Cheverly "A plate glass window and an automobile window were broken during a fight that broke out October 1 ,1960 at this location. At least a dozen participants were involved, using fists, a tire chain and a knife. Police determined that that melee was sparked by a dispute over the right-of-way in the Drive-in's parking lot and some insulting remarks made to a lone girl returning from a dance at the Bladensburg fire house. One adult was allegedly injured after a trash can was hurled into the drive-in shattering its window". (3 Hurt as Dozen Fight in Bladensburg Brawl, The Washington Post, 2 Oct 1960, Page A3) This site is now Peking Garden Chinese Restaurant.
Bringing this thread back to the top to celebrate the return to the HAMB of our pal, Tommy, after a lengthy absence. Hope this return to the top will jog some memories of more great stories from that era or maybe some new folks on here will see it and chime in with their remembrances...........Pictures would also be great.........Don.
A crowd was gathering around the GTO that was not a regular. So we mosyed over to see what was up. They broke up and someone yelled "NASA" We all new it meant that they were going to race in front of the Goddard space flight center building on 197. Nobody needed directions so we all lined the course on 197 to watch. Jack Remington got chosen to be flagman. just over the hill a cop car with the bubble gum machine flashing went down out of sight in the holler headed our way. Every one scattered and Jack ran up into the woods It looked like a LeMans start with all the cars pulling out onto the highway. After we were back on the highway driving like good citizens the "police car" passes us and it turned out out be an ambulance. A Cadillac which was the norm back then no rescue squad trucks back then. No accidents and we all rode quietly back to the Mo. Someone asked where's Jack??? He rode out to the race in someones car and got left there in all the confusion. A couple of hours later he got dropped off in front of the Mo after hitch hiking back. He was less than pleased!!! Just another Sat night at the Mo.
Last time I was through the old neighborhood it looked like Somalia. Good thing we've got memories 'cause there's no going back.
......If you leave the campus at U. of Maryland and head up University Blvd. toward the beltway past the original Ledo's in Adelphi you would think you made a wrong turn into El Salvador.
The wife and I lived in Langley Park Apartments back in the late seventies. We were in one of the last buildings that was clean and roach free. The South American gangs were coming in. They were burning cars in the back lots and attacking each other with machettes. Some South Americans moved in our building and trashed the hallway regularly with garbage. They brought roaches. It was time to go! I'm not affraid of copperheads, rattle snakes or spiders but I hate phukin roaches!
Too young to remember the Mo it was gone when I started driving. I do remember sitting on the wall at the Palmer Ford dealership watching the drive in movie when funds were tight. Catching a buz behind Northwestern H.S. during summer school. Going down to V st NE to watch some racing. Parking down near the river in Bladensburg with your girl. Eating one of the best burgers on the planet at Ray's Ranch House in Queenstown. Watching Chicken George shoot arrows at passing cars from his yard near peace cross (that man was certifiable). Lottsford road, cry baby bridge, PG Plaza, Ledo's, Capital Plaza, Tic Tock, Jimmy Comers Tippy's Tacos, Town Hall, The "Vue", Kim's Hideaway, Frankie's and Charlie's, Jimmy's Crab House and standing in line with the other drunks getting crappy tacos at Jack in the Box on University Blvd when everything else was closed.
...............We used to see who could drive the fastest down Lottsford-Vista Rd. between the "kissing trees", 2 huge Oak trees that intruded onto the road surface so close that you could hardly drive past without hitting one or both when at speed. Every now and then you would hear of someone totaling a car there. We used to hold timed runs on Fletchertown Rd. near Old Bowie, then a narrow, crowned, barely 2 lane road than ran between Hillmeade Rd. and Hightop Rd. I crashed my motorcycle there late one night when a thin layer of dew had settled on the pavement. Ah, my miss-spent youth.
I think I know where Fletchertown Rd is, not far from where GlenDale Rd. used to cross the RR tracks. We used to go target shooting down the tracks a ways near a swamp of sorts. Now I have been told Greenbelt road runs into GlenDale Blvd. bypassing the old 2 lane road. I have not been out that way in 30 years, I wonder if Its still recognizable.
......It's now a nicely paved, much wider street with nice big houses and streetlights, and no sign of the "Goatman" anywhere.
The Jalopy Journal
