Good exercise for snowy, cold days to think back to your youth, eh? My dad
was a carpenter so when I became interested in hot rods, about age 11 or 12
I think, I was on my own. I would haunt the local cigar store waiting for
the next month's issue of Rod and Custom (the little ones) and read them in
study hall. Small town in upstate New York so there weren't many cars/hot
rodders to hand with. There was a welding shop in our town owned by a guy
named Gordon Ross. He ran a NASCAR modified at the now defunct Agawam, MA
race track. Great little '37 Chev coupe. Started hanging out there when I
got my license at 16 and he evidently took a liking to me. He used to break
in the small blocks for his race car by putting them in an old '47 Ford
tudor and pushing his welding truck with the sedan up Route 9. Sold me that
tudor sedan with the aluminum adapter chev/ford for $75 dollars. I found a
'57 Chev 283 in a local junkyard, this being about 1960, and rebuilt it in a
barn, running up to the weld shop and asking questions almost daily. I was
one proud kid when I got that rig on the road! I was working at Mac's mobil
station part time then and the boss did a lot of work on state trooper cars
so he kept me out of hot water several times a month. Been bitten by the
bug ever since. Took a hiatus in the late sixties/early seventies to tour
the oceans of the world in Uncle Sam's submarine force but started back up
once I was back on land to stay. I'll never forget my mother, in response
to another ladies remark about my general greasy state of dress, that at
least she always knew where I was on a Saturday night as she could look out
the kitchen window and watch me doing my almost weekly transmission change
on the sedan, having lunched another '39 Ford tranny. Wow, used to buy them
for $5-10 apiece. Had quite a pile of cases when I went into the Navy.
-----Original Message-----
From: dahlgren <dahlgren@uconect.net>
To: DOUG ODOM <popms@thegrid.net>
Cc: Land-speed@autox.team.net <Land-speed@autox.team.net>
Date: Thursday, January 27, 2000 6:31 AM
Subject: Re: Youngsters
>Real nice thought even if they never race a car in their life..Kinda
>what is all about in the big picture..I remember working on Nascar
>Modifieds as a very young boy and will never forget the 'chances' to get
>a ride while they pulled it up on the trailer.. My neighbor had one that
>Carl 'Buggsy' Stevens drove before he was famous. An injected SBC, at 12
>I could do the air density stuff and come up with the right pill size
>while my buddies were struggling with their 'hill buggies' LOL.. Those
>sounds and smells are what got me in the racing business for life. All
>started at the tender age of 8. Later in high school as a senior we had
>a substitute auto shop teacher that claimed to drive a TF car. He had
>pics and brought in the fire suit and we talked a lot about racing and
>safety but all thought he was BS'ing us all. He finally brought it in
>and fired it and did a short couple of burnouts in the parking lot. I
>got the honor of priming the blower with alky to fire it while two
>buddies wrestled with the starter.. A real hoot if there ever was one. I
>thought we were going to break every window in the building.. Oh well
>sorry to ramble but this thread reminded me of some nice days gone by
>now..
>
>Dave Dahlgren
>
>DOUG ODOM wrote:
>>
>> Dick, Your message about your crew member in school made me think. I
>> take our car down to the local high school auto shop once a year. The
>> shop teacher makes arrangements with the other shops and even the math
>> teachers to have a small assembly. The kids ask a lot of questions and
>> are interested. We try and explain how much math and calculations it
>> takes to run fast or for a record. The fact that an attractive woman on
>> the team drives the car with the E motor in it and is in the 200mph club
>> brings extra interest from the girls. At lunch time the word has spread
>> and a lot of non shop kids come down and take a look also. I think if we
>> can get some of the younger people interested more people will enjoy the
>> sport.
>> The shop teacher will have one or two kids that are the top of
his
>> class and I'll let them come over to the shop on a weekend and help with
>> some little thing on the car. I'm no teacher, but if you show some kid
>> how to make a fender brace with the shrinker - stretcher and you put the
>> part on the car that he made, you will see their eyes light up.
>> Just a thought, Doug
>
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