...And In Between...

Believe it or not, there were many other aspects in our lives beside driving around in little bitty cars.  A few of our extra activities included our cars, but not necessarily.

When we would have a free Sunday, which wasn’t often, we might drive around town with Zan and Carolyn.  She and I, with Tracy, their baby boy, would be in the Porsche.  The guys would be in their Austin Healey, following us.  If we came to a stop light and there happened to be boys in a car next to us, Carolyn would put Tracy on the floor, so two girls in a sports car could talk to the “hunks” in the other car.  Then Bill and Zan would drive up and claim us as their wives!

We also went on a camping trip with Zan, Carolyn, and Tracy.  We went up into the mountains of Colorado to the Cripple Creek area.  By then, Tracy was just learning to walk.  The slope of the terrain was quite a challenge for the little fellow.  While on that trip we went to the melodrama in Cripple Creek.  You know the kind where you boo and hiss the villain and oh and ah the damsel in distress and cheer wildly when the hero appears and saves her from the villain's dastardly deeds.  It was a fun trip.

Bill was on a bowling team, sponsored by Paul Ellis Automotive Parts, who paid for their shirts and bowling fees.  His team members were his dad, Harold, plus Roy Gladson, and Paul Ellis.  I was the score keeper.  Way back then the electronic scoring machines hadn’t been invented.

Every week, they would each put a dollar in the “kitty.”  Whoever bowled the most over his average won the “pot.”  Bill won every week, but always made sure not to raise his average too much.  It was our “eating out” money.

There was a Mexican restaurant that had a Monday night special...one enchilada dinner for $1.00, a second one for free.  That’s a “back in the good old days” story, eh?  We usually met Ronnie and Roberta there for dinner.  Wow!  What a deal!  And the food was really, really good.

Phase Three...Racing (again)

At some point in time, an event was held at Rattlesnake Raceway.  It wasn’t a sanctioned race.  It was a team event, with two drivers per team.  I signed up to be Bill’s co-driver.  I didn’t have a competition license, but could drive in this event.

From the back, it was hard to tell who was wearing the racing helmet and driving at that time.  I was in a very difficult part of the track when Peewee, driving an AC Bristol. came up behind me.  His car was more powerful than our little Sprite.  He was trying to push me into the corner.  I kept my foot on the “go pedal” and stayed in front of him to the straight-away.

Peewee said when he saw the Sprite in front of him he thought, “I’m going to push Bill into this corner and see if I can make him spin out.”  When he passed and saw me in the car instead of Bill, guess who spun?  Right...Peewee!  I think that day, he learned not to mess with me!

Some weeks later, we were back at the Midland track.  I was at the side of the track, watching the race with Ronnie Rone.  Just as Dave Fawcett, owner of the foreign car dealership in Lubbock, and a friend of ours, came into view.  Another car drove over the top of his open car, killing him instantly!  It was a sight I will never forget.  From then on, I had no interest in driving a car on a racetrack.

Bill drove in two more races that spring, but we can’t remember when or where they were.

Phase Three...Racing (continued)

We started the 1963 racing season in March at Green Valley Raceway, in Fort Worth.  Bill had his first DNF in the Sprite.  He had a broken rotor cap that sidelined him.  Shucks!

It wasn’t a weekend without excitement, however.  Our friends, Ronnie and Roberta Rone were at the race, also.  Roberta and I would watch the races from the stands for awhile and then go down to the hair pin turn, which was the last turn, and watch from there.  

We took Mother’s car and drove about a half mile to find a good spot.  There were about four dips, probably for drainage, and I drove very carefully down and back up each one.

We were watching one of Ronnie’s races when we saw a cloud of dust where his car should be.  The yellow flag went out and an ambulance went onto the track.  Needless to say, Roberta was stressed big time!  We jumped back in the car and took off for the pits.  Later, neither of us could remember any of the dips.  We must have been airborne.

We got back to the pits just as the ambulance arrived.  Ronnie had flipped his car and put his arm up to keep the ground from hurting his race car.  Dah!  Not a good idea.  We took him to a hospital where they set his broken arm.  

He was still in a world of hurt the next day, so Roberta and I drove the Dodge, towing the Sprite, back to Lubbock.  Ronnie lay in the back and moaned and groaned all the way.  Bill drove their car and towed their wrecked race car back.  Ronnie was about 6’5” and wouldn’t fit in the back of their car.  That’s why we used the Dodge as a make shift medical vehicle on the way home.

What a weekend!

Bill’s sixth race was back at Fort Sumner, New Mexico.  Because of the remoteness of the track and the fact that many of the drivers were single guys, Carolyn and I decided to poll the group to see how many of them would buy lunch from us.  We took all the makings for ham and cheese sandwiches, condiments, chips, homemade cookies, and a large cooler of sodas.

Our work station was the trunk of the Dodge.  I can’t remember how many lunches we served that day, or how much we charged, but we made enough money to pay for the trip, and feed the four of us.

Bill and I had purchased a slicer (kind of like an “As Seen on TV” thing).  We used the slicer for the tomatoes.  Peewee, who always had a comment, said we sliced the tomatoes so thin you could read a newspaper through them.  In spite of that, he came back for seconds.  

By the way, somewhere along the way, we got rid of the slicer.  Over the years, we have both wished we still had it.  It was a great little gadget and I think we paid a dollar for it.

Denise McCluggage raced at Fort Sumner, also, that weekend.  She had raced at big tracks like Sebring, but she drove at small places, too.  She also wrote article on racing for newspapers and magazines.  I can’t remember much about her except that she had a white helmet with dots on it.  Peewee, in his usual fashion, called her Dirty Knees instead of Denise.

The race was fun that weekend.  Bill was a very good driver and won both his Saturday and Sunday races.  He liked to experiment to see which lane on the track was the fastest.  In the process, he siked Zan out.  Zan thought he was as good a driver as Bill, but he wasn’t.  On every lap, Bill would be ahead on the last corner, but would let Zan pass him at the finish line.  When it was time for the last lap, I would signal Bill from the sideline and he would race across the finish line with Zan in second place, never knowing how Bill had set him up.

Phase Three...Racing

Phase Three...Racing

In the spring of 1962, Bill started driving the Sprite at the Sports Car Club of America level.  SCCA was the major sanctioning group for amateur racing  in this country.

Bill’s first driver’s school was in Midland, Texas, at Rattlesnake Raceway.  The track was built by Jim Hall where he developed the Chaparral, among other things.  It was fiberglass and had a wing on the back to help hold it down on the track.

Rattlesnake Raceway was a road course, built out in the middle of a sand dune area.  One time, another car went off the track and threw sand onto the pavement.  When Bill came around, being in the lead, he got into the sand and slid off the track  He rolled the Sprite.  The yellow flag came out and everyone else slowed down. The only damage I can remember was a scratch on top of his racing helmet and the radio antenna was broken off.

Bill had to have three driver’s schoosl before he would get his competition license.  The second one was in June at Green Valley Raceway in the Forth Worth area.  The school was on Friday and races were held on Saturday and Sunday.  Bill was allowed to drive the races as a novice.  The Sprite was marked with an “X” on back, to let other drivers know he was a ”newbie.”  The “X” wasn’t for “X marks the spot, hit here.”  It was to warn the “pros” this guy was new.  Watch out!  

There were 41 Sprites in Bill’s class (HP).  Because he was a novice he started from the very back of the field.  He couldn’t even see the front of the group.  The flagger dropped the green flag and everyone took off.  So did Bill!  He finished 17th one day and 19th the other.  Not bad for a beginner in such a large field!

For his last Driver’s School, he was back at Rattlesnake Raceway.  Jim Hall was a celebrity in the racing world and shared his facility and his knowledge with other racers.  And he was always in the pits with the rest of us.  One time, years later after we had moved to Colorado,  we went to see him race at a track north of where we lived.  When he saw us, he said, “Hi, Bill.  How are you?”  He was definitely a “people person.”

Bill’s second race was also at Green Valley in September.  

To say we were racing on a shoe string would be a gross understatement.  We bought his helmet, and his racing suit had to be fire proof.  They were expensive so we made some flame retardant powder out of Borax and a few other things, put it and water in a bucket, and soaked his suit in it.  My, how things have changed!  Bill remembers the suit being short sleeved.  It was the kind of one piece thing an old man might wear to work in his yard.  His shoes had to be leather so he wore his bowling shoes.  We towed the Sprite with my mother’s Dodge Dart.  She generously let us use it to go to all those races.  I think she secretly liked to have an excuse to stay home and work on her craft projects.

The third race was in Fort Sumner, New Mexico in October. It was at an old airport.  The course was set up on the landing strips.  All I can remember about the place was the remoteness of it.

The last race for 1962 was in November.   It was once again in Midland at Rattlesnake Raceway.  We enjoyed being there and it was the closest track to Lubbock.  The little Sprite had performed flawlessly all year long.

(To be continued.)

Phase Two...Weekend Events...Gymkhanas

At the time we were involved in crazy car stuff, a gymkhana was an event where cones were set up to make a course and one car would drive at a time.  Points were added to your time if you knocked a cone over.  If you got off course, you went back to the place you transgressed, as the clock kept running.  Otherwise, you were disqualified.

Nowadays, they might be called autocrosses or Solo 1 and Solo 2.  Times are changing!

Anyway, we had lots of gymkhanas..some complicated and some kind of Mickey Mouse.  Because Texas had what was called the Blue Law then, we were able to use business parking lots.  The Blue Law required businesses to close either on Saturday or Sunday. 

All of these events were fun, and our little Sprite preformed well.  We won more than our fair share of these events.  Most of the wins didn’t come with trophies, but we were awarded dash plaques, which we proudly displayed on the dash of our cars.

The Mickey Mouse, or out of the ordaniary, events were the most fun and memorable.  At one such event, the driver was blindfolded and the passenger would tell which way the car should turn.  Our friend, Carolyn, was teamed with Kent Clark, aka Superman.  She sat behind him, on the deck of “The Bird.”  She would turn his head in the direction he needed to go.  The only problem with that plan was the tightness of some of the turns.  I think she nearly broke his neck or twisted his head off.  It was interesting to see the different methods people used to finish this event.

Another fun event was wrapping a rope around a pole.  A rope was tied to a light pole.  There was a knot at the other end.  The passenger held onto the knot with one hand.  If the rope touched the ground there was a penalty.  Wrapping it around the pole wasn’t much of a problem, but unwrapping it was a different matter.  It was a challenge to see how high or how far away from the pole you could hold the rope.  Anything to keep it off the ground and still hold on to the knot.  Some people stood up to hold the rope high and hang onto the windshield with the other hand.  We remember one person climbing over the driver to hold the rope as far to the left as possible.

One time we had an event at a small dirt track a few miles outside of Lubbock.  We went out one at a time, so it wasn’t like a race, but it was a timed event.  As I was going around the track, Bill and PeeWee were standing on the edge watching.  PeeWee said, “I’d give $5.00 to see her spin.”  Just then I did.  Bill held out his hand to collect.

Zan, Carolyn, and the two of us went to the small town of Tahoka.  We met with the sheriff to discuss having an event in their town.  The downtown was typical of towns in those days...a court house in the middle of a square.  The sheriff arranged to have the streets blocked off on Sunday.  We were able to set up cones all around.b  We had a lot of spectators.  It was a unique event, but I don’t think we were ever invited back.

Phase Two...Weekend Events...Rallies (continued)

On one of the most unusual rallies we ever went on, the directions were written in Chinese.  Zan and his brother, Dale, planned it.  Dale was a graphic artist and quite creative.  The characters were written from top to bottom.  There were eight or nine pages of them.

We were the last car to leave the starting line. Zan told us this was one we wouldn’t win.  No one should ever tell us that.  We were more determined than ever.  

We drove for about half a block and decided we needed to take time to translate the instructions.  We had been given a key for the symbols.  By the time we had translated the first page, we had the symbols memorized.  From there on the translation was really quick and easy.  

Bill recalculated the time, distance, and speed, and off we went.  The checkpoint was a phone booth.  We were to call a number and report in.  Shirley, Dale’s wife, answered with “Lin Ling’s Chinese Take Out.”  In my best imitation of an Oriental accent, I ordered chow mein and several other things.  There was dead silence on the other end of the line.  Then, “Uh, uh, uh.”  I said, “This is Raymonda.  Please have my order ready when we get to the finish line.”

We continued to complete the rally.  The finish line was in the alley behind Dale and Shirley’s house.  We were right on time.  Only about half of the 25 or 30 cars in the event finished without opening their “panic instructions.”  Everyone else was late, some very, very late.  Zan said when he saw us stop a half block from the start, he knew we would win.

Once, Bill and I were in charge of a rally.  We can’t remember much about it except how the route was determined.  Bill and his tax appraiser partner had a city map and marked the proposed route as they went about their daily official business.  Your tax dollars at work!!!

Sometimes a rally would use unusual words and we would have to figure them out before we could follow the directions.  One was, “turn right at ustabe Cobb’s.”  Well, Cobb’s was a department store that had closed and the translation was, “turn right at use to be Cobb’s.  Depending on where  you put the accent determined what it meant.  We read it as “u STA be.”  To this day, we still include that word in our vocabulary. 

For the next part of this narrative about our rally days (or should that be “rally daze”), we are going to jump ahead in time, place, and family size...20 years, Casper, Wyoming, and four kids.

We were returning from Denver in our motorhome on a Sunday at mid-day.  As we went through Douglas, Wyoming, we noticed a group of sports cars gathered in a parking lot.  We pulled off the freeway to see what was going on, only to discover they were setting up a rally.  We hurried on to Casper, loaded snacks and water into the Honda, got the circular slide rule, clipboard, and stopwatch, and all six of us jumped into the little car and away we went, back to Douglas.

I really can’t remember much about the rally, other than the kids having a great time.  They had never been on a rally before and thought it was a lark.  And to top it off, we won the trophy.  Bill and I still had the “rally magic touch.”