“They saw their injured country's woe;
The flaming town, the wasted field;
Then rushed to meet the insulting foe;
They took the spear, - but left the shield.”
―Philip Freneau
.
And by a prudent flight and cunning save A life which valour could not, from the grave. A better buckler I can soon regain, But who can get another life again?
Archilochus
Friday, March 4, 2022
Monsters Really Exist
Green Monster
1963-66
Built by Walt Arfons. Driven by Doug Rose. On July 4, 1966, Rose crashed at the Cedar Hills Drag Strip in Richlands, Virginia. He had to have both of his legs amputated. 271 mph top speed.
It was racing bad boy Nero Steptoe that proposed that faster cars needed to be bean-shaped and lower to the ground. My dad as a kid hung out in his garage. 50 or so years later, car manufacturers started making bean-shaped sports cars
...and of course, most of the NASCAR regulations and rulebooks were written to outlaw Nero Steptoe's mods, like a set of super long coiled fuel lines that effectively gave him two gas tanks lol
My older brother was into slot cars... and there were quite a few tracks in our early 60's California neighborhood when I was growing up. He'd build and paint the cars, and then give me the crappy ones to race against him... and of course, it was always my job to put his cars back on the track when he crashed.
My Boy Scout years were filled with Pinewood Derby trophies. My Dad was a master of woodworking and metalsmithing so I would draw a picture of what I wanted and he would turn a block of wood into a supercar. My favorite one was a sleek, chrome foil wrapped Stingray Corvette looking spaceship car with a teardrop shaped cockpit at the back of it that tapered into a sharkfin. Beneath the foil of course was evidence that we replaced all the weight carved out of the block of wood with molten lead fishing line weights to bring the car back up to maximum weight, but front heavy lol. Topped off with squirts of graphite dust on the axles to reduce friction. We blew away all the pocket knife whittled bullshit cars. My Dad took racing seriously lol
The only project my dad ever helped me with was restoring a canvas kayak. I had found an old broken kayak frame on which I replaced a few structural pieces... but I couldn't figure out had to get the new canvas back on. He figured how to efficiently wrap the whole thing and then cut out the cockpit, which for the life of me, I would never have figured out.
It ended up being a pretty good little fishing boat... and it probably only weighed 10 pounds after doping and sealing the exterior. I used to tie it to the top of our car and drive up to Sandy Wool Lake and fish in the evenings. Goof times. :)
Of course I loved HS... Saturday nights in the stands of San Jose Speedway, drinking beers and smoking doobies with the crew from the Straw Hat Pizza parlor after bussing tables and washing pizza pans. We used to trade pizza's for weed @ work...
This was my Uncle Louie's place.... before Frontier Village ran him out of business. He loved San Jose and its' history and art. His father had been a state legislator, and gf had run for governor on the Republican ticket. His father was a "Progressive" for La Foyette. He provided an oral history of the Progressive Party in California.
His gf... General George S. Evans General George S. Evans came to California in 1849 by way of Michigan and Texas, where he served in the Texas Rangers. Over the next ten years he was involved in mining, business, and eventually government work for both Tuolumne County and the State of California. He married Fannie Markham of Sonora in 1857. On October 16, 1861, he joined the California Volunteers at Camp Alert in San Francisco and was commissioned as a major, and later a lieutenant colonel, in the Tuolumne Rangers, Company E, Second Cavalry. Over the next two years he led three companies on Indian campaigns in Southern California and Utah. In 1863 he resigned his commission and returned to California, where he was involved in politics, serving as a state senator and the mayor of Stockton. In the 1880's he made an unsuccessful bid to be the Republican Party's gubernatorial candidate. He moved to San Francisco with his family in 1880, when he was appointed the State Harbor Commissioner. He remained there until his death in 1883.
15 comments:
slow poke
Yeah, but can he crash it and only lose two legs?
Probably not, but it's street legal. Just gotta change the tires every 15 miles :P
Who's gonna crash a $4 million supercar and want to live anyway?
It was racing bad boy Nero Steptoe that proposed that faster cars needed to be bean-shaped and lower to the ground. My dad as a kid hung out in his garage. 50 or so years later, car manufacturers started making bean-shaped sports cars
...and of course, most of the NASCAR regulations and rulebooks were written to outlaw Nero Steptoe's mods, like a set of super long coiled fuel lines that effectively gave him two gas tanks lol
Moonshine runners lol
My older brother was into slot cars... and there were quite a few tracks in our early 60's California neighborhood when I was growing up. He'd build and paint the cars, and then give me the crappy ones to race against him... and of course, it was always my job to put his cars back on the track when he crashed.
My Boy Scout years were filled with Pinewood Derby trophies. My Dad was a master of woodworking and metalsmithing so I would draw a picture of what I wanted and he would turn a block of wood into a supercar. My favorite one was a sleek, chrome foil wrapped Stingray Corvette looking spaceship car with a teardrop shaped cockpit at the back of it that tapered into a sharkfin. Beneath the foil of course was evidence that we replaced all the weight carved out of the block of wood with molten lead fishing line weights to bring the car back up to maximum weight, but front heavy lol. Topped off with squirts of graphite dust on the axles to reduce friction. We blew away all the pocket knife whittled bullshit cars. My Dad took racing seriously lol
The only project my dad ever helped me with was restoring a canvas kayak. I had found an old broken kayak frame on which I replaced a few structural pieces... but I couldn't figure out had to get the new canvas back on. He figured how to efficiently wrap the whole thing and then cut out the cockpit, which for the life of me, I would never have figured out.
It ended up being a pretty good little fishing boat... and it probably only weighed 10 pounds after doping and sealing the exterior. I used to tie it to the top of our car and drive up to Sandy Wool Lake and fish in the evenings. Goof times. :)
Of course I loved HS... Saturday nights in the stands of San Jose Speedway, drinking beers and smoking doobies with the crew from the Straw Hat Pizza parlor after bussing tables and washing pizza pans. We used to trade pizza's for weed @ work...
Silicon Valley before the silicon took over...
This was my Uncle Louie's place.... before Frontier Village ran him out of business. He loved San Jose and its' history and art. His father had been a state legislator, and gf had run for governor on the Republican ticket. His father was a "Progressive" for La Foyette. He provided an oral history of the Progressive Party in California.
His gf... General George S. Evans
General George S. Evans came to California in 1849 by way of Michigan and Texas, where he served in the Texas Rangers. Over the next ten years he was involved in mining, business, and eventually government work for both Tuolumne County and the State of California. He married Fannie Markham of Sonora in 1857. On October 16, 1861, he joined the California Volunteers at Camp Alert in San Francisco and was commissioned as a major, and later a lieutenant colonel, in the Tuolumne Rangers, Company E, Second Cavalry. Over the next two years he led three companies on Indian campaigns in Southern California and Utah. In 1863 he resigned his commission and returned to California, where he was involved in politics, serving as a state senator and the mayor of Stockton. In the 1880's he made an unsuccessful bid to be the Republican Party's gubernatorial candidate. He moved to San Francisco with his family in 1880, when he was appointed the State Harbor Commissioner. He remained there until his death in 1883.
Source
I used to listen to my Uncle Louie's stories for hours. He knew the entire history of San Jose from its' early days.
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