Written By Kenneth Kinder
I was sitting at the Del Norte Health Club today waiting for Janey to finish her water aerobics class. I had located myself in a chair under a shade tree and was watching a group of young children enjoying the swimming pool. Bea was sitting with me and we were discussing their young age and the physical accomplishments they had attained in their few years on earth. Bea said this one child couldn’t be over six years old and I had to agree.
For some reason my mind started to wander, and I thought about the farm children and the early age they were allowed to operate farm equipment. In fact in some of our heartland states, children were excused from school to help in the harvest due to the low budget and shortage of man power. I then thought back to how young Neal and I were when we learned to drive. We were not a lot older than some of these children. I learned to drive in El Monte at my sister Firelans house, and the only gears I knew were first gear and reverse. They had a long driveway and a large hay lot next door. My other sister Wanda came to visit and borrowed sisters car to go to town. She asked if I would like to come along ? I said sure, and asked can I drive the car? She ask if I knew how, and I replied yes so she said go ahead. I took off down the street and after about a block, she said maybe you should shift gears. I replied this is the only forward gear that I can use. Needless to say I had to pull over and relinquish control of Henry Fords marvelous machine. Well I determined real quick how to use the rest of that transmission. I was under ten years old and by the time I was fourteen and got my first drivers license I had my second old car. When I was fifteen, Wanda had to verify that I was sixteen years old so I could get a work permit to allow me a job at U.S. Rubber Co. inspecting tires. I would work the midnight shift at U.S. Rubber, take a shower at the plant and then drive from Los Angeles to El Monte to attend high school. This was not a full time job, as the tire companies bid and got a large contract to fill, they would hire a large group of people for work until they met this obligation. After a few of these short jobs if you were dependable, you had a good chance of landing a steady position. This in point of fact was my situation when my nemesis (Neal) called that summer of 1949 and told me his big story about logging. This might sound strange to a lot of people; but we lived in a different time, and it was not unusual for young people to hitch-hike all over the country.
Cars were a way of life for anyone that lived in California during my youth. Tickets were another thing that was the result of ownership for some of these drivers, big brother being one of these people. There came a time in Neals life that he got more tickets than his glove box could accommodate. In the middle 1940’s juveniles were not fined for traffic offenses. What was required was a visit to the judge with one or both of your parents. Neal had mom on a first name basis with the judge in Pasadena, Cal. At one time Neal had a grand total of 37 tickets, and the judge wasn’t a happy camper. Poor old mom was standing there before the bar of justice pleading with the judge to let her son keep his drivers license. This magistrate gave Neal a huge book of vehicle codes and orders to memorize the contents. He said to come back in six weeks and he would then test him on the contents. Neal didn’t even break the covers of this book, and when he came before the judge six weeks later, and was asked did you read this manual from cover to cover? He lied through his teeth and replied yes, (so this simple judge said ok. go and sin no more). As for sweet little me I only got one ticket while we lived in the L.A. area and that was because I didn’t have the horse-power to out run the cop.
Now there are other way’s to travel besides automobiles. And Janey’s oldest brother Alpha (Tug) Cox told me about one of them on a trip we took to deliver his boat to Lake Almanor. We were discussing the day’s of our youth and the good times we had. He asked me if I ever rode the rails? My reply was no but I had always had a desire to do so. My wish was to have enough money to buy food and necessities but hobo just for the transportation. I had hoped to try this for a summer when I got out of the Army; but I had a job driving truck waiting for me and was afraid of losing it if I didn’t start right away. Tug said he used to catch a ride on the rails to Sacramento when he couldn’t make other arrangements. He was telling me about one time he took this girl with him that was a friend of the family. He said he was just trying to be nice and take her to the big city and back; but the train went through a long tunnel between Sacramento and Colfax. Going through this tunnel was quite an experience, as the smoke from the multiple engines stacks put out enough smoke to let you enjoy the thrill of being black, so you could put in your claim for forty acres and a mule. When he got this lovely female home her skin and clothes were so black that her folks were ready to shoot him. So if you use this mode of travel, choose your company carefully.
My father was a very capable man, but his main job was working as a mechanic. He could repair almost any type of engine, steam, gasoline, diesel etc. So it was in this way that we were exposed to cars at such an early age. As I had written earlier dad was dead set against motorcycles, but cars were another story. Neal put more money into cars than me, but he didn’t like working on them. So while he was working at the Market Basket, I was working part time at dads garage, pumping gas, tearing down motors, and cleaning parts. Dad did the technical work and I was just a flunky. It was during this time right after WW 2 that Neal joined two organizations, the Southern California Timing Association ( S.C.T.A.) [and they still exist today] , also The El Monte Six Barrels. A car club dedicated to Chevrolet owners. Neal had some pretty nice custom cars but he wanted more. So we got on dads case about building Neal a hot rod. Neal purchased this nice 32 Ford Deuce Coupe, and dad built him one hot puppy. Only problem he wouldn’t let him race it, especially on the track. It was hard to control Neal off the track, but racing on the track required our parents written permission.
So here sets Neal with a racer that he can’t race, so the next best choice is hire a driver to race your monster for you. This is exactly what Neal did for a few races long enough to win some trophies. I remember the first week-end we got this roadster running, we didn’t have it completely bolted together. No floorboards were installed, no registration was purchased, and last but not least it had not been road tested to any degree. What the heck this doesn’t hold back three qualified Okies. I forgot to mention that we were going to take a maiden voyage from Southern Cal. to the upper middle part of the state, and we had our seventy something grand-dad riding in the rumble seat. Thats right Hee-Haw is riding shot gun and pity any one that followed to close, cause he had a mouth full of Day’s Work chewing tobacco, and a strong tail wind in which to spit. Well this is just the beginning of this trip, because after driving all night and properly breaking in this engine we end up getting stopped in Sanger Cal. by the city police. Like I said we were minus the proper registration, and a few other minor infractions of the vehicle code.
The good news was we were at our destination, the home of our uncle Pete, Hee-Haws middle son and better yet the main mechanic on all the city police cars. When they discovered who we were, we were treated like a rich Chinaman by the Republican party seeking money for some of their congressional races. (Shades of Johnny Chung). The police gave us an escort to uncle Petes house, and after a nice visit a couple of good meals, and some minor tuning on Neals roadster we left Sanger again with a police escort and a caution to travel after dark so we would be harder to spot. Neal still had this little racer when he moved to Grass Valley in 1949. The first winter he forgot to drain the water from the block, and the frozen water cracked the heads. Neal didn’t have any money to repair it because his hungry logging truck ate all our cash, so he sold it to one of our friends Don Wirta and he never did repair the last of the really hot rods . Like the song said we had joy we had fun we had seasons in the Sun.