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As I have been writing about my arrival in Grass Valley in 1949, and the adventures that Neal and I had logging and working in the woods. My mind wandered to one Saturday, that Neal and I had delivered a load of logs to Crawfords sawmill, in the small town of Colfax, California. We were headed back to our cabin in Grass Valley, when Neal spotted a guy from our recent past walking the streets of this small town. By recent past I mean like six months prior and what was so strange, was we had known this guy in El Monte close to 400 miles south of our present location.
His name was Luke (Bill) Sellers and he had been a classmate of ours in high school. He was the brunt end of the joke on so many occasions, and the only reason that comes to mind is his lack of fighting back when some-one pulled a prank on him. In other words he was an easy target. I remember about so many times that we would be at the Hula Hut, or Simons drive-in and some one would pants Luke and send his clothes up a light standard, or use him as a guinea pig for their barber college experiment. This was at the end of the war and a lot of our friends were veterans that were going to school on military money better known as the GI bill. This money could be used in many way’s and a lot of the guy’s found that barber college was the least strenuous on their mental faculties. Any how back to Luke. He was the type of guy that was happy just to be one of the gang. A gopher that was gullible and wanted to please.
At these drive-ins, cars would park three deep in line waiting for their car-hop on roller skates to bring their orders. It was usually at one of these locations that we would find Luke and have him do our bidding. This is where we would challenge other cars to a race at 5th avenue out in the country. A straight stretch of road that was wide and long enough to determine who had the fastest vehicle. Luke was always available to clean the windshields, change the flats, start the races, any thing that we needed he did.
So, when we spotted him walking the streets, we pulled over and asked him "what he was doing here so far from home? His reply, was don’t you remember down at the Hula Hut, you told me there was lot’s of work up here in the woods and that I should come on up." We probably had told him something along this line not thinking that he would follow through on our advice. So we loaded Luke in the truck, took him back to our huge 20+20 cabin and had him spend the weekend with us. On Monday morning we took him to the forestry dept and got him a job working in the woods up near Downeville a town high in the Sierra Nevada Mts.
Luke spent the whole summer working hard and at the end of his tour, he came by to thank us and tell us about his experiences. He said, "he had a great time with the forestry, made a few dollars and was heading home. He also told us he lost a good friend that he met while working there." This friend was killed by a bear while working in the woods.
This was in the fall of 1949, and the next time I saw Luke he was in a military hospital at Ft. Ord California. I was just going through my indoctrination to begin my training as a soldier in the Army. I received word that Luke was on this base and in the hospital. When I went to visit him he was pretty much the same personality, not complaining just excepting the fact this was the hand that was dealt him. His whole left shoulder was messed up, wounded while in Korea, and his last words to me were "be careful over there." To me this brunt end of the joke was a true hero, and I made up my mind that day to try and never be a participant in any stupid games that people pull on each other to demean or humiliate them.
It was at one of these same drive-ins in the winter of 1950, that I ran across another errant classmate. These drive-ins, were like the ones depicted in the movie American Graffiti, or the TV series Happy Day’s. I was back in southern Ca. because the weather in Grass Valley was to bad to let us do any logging, so I came down to visit relatives and friends. This classmates name was Willie Shoemaker. If you are at all familiar with horse racing and jockey’s, that name should ring a bell. Willie at one time was the winningest jockey of all times. I don’t know if that holds true today; but he held that title for a number of years.
How I knew Willie, was by sharing physical education classes with him. He was not very enthusiastic about school or education, his only interest lay in horses. He was constantly asking me to cut classes and give him a ride to Warners Stables to exercise, and cool down or hot walk horses. As I have stated in previous stories, I don’t like horses. It’s not that I don’t like horses, it’s more that I am uncomfortable around them. I have a certain amount of fear of them and they can sense this, and when this happens you have lost the battle of who has control. As I wrote in another story my heros have always been cowboy’s; but the horse I prefer to ride, has two wheels and handle-bars, four cylinders and drinks gas.
Getting back to Willie, at one point in our relationship I more or less told him if he didn’t pay more attention to school and studies he would never become more than a bum. So it was about two years later and he was an up and coming jockey, heck he was better then that, he had made a bundle. So here I am sitting in a buddies car with about two quarters to rub together, and up drives Willie in a brand new Cadillac convertible, with this beautiful six foot blond draped all over his 108 pound body. When Willie spotted me he said "hey Kinder how you doing? Making lots of money? Hows the world treating you?" He went on and on and he then ask me, "do you remember what you told me a few years ago? It went something like you will always be a bum or no good nobody. He then ask about my financial standings, I mean he really rubbed it in my face." So I guess this is the reason I have seldom gambled, because I don’t know how to pick a winner when I see one.
Willie didn’t needle me very long because he was really a pretty nice guy, and I deserved what he gave me. We enjoyed each others company that evening and a couple more times before our paths separated, and the last that I heard about him was that he had an accident in his van returning from Santa Anita race track. It seems he dropped something while he was driving and reached down to retrieve this object, when he hit the shoulder of the road, lost control of his van turning over many times down the side of a hill. The final outcome is Willie is now a paraplegic. I heard that he still trains horses and jockey’s , so I guess it is hard to keep a winner down.
Speaking of winners, I had the privilege to be near greatness on two separate occasions this past week. On Thursday the 25th I watched my grand-daughter reel in two trophy size trout (maybe I exaggerate), but they were keepers. I have been telling her that we were going fishing all summer, and now that El Nino is upon us I figured we better get it done. So we went up to Caples Creek and drowned a few worms. My grand-daughter will be six in two weeks and she thinks she is pretty big stuff. I told her mother to dress her in jeans and a long sleeve shirt, and we would pack a picnic lunch. So when Jessica arrived her mother said that she had packed a separate bag and that I should check it out. When I opened the bag, I found it contained a roll of toilet paper, two paper plates and two paper cups. She remembered my introducing her to the joy of out-door toileting when she was three, and she thought it was great.
The other winner I was in close proximity with was Scotty Parker. On Saturday The annual motorcycle one mile event that usually decides the holder of the # 1 plate for the following year. This race was a barn burner, as usual Scotty Parker from the state of Michigan, was right up there in the point chase. The final race was 25 miles, and after 14 laps a bike slid out in turn 4, and the race was halted . So when the race was restarted after all bikes had a tire change they were all lined in a straight line, and Scotty was in third place. He held back until the last two laps, he then turned on and won. Below, is a picture of Scotty with his # 1 plate on his proud steed.
