George and I

Standing on the start line at Bonneville in 2009, my friends Bill, Tim and I spy a beautiful bright yellow roadster with a color-matched 30's pickup as a push truck.  "Hey, isn't that George's truck?"  Bill says to Tim.  Apparently, George, the owner of the truck also lives in Washington and my friends know the guy.  We make small talk while they set up to run, and George tells us where we can find 'em in the pits so we can meet up later.  It's obvious he's one of the friendliest guys you ever met, and he's crewing for the Flatliners, so I make a mental note of where they are 'cause I want to get a closer look at what they have under the hood of the roadster.

 George and the Flatliners, gettin' ready for a run...

While George and the Flatliners guys get down to business, Tim elbows me to get my attention, undoes a couple of snaps at the corner of George's tonneau cover and dumps the handful of crushed empty beer cans he's been carrying around for the last half of an hour into the bed of George's truck.  Tim grins, we stand back, and the start line officials wave 'em out on to the course.

Pushing in to a run, our beer cans in tow...

The next day, I go out and find George, Don and Skippy in the pits.  They're working on the roadster as they've been plagued with problems this time out.  The hood is off the car, and I find myself staring at one of the purdiest blown flathead setups I've ever seen.  We chat about the car for a bit, and George asks where in Washington it is that I'm from.  When he finds out I live in Puyallup, we discover we know a lot of the same people, and in fact, I have a bunch of pictures of his cars from local parties and shows. 

But that's only the beginning.  After a while, we put together that he lived in Santa Cruz when I was growing up there, had an auto shop across the street from the high school I went to with his two step-sons, and they were pretty tight with the two brothers that were in the band that used to invite me up on stage.  Small frickin' world, I thought.

Over that week, I hang out with these guys a bunch, and although the car is uncooperative, we had a great time.  Sadly, it's the last time the car ever runs as it finds a new home in a museum in the mid west, retired.

L to R: Don, Myself, George, and Skip's in the dirver's seat.

Somehow, I didn't run into George in 2010, on the salt or at any of the local shows, though we were both at most of the same events at the same time.  However, this year at Bonneville, I did run into him in the pits.  He was talking to Paul Heady, who was running '34 coupe in the Vintage Fuel Altered class, and for whom I had volunteered to lend a hand.  After a hearty handshake he asked what I was up to, and I replied, "oh, I'm helping Paul out on this neat ol' race car."  He says, "y'mean MY old race car?"  Apparently, George used to own the car that Paul was running, and sold it to him with the agreement that Paul had to keep it a racer and run it at Bonneville.  Yet again, another random connection.

By the way, Paul is the current Vintage Fuel Altered and Vintage Gas Altered record holder with that '34, but we were unfortunately unable to better his times this year.

Paul's '34 Coupe race car, (which used to be George's).

So that brings us up to a couple of weeks ago when I happen to find the brake drums I'm looking for on eBay.  Since wide five drums from '37 or later are getting kind of hard to find, I look at 'em pretty hard and they look like they're in good shape and are a great deal.  Plus, I've been looking for a pair for about a year and haven't been able to find 'em, not even at the Turlock swap meet, so I'm super interested.  I notice that they're located in Sequim, which is only about 2 hours away.  Even better.  I can just go pick 'em up rather than having to pay a bundle to have them sent.  Then it occurs to me...  "Wait a frickin' minute... Isn't Sequim where George lives?"  He and I had been emailing back and forth recently, so I shot him a note, and sure enough, he had posted them on eBay himself.

I made a trip out to Sequim a few Saturdays ago to pick up the drums and hang out with George for the day.  It was great to see him and check out his shop, as well as all of the things he was working on.  Here's some of the photos I shot out there:

 In the shop...

 The roof panel for this pickup doubles as a tonneau cover. Pretty slick...

 One of the man's friends showed up driving this great little pickup.

 George has had this 5-window since he was 18.

 "And here's the guest room.  Don't worry, we'll roll the Fiat outta there if you're ever going to stay over."  I told him I thought the wifey would prefer the car in the room.  She agreed.

Mr. George Antoline, in the green room...

Y'know, people keep saying that the hot rod hobby is getting too big, it's getting harder and harder to find "the good stuff" and everything's becoming too mainstream.  Most of the time, I'm inclined to agree, but  George kind of makes me wonder:  If I can keep running into the same dude in such random ways, is that really the case?

Thanks, George, for the brakes, as well as a great afternoon.  See you next time, planned or not!

Summer Dreamin': Mrs. Turner's

Summer is definitely over.  Been that way for a little while now, and it's getting to the point where you think about last summer, and about the things that will keep you feeling warm until the spring thaw.  I'm not one who bitches about the weather much, or who feels hemmed in when it's not 70 degrees and sunny outside.  The Northwest is a beautiful place to live year 'round, and there's always things to do regardless of the weather, but usually, outdoor auto-related events ain't one of them.  Therefore, one of the things that keeps me warm through every winter is the thought of Mrs. Turner's Friday Cruise-In starting up again in May. 

I live across the street from A Diner called Mrs. Turner's, which is one of the oldest establishments in the downtown Puyallup area, and every Friday from roughly Memorial Day through Labor day, they host a cruise-in and back lot barbecue.  The owner/operators are classic car enthusiasts and put this deal on mostly for the fun of it, and so that their friends who have old cars have an excuse to dust 'em off and come visit once a week.  As you'd expect, you do see a lot of the same stuff, and as it's open to absolutely anyone so of course you'll see stuff that isn't really to your taste.  But the variety also makes it kind of fun, too.  Over the years, I've seen everything from old survivor Model T's, COPO muscle cars, Ardun powered roadsters, pastel tweed-clad tilt column street rods, vintage European race cars, and even a complete stem to stern reproduction of KITT from Knight Rider.

Here's some of the photos I've collect from a few years of summer Fridays across the street at Mrs. Turners...

The owners built this little Texaco Service station 'cause they needed someplace to store all the stuff they need for the cruise in:  Tables, barbecue, easy-ups, etc.  Helluva way to camouflage a storage shed.

This 1928 Pontiac pickup has been owned by the same family since new.  It was purchased as a work truck by a local berry farmer and has served as such ever since. 

The original owner's grandson now drives the truck occasionally, and has fitted this old motorized bike on back.

Can you say...

...ARDUN?  Delicious.

Ever seen a Dodge La Femme before?  Me neither.  They were one of the only cars ever to be marketed specifically to women.

The afore mentioned KITT replica gettin' the terrycloth glove treatment... 

And like I said, stem to stern, no stone unturned.

 This is the owner, Starla's T-Bird

Solids and Spokes Invitational

Clayton's big-ass birthday party, a.k.a. The Solids and Spokes Invitational was this past weekend in Santa Cruz, California.  As it was his 40th, I didn't think I could pass it up, and boy, was I glad I didn't.  Tons of great friends attended, old and new, tons of bitchin' cars, a good lil' reliability run including a stop at Bruce Canepa's wonderland, topped off with a BBQ at the Slaughter residence.  And by BBQ, I mean great food, beer, ACDC cover band that rocked hard, and 60-foot car drop.  Don't know what a car drop is?  There's photos below...

 Friday night, a few of us met up at Clay's to catch up before the big shindig on Saturday.

Mr. Clayton Slaughter, at home in the workplace...

Galli Sr. rockin' a 40, thanks to Jr.  The 5 window is theirs, and the story behind it is... well, just one of those stories.

In short, it goes like this:  Son Mikey was being taken out to dinner for his birthday in Boulder Creek.  While waiting to get in to the restaurant, Mike spots something under a tarp adjacent to the place.  After many trips back and forth, he eventually succeeds in convincing his dad that it is indeed a '32, and it looked untouched.  The car's inheritor eventually caved to their requests for purchase, and they bought the car and took it to Mr. Vern Tardel.  Vern did most of the work, (swapped the B motor for a flathead V8, suspension, steering, etc.) to get it where it sits today.  Much of the car is as they bought it, including WWII gas rationing stickers.

Neely Farrel and Alisha Slaughter, still smilin' after spending countless hours of setting up for this shindig.

The next day, at the start point, about 35 cars showed up for the reliability run.  Both quality and quantity impressed.

John Forbes' monster... It's a good thing that the roads we were about to drive were pretty much in his front yard.  It'd be pretty challenging to pilot his rig blind through them twisties, but after all, John has worked for Bonney Doon Fire Department for long time.

Greg Lazzarini's ol' racecar.  He's meeting up with the builder of some years ago soon, so I'm eager to find out more about this beautiful old coupe.



This was Lars Mapstead's first cruise in this car, and he said it drove quite nicely.

The Galli '32

The first time I saw Mark Nelson's 5-window, it was a primer grey daily driver that he'd built in like 2 weeks or something.  Pretty cool daily driver I thought, well it's still driven daily, but it's a whole lot nicer now.

Pachi and Nikki drove this beautiful little (roofless) roadster all the way from Winnemucca to Santa Cruz the day before the run, drove the run on Saturday, then drove it all the way back on Sunday.  I suppose that if I'd built something this nice I'd be prone to spending as much time in it as possible, too.

On Bonney Doon Road...

Hot rods takin' over the Canepa complex...

Bruce Canepa's showroom and museum goodies...

Yeah, that is the real So-Cal Coupe.

Canepa's Shop, right side...

...and left side.

And... the storage room.  Let's see... which one today?  How about B-3?

This is the So-Cal/Canepa LSR car which had been wrecked at Bonneville, but not that you could tell now.

Okay, so I don't know the whole story or anything, but someone told me that this Dusenburg sports the chassis #001.  Ummm....

After we left the Canepa compound, we headed up to the Slaughter ranch, where it was BBQ, beer, a little rock and roll, and dropping a car from a 60-foot crane, all in the company of friends and family.

The car drop:  Thanks tons Charley Chesleigh for donating your ol' racecar.  It's in a better place, now...

 This'd be the car Curt Williams' dad built and raced at the famed Half Moon Bay strip way back when.  After his dad's sad passing, Curt and Clay revived the coupe and Curt drives it much as his dad left it.  And why would anyone change it?

I'm glad they're all laughin' it up, as they seemed frustrated by Sid's roadster Thursday night.



Midtown reunion:  L to R, Tosh Woods, Lee Faraola, Craig Meakin, Curt Williams, Zeb Nevins, Clayton Slaughter

Lars brought this little jem for us to drool on, too.  It's a '27 model T with an injected Ardun flathead, wrapped in actual signed VonDutch pinstriping.  I believe it set some records at Bonneville and the dry lakes before a drag outfit bought the car and ran it with some success.

Next day:  Curt pullin' his coupe into the garage.

All in, and just before it started raining.

I had one helluva time.  Thanks, Slaughters and everyone else who made this such a great time.  If  you happen to get an invite for this event next year, I'd strongly suggest you attend.  A good time will be had by all.