Scuderia Di Pietra

Scuderia di Pietra

By the late 1980s or early 1990s the Stein household had a stable of nine cars and a motorcycle stashed around the San Carlos property. But before I speak about that I should explain the title of this piece.

For a few years I belonged to an Italian language practice group out of Sacramento. It was started by, and had many members who, are Italian ex-pats or US citizens who nonetheless all spoke fluent Italian. Digressing a bit (here we go again! Watch out!)...the national Italian language is pretty much based on the dialect of a single region...Tuscany. The 15 regions which make up the united Italy all have their own dialects, and that of one can be all but unintelligible to the citizen of another. It was Dante who is largely responsible for the Latin “vulgate” spoken by the common people of his native Florence ultimately becoming accepted as a common national language, as he was one of the first to write in this dialect rather than “High” Latin.

Anyway...while the members of the language groups came from all over Italy, they all were required to learn the national language, and the group came together both so they could keep up their skills and also to share the beauty of Italian with novices such as me...I got hooked on “La Bella Lingua” and much else about the country (not the least of which is their passion for and creations of things automotive) with my first of what is now more than half a dozen trips to the country dating back almost 20 years.

Patrizia was the head of the group, and she insisted that each of us non-Italians not only speak as much as possible only in that language, but that we be given names which were Italian translations or as close as could be made (she never did figure out what to do with the name “Sherri” as there is literally nothing close in Italian). So it was natural that I be dubbed “Martino.”

I added the Di Pietra myself as a result of something the teacher of an online music appreciation course I took named Robert Greenburg said. As a way of illustrating the beauty of Italian and how well it lent itself to music, he mentioned that he would much rather be known by the melodic Italian equivalent of his name...”Roberto Monteverdi,” literally “Green Mountain”...the same thing meant by “Green Burg” in German. From there it was easy for me to turn the meaning of “Stein” in German (“stone”) to “Pietra,” the Italian version. I added the “Di” (“of”) just because it made the sounds flow better.

So...back to cars and such. I had the 914 of course, since that had been with me since 1970. When we came to California in 1974, between the four adults we had a Plymouth Road Runner, a 73 VW “Super” Beetle, a Honda 350, and my Suzuki 550 Triple two-stroke. But when things came apart the Plymouth and Honda went with Shelly and the VW bumped down the road with Marcia. While I was sad to see her go I can't say I would miss that car.

We had sold my 66 MkIII Spridget before leaving Florida. It just did not make sense to bring it cross-country, and I'm not really sure it would even have made it. Those cars just were not up to high mileage regular use, and it was starting to show neediness. Once in Vegas we purchased a 72 Beetle, which was a pretty solid little car.

Sun Yellow
in Sunny  Las Vegas

But again, moving to California, it seemed smarter to sell it and then get another one once in the Golden State. V-dubs were certainly plentiful and there was nothing particularly endearing about the 72 versus its 73 replacement. The 72 had been hit by some young girl running a traffic signal, which was one more reason to not keep it. But the 73, despite having more trunk space in the “Super” version, somehow seemed to have lost the soul the Bug was known for...and it was not long after that the model, the most successful single car model in history, became just that...history.

So Sherri was without a car...but then Sherri was not working either. Even when she got her first job I could still drop her off and pick her up from her office in San Mateo on my way to and from the City. Odd though it seems now, the computer company I worked for had offices on Battery Street, and a dedicated parking lot free for employees north of Broadway near Levi Strauss headquarters.

Of course this “solution” could not continue forever, which is how the 67 VW van mentioned in an earlier blog (“Cars Suck”) came into the picture. (“I'll still get up and make your lunch if we buy the car for me,” she said. Yeah, right?). Before Sherri found work she would sometimes take the train into the City and meet me for lunch. And in those happy-go-lucky days we even once made love in the 914 (surprising how much room there is in that thing) as it sat under a car cover (I always kept it thus covered when parked)...resulting in startling a couple of folks as we crawled out from under it in a rather funky and disheveled state after (God, it was HOT under there, in more ways than one).

Which reminds me of the time I was working late and she met me for dinner, after which sitting on the boss's couch for a business meeting always gave me a case of the giggles.

But I digress...

In 1977 the 550 got traded for the second year of the first four stroke Suzuki..the GS750, also pictured in an earlier post. I put over 40,000 miles on that wonderful ride before deciding that most of what I was doing was commuting to work on it in what was becoming pretty sketchy driving and traffic. But I did used to get some of my very own odd looks when I stripped off my helmet and leathers and stashed them in the side cases, revealing me in all my three piece business suited splendor. This was just as the so-called “Montgomery Street” group of banker/bikers were getting started, and business suited motorcyclists were not a common sight in the Financial District. Until the City finally got smart and put in dedicated cycle parking we all used to park on the sidewalks. Generally the Cops left us alone, but every so often one got a wild hair up his nose and ticketed me.

I suppose the next vehicle to come along was the Ferrari...in 1979. That story is told elsewhere, but suddenly I was among people who had actual collections of cars, so the accumulation did not seem at all strange. The family car had, by then, become a 77 Oldsmobile 88 with, of all things, a red velour interior and (yuch!) a silver vinyl top, matching the car's paint. What was I thinking?

18 feet of American Obesity
Our garage was 17 feet deep

 On top of being just, well, totally BORING, Adin was an infant at the time and somehow a bottle of his milk got “lost” in the cavernous interior of the beast for a few days. We never did get the smell of sour milk totally erased.

Ernie gave me the impetus for the next additions. When he was a teen his father made his approval of a driver's license contingent on a shared purchase of a Model A Ford...a total outlay back then of $50.

I don't really know what Ernie's looked like
But given his skill and interest I
somehow picture it coming out like this
when he was finished

The deal was that only after Ernie disassembled and then restored the entire car could he get permission to drive. It took him a year and a half and in the process he learned to do everything from mechanical work to upholstery.

I thought the story such a great idea that I asked both kids what cars they wanted. By then Jason was around 16 and Adin was 10. Jason is not really a “car nut” but found the funkiness of the Crosleys he'd seen at club events attractive, so we purchased an “all there but needs total going through” 52 wagon from Dick Scanlan. 

I only wish my restoration looked as good

Adin, of course, having grown up around racing and cars and thoroughly inhaling their seduction, chose something a bit more...well, put a name to it...a Sebring Sprite.

Butch Gilbert Restoration
at Fantasy Junction

 These were official factory racers which ran the 12 hour event from about 1960 through later in that decade. He was familiar with the one raced back then by Bob Thulander. However, at the time it was a $20,000 car, so I told him to pick something a bit less exotic, like a normal Bugeye. I ran across a one owner California car in an ad, being sold by the son of a career military man stationed at Moffett Field who had passed away. It was one of my staff who talked me into immediately leaving work to look at it. For $1800 left me by an aunt we had a running Sprite in peeling British Racing Green paint, overlaying the original white.

The Crosley was my second rebuild (the Siata story is detailed elsewhere), and my success with it was not much better than the first effort. Adin actually helped me on it more than Jason did. The older boy kept the car through college and then sold it.

The Sprite was a different story entirely. I garaged it for many years and kept it running, finally telling Adin it was time for him to takeover about ten years ago. He totally stripped and restored it to a very high standard. Here's how it looks today: 

Obviously I'm proud of his work
100 Point restoration
Seems some of me rubbed off on him

So at that point, before moving the Crosley up to Chico when Jason went to school there, we had six cars (Sprite, Crosley, Oldsmobile, Porsche, Ferrari, and Siata), and the Suzuki cycle. But I wasn't done yet.

If I was going to race the Siata I obviously needed a trailer, as it is not “street legal.” Tom Thinnesen had designed a neat, lightweight open unit for his Lola; a tilt-bed which allowed the car to be winched onto it without the need for additional ramps. I got a copy of his plans and had the same builder do one for me. At first I towed it with the Oldsmobile, but realized quickly that it would be better to have something like a small pickup in order to be able to carry the needed “care and feeding” stuff required for races, as well as perhaps to sleep in at the track.

Bill Morton just happened to have a one year old Toyota with a shell over the bed that would do nicely, It would also allow me to “retire” the 914 as a daily driver.

21 mpg pulling a race car on an open trailer
Simpler times

 So I was now up to seven.

The Toyota and Olds were parked along the curb in front of our house. The Ferrari and Siata lived in the garage. The other vehicles were stashed in various lean-tos and sheds I built in two paved side yards. Thus everything was behind fences and “under cover” so looking at our small, 4500 square foot lot, there was no sense of the madness within.

And then I wrecked the Siata, a story I may (or may not) relate at another time...or have I already? At any rate, while it was being rebuilt I decided it would be good to have something else to put “on track” lest I lose my nerve. I had grown quite attracted to the purity of open-wheeled racers and their simplicity, lacking most of the bodywork that so often is in the way of making the job of working on a car easy.

Thus came the Quantum FJ (Formula Junior).

The purest form of the automobile
And the best paint job I ever did

 I will provide more detail about this unique ride some other time, but the point here is this was the eighth vehicle (ninth if you include the trailer) somehow stashed on the Stein homestead a few blocks from the center of San Carlos.

And then there was number nine...and a half. Gary Winiger and I got the crazy idea of trying to build a two stroke Saab semi-rally-like 96 sedan with which to outrage the vintage community. What we were thinking of was something like this, from a recent article on the “Bring a Trailer” web site:

It would have been fun
But energy and time were lacking
We would have been better off just buying one
already restored like this

 What we actually acquired was two Monte Carlo “rollers” and (here we go again) a bunch of boxes of parts. One car “lived” at Gary's with the idea it was to be a parts donor, while the other one came to San Carlos for me to work on. We ran out of enthusiasm well before the project was well started, and eventually sold them BACK to the guy we got them from to begin with. His plan was to make one into his daily driver, but I have sort of lost track of the status of that project.

And that, dear children, is how daddy quickly got things out of control. The lesson was that it is easier to buy them than build them and keep them running.

Fortunately sanity gradually reasserted itself, and at present we are “down to” a mere five cars and a trailer. And one of the cars (the MG racer) is shared with Adin.

A Work in Progress
If the kid ever gets the time to work on it

Well, there is that Venture 21 sailboat and trailer too, but that doesn't count, does it? And Adin did need a place to store HIS trailer without continuing to spend $200 a month to do so, right? And the Lance camper was a good and practical way to be comfortable and save money by not staying in motels and eating out all the time at race weekends.

And yes...I still do have the damned old derelict Suzuki.

 Sigh...

Cars Suck

Cars Suck

That's what it said on the front of a T shirt Marshall Mathews once wore to a Ferrrari Club event. Marshall was the body shop manager for Carlsen Porsche in Palo Alto at the time...so you would figure he should know, right?

Oh yeah? Cars, at least those built before about 1990, are so much less “sucky” than computers it isn't even funny. Yeah, I know, this blog is not supposed to be about the latter, but in today's world they are so much a part of vehicles it is hard to tell where one ends and the other begins. Have you seen the Mercedes commercials lately? “It's a super computer, it's a stereo system, it leaps tall buildings all by itself...” in short, it seems to be everything but a car!

At least with pre-90s cars, for the most part you could look at and figure out what was happening if things were going wrong (well, that excludes many electrical glitches of course, but then a computer is nothing but electrical glitches packaged up in a sleek aluminum case). Is there gas in the tank? Add a couple of gallons from a can to be sure. Is the fuel reaching the carb or injectors? Pull a hose, energize the fuel pump, and see if liquid flows out. Are those mysterious electrons getting to the cylinders? Pull a plug, ground it and see if a spark jumps across the electrodes (yeah, I know it can sometimes be dicey and not recommended, but I've never had an issue in 50 years of testing this way). Pretty simple for the most part.

Not so a computer, nor a modern car. It starts by the manufacturer intentionally doing things to keep you from knowing what is going on “under the hood.”

“We can't possibly let a peasant like you look into the innards of our wonderful product to figure out what is wrong with it. We are so sure of ourselves that we think we built it so nothing WILL go wrong with it, and if it does we will use yet another wonder gizmo you have no access to and is yet another computer to figure it out.” And heaven help you when (not if) the symptoms your Belchfire is experiencing has not been written into that diagnostic program. Time for the great parts swap fire drill! Step right up folks while we put in what the computer sez even though it makes no sense...or maybe we'll just reset the damn “check engine light” for free after several busted attempts to change something to make it go away. And that light? It basically says that you, dear driver, are too damn stupid to be given any meaningful information, so instead we light up a warning that could mean anything from an air leak in your gas cap (nope, that didn't make the light stop coming on) to “your engine is going to blow up in 30 seconds. Immediately open the door and jump out.”

Yes, the above is a real example of the “light gremlin” in my 99 Dodge 2500 truck. So every so often when the light comes on, I simply have the guys reset it when I'm due for an oil change.

“Oh,” you ask, “but what if this time there really IS a problem?” I guess I had better start wearing a helmet and Nomex underwear when I drive it, anticipating that dive out the door.

But I digress ( a LOT!). Yesterday Sherri's computer decided to have some fun with me. Not her, because, like most of the planet, she doesn't want to, nor could she, become a systems administrator, which is pretty much what is required of anyone owning today's little electronic wonders...other than a car, of course. That one is just hopeless and there is no option but to get the damn thing in to the so-called “professionals” and hope for the best.

She launched Apple's Safari web browser, which opened OK, and then that spinning beach ball from hell appeared. Every computer company (well, at least the ones who make operating systems) thinks that a blue screen, a tumbling hourglass, or a spinning beach ball will keep the animals amused while the system is actually choking to death with no way to get out of it. It's busy, it means...but doing WHAT is anyone's guess. In any case, about all you can do is some sort of “in case of fire break glass” technique (CTL/ALT/DEL...or COMMAND/OPTION/ESC) to force the hung program to quit. In the case it is the whole system, at some point you learn that pressing the power button and just sitting on it will cause a full power off. Gee...and Steve Jobs always wanted to get rid of on/off switches (yeah, and Elon Musk and most of the car companies want to get rid of drivers).

You might, in some cases, be able to do something like display a log...for all the good that does. It is totally unintelligible to anyone who does not know far too much about techie stuff to likely to exist in any household outside the confines of the San Francisco peninsula. But you can often send the log off to the computer company, though heaven knows what they do with it. In 50 years as a reasonably technical cog in the computer business I have yet to ever seen anything come back from that black hole.

So I forced Safari to quit, and relaunched it, with exactly the same result. Next step? Restart the computer. This often allows the little beast to spit out whatever it was choking on. Not unlike taking a running start with your foot to the floor to get a vehicle like our old 67 VW van up Nob Hill.

Our Second Generation VW
Lacked the Westphalia raisable roof
But included the bed and sink cabinet,
though without the sink or fridge

That thing did not have enough guts to get out of its own way. But I'm digressing again. It did manage to take us 4500 miles through some pretty wonderful countryside in 1977, but that's a story for another day.

Other than staring at goat entrails, the next step can only be to shut the system down and power it up again. This sometimes works when using “restart” doesn't. But no, not this time, sucker. What appeared was...oh crap! The operating system won't load and it is asking to either load from a backup made with Apple's “Time Machine” backup software, or...Nooooooooo!...download a new OS copy from Apple.

Puleeeze don't tell me there is no recent backup! I had a full copy of the entire system (called a “clone”) on an external drive, but that was done just before upgrading her to the new OS...which had to be done before, among other things, the tech gurus at Apple were likely to want to speak with me about any other problems I might be interested in trying to solve...like why, despite all the apparently correct iCloud settings, stuff did sometimes NOT get to all her devices.

This stuff is getting so complex that the first line of defense for Support staffs is either “are you on the latest OS?” or “are you on WiFi?” If the answer to the first is negative or the second positive, what you will most like hear next is to upgrade to the latest version in the first example, or patch around the WiFi in the second. It's ALWAYS someone else's problem other than the guy your are talking with.

And...as luck would have it, despite being really disciplined in both my work on cars and my administration of the increasingly complex world of our home electronics, somehow Time Machine had gotten turned off in the past, and while I had recognized that after the OS upgrade and turned it back on, it had not yet backed the system up...so I had a clone of the disc and a Time Machine backup, but both were from before the OS upgrade. If I used either many settings and options changed and tweaked as part of the upgrade would have to be redone. A long pain in the...

This was starting to look like trying to regap the points on your motorcycle, only to find that the side cover to the engine had one screw that would not come out, which you of course then totally buggered the head of by trying. Several hours, tools, and curses later...

See? This is about cars after all!

The only other option left was to download the OS all over again. But like that VW van, here in the back 40 our internet is, by 2107 standards, decidedly lacking horsepower. And operating system downloads are massive. It was going to take an hour and a half just to get the thing.

Except it didn't. I've see this before. Opening the aforementioned log I could see that I was indeed connected to Apple's download server...it's named “Commerce” and please don't ask me why I know that. I just told you I'd seen this problem before. There is sometimes something going on between my Internet Service Provider (ISP) and that Apple server which causes it to go into a mode where it keeps downloading...forever...and never completes the process. And neither Apple nor the ISP eer owned up to what was the cause. After three hours I was seeing a completion of over 200% indicated, and yet a time estimate displayed of “less than one minute” remaining.

Did the same guys program that who did those silly diagnostic software programs the car dealers rely on?

I killed the download and tried again...TWICE. Same results (isn't doing the same thing over and over expecting different results one of the tests for insanity?). But with 40 years experience with computers...experience which is much deeper than what I have with cars , I still had one thing I could try before either contacting Apple or reverting to that cloned pre-upgrade backup. I decided to simply close the system down, power it off, and power it up again.

And (don't ask why, I have no clue)...it WORKED! Now I'm thinking maybe the hard drive is going bad or at least has a bad segment. I tested a couple of programs and they seemed just fine...until I got to Safari. There's the damn beach ball again. Back to square one. Full circle. Other than by now I had been chasing ghosts for about six hours. Time to contact Apple.

As always they were just great. I sure wish car repair places were as good, but then they don't think of themselves as primarily computer people...even though they really are. I did get thrown off by the first question the tech asked me in my online chat session. Did I have another browser I could use, like Chrome or Firefox. Wait...how did he think I got through to him after I told him all Safari was doing was looping around its own navel and I could not do anything with it? Did he think there was a way to do a chat session without a browser? IS there? How the hell would I or anyone else know?

He even had me chasing my tail with a wrong instruction. He wanted me to get into a high level folder called “Library...” one of those “keep your hands out of the engine” things Apple hides from you unless you have the secret password...which in this case is holding down the “Option” key (not “Command” as he at first told me) while clicking on the “Go” menu item at the top of the Finder screen. And then he walked me through deleting a whole bunch of arcane files and folder related to Safari, the only ones of which I recognized (and this after 40+ years of this) were “cache” and “cookies.”

Sure...any average Joe and housewife ought to be able to figure out the modern “oh...so intuitive you never need a manual” electronic wonders, right? They “just work...” except for when they don't, which is a hell of a lot more often than any pre-1990 non-electronic car. It might wear out in 60,000 miles while today's motors are good for 250K...but the problem is the electronics will all go nuts well before then and you can just scrap the darn thing cause no one will be able to figure out how to fix it.

So...after midnight...and 7+ hours, I restarted the system and everything, including Safari, worked like a champ. Of course I instantly created another backup, this one with those changed Safari settings in it. I just wonder what anyone not married to someone in the tech business does with problems like this.

Likely just buys a new computer...and don't companies like Apple just love that?

Cars in the Summer of Love

Cars in the Summer of Love

This could be a long post...and I am not at all sure how I am going to talk about that summer and ties cars into it. But after viewing the exhibit at the DeYoung Art Museum celebrating the 50^th anniversary of that event I think I have to try.

I was and was not part of it. I was a continent away and deep in my own problems in a world that was in large part apparently dead or otherwise immune to the seductiveness of that explosion of consciousness and creativity.

Much of Gainesville was out of touch...and what was touched was, at least in public, only grazed by the music and apparently nothing else. No protests, no “Be Ins,” no civil rights marches, no fiery anti-war speeches. Underneath all that might have been percolating, but on the surface not much was visible.

I had returned from my cross-country (OK...half cross-country) jaunt with the Sprite to once again bury my head in my books, but at the same time I was rapidly changing. While I was not quite ready for Candy's apparent new sexual freedom in her relationship in KC with John and Sue it was not because I saw anything particularly wrong morally with the idea of three (or more) somes or “open marriage.” I could wrap my head around the idea...but was not up to the reality.

But this did fit with other awakenings in me that I was becoming increasingly aware of, and uncomfortable with, the myths versus the realities and the potentials of life in America in the face of Vietnam and the “Man in the Grey Flannel Suit” conformism, especially in conservative North Florida. But it was largely my Yamaha motorcycle and not the car which was my means to gain both space and time to just think.

The rural roads of Alachua County became my Walden, and the bike my muse. The world and path of education, marriage, job was beginning to look much different than I had previously envisioned it.

It was Tom Wessling who was the catalyst into the mind expansion of drugs as well as using that to facilitate creative expression in writing and graphic art. Tom was my roommate, along with Marcia. Though she was officially still an on-campus dorm resident, for all practical purposes she lived with me-her lack of presence at the dorm being covered by friends there. As a senior I was pushing hard to try and finish my schoolwork and get my degree by June, but it was increasingly apparent that was not going to happen...despite always taking a heavy load of classes and even staying in town over the summer and taking classes while working as a DJ at a local radio station, there were still too many credits left to not require one more term.

But it was neither relationship tension, of which there was none, nor classroom pressure which kept me wandering the back roads on the bike. There was more just a growing itch and feeling both that something was increasingly wrong with the world as it was being presented to me in Florida versus what might be possible elsewhere, along with feeling I was trapped by my military commitment. And there was something totally and increasingly obviously screwed up about that!

I was not an early convert to cannabis, no less more potent psychedelics. And it was not a topic you discussed with anyone you were not really sure about. So when “Time” magazine did a cover article the gist of which was that the weed might be less harmful than the government's “Reefer Madness” publicity stated, two things went through my overly analytical brain...I might be willing to try the stuff to see for myself, and if they are lying about this what else might they be manipulating for their own nefarious purposes? And of course Vietnam had to be the 800 pound elephant in that discussion. But one thing at a time. Once I expressed the first thought out loud Tom got off the coach, went into his bedroom, and tossed a baby food jar of pot in my lap when he returned. I'd been living with the guy for a year and he was not about to tell me he was smoking that whole time until and unless he felt he could trust me. My best friend and yet on that topic everyone was paranoid. And this was even before Nixon and the DEA.

I was already in hot water with the Air Force over Vietnam...and more. I don't recall if it was during that summer or the year before, but along with the rest of my upper classmate ROTC students, I had to attend a six week camp at Eglin AFB in the panhandle...as unlovely a place as I could possibly imagine. My only relief from endless drills and exercises was a weekend pass mid-way through the month-long ordeal. The Sprite and I hit the road as hard and fast as that little car could move...I blasted out of the state with my foot planted to the floor...only to realize I had nowhere to go and no one with which to go.

I spent the weekend sitting on the floor of a motel room in Mobile, thinking about how totally fucked I was. The supposedly fine “officers and gentlemen” in camp were a bunch of brawling, drinking, bragging jocks who somehow made the experience harken back to the fraternity rush party I had attended as a freshman...the same attempt to convince everyone how cool and grown up you were, while in reality you had no chance at living the life you were claiming. These guys obviously got drunk but just as obviously did not pick up and go to bed with...anyone, no less the multiple couplings they claimed. But I was told by the AF major we reported to that I was rated dead last by my “peers.” I might not have said it out loud but I clearly remember at least thinking that...these were decidedly NOT my peers.

And that was by far not the most serious conclusion I was reaching about the whole Vietnam thing. And those questions I was asking out loud, and the answers somehow were sounding like they belonged in the same bin with “Reefer Madness.”

So, when it was over....back on the motorcycle for many long rides in the hills. The only answer I could think of was to at least defer the madness by applying for Grad School, which I was planning to do anyway, since my career goal at the time was to become a professor, hopefully with UF so I could continue to live in Gainesville, a town I had come to deeply love. While Steppenwolf's “Magic Carpet Ride” was not released until the following year, in 1967 the Yamaha was already filling that role.

But there were other fragments of new ideas that were starting to coalesce for me that ultimately pointed West.

When my discomfort led to me leaving Kansas City and Candy (They really did have some “crazy little women there”) I decided I might as well explore some new parts of the country, and routed myself south through Dallas, including a few moments at a memorial to JFK overlooking the place where he had been murdered three years earlier. I had made a photographic journal of the trip (which I still have), and took a snapshot which later became one leg of a trinity of art I will explain in a moment.

At the start of my senior year I had begun writing...sort of rambling half poetry half narrative stuff just trying somehow to exhale my growing tension and discomfort onto a page. I've got all that stuff still too, and on occasion it is a good “level set” to re-read it and think about my life then and now. But I also had a yearning for graphic expression, though I didn't realize it until I lived with Tom, for whom art was always his passion. Dad had tried his hand at both oil painting and photography, and I commandeered his paint set (yeah, got that too...I'm not a hoarder but I don't easily part with things which trace and echo my personal development). Thus it was easy for me to jump right into oil on canvas. To this day I love the smell of linseed oil...it evokes deep memories.

Later, when I started photography, I tried to blend it with painting for some early experiments in multi-media. I quickly learned that I had skill with a camera that I totally lacked with a paintbrush, and the Sprite and the bike became my “magic carpets” leading me to capture visions in silver all over my surroundings...yet another way to try and temporarily escape the pressure cooker.

I don't remember exact dates but somewhere in this era I produced three paintings...the trinity I mentioned above, which to my amazement at discovering today, really express that gnawing feeling of “wrongness” that ate at me around that symbolic summer. I don't remember the order I painted them, but today they clearly address culture, religion, and politics...and after viewing them it is obvious to me why I began to embrace Timothy Leary's mantra of “turn on, tune in, drop out.” I never fully did the third, but looking West ( to see the East, oddly) became increasingly at first an interest, later an obsession, and finally a life choice.

The first painting I call “The Hero.” Even with the insanity of the War and the government, the South and Gainesville worshipped football as if it was a religion. And Steve Spurrier, the then quarterback of the Florida Gators, if not God certainly was Jesus with a number 11 on his back. It was impossible, even as little sports oriented as I was, to not get caught up in the fever. So I did a huge painting of what it seemed like to me. The stands full of colored dots...an undifferentiated mob of worshippers. They face the field with its obscure talismans of stripes and numbers, upon which are arrayed the rows of temple virgins (cheerleaders) and high priests singing “hosannas” (the marching band), in front of the god on his throne.. faceless (all the figures are faceless... this is because they are roles and not people and change with the years, but also because...I did not have the skill to paint faces). The god has his arms upraised, and is standing on top of a huge pedestal which is really a marble and gold trophy. He wears, on his vestment, the number “11,” Spurrier's number. So much for society. You could easily substitute the military for the band and LBJ for Spurrier. The worship service, at least for the first years of the War, would be almost identical.

The second painting was a long, narrow vertical. Against a blood red background I painted a church with two towers. On the front of the towers there are several large Pepsi-Cola bottletops, with their cheery “Pepsi” lettering and red, white, and blue patriotic surround. Hanging by his cape from a cross on the top of one of the towers is a very emaciated Superman. I have not a clue what I was thinking at the time, but now muse about maybe a “God is Dead” thing or perhaps “no Super Hero is going to save us from this mess” and yet somehow the “Pepsi Generation” is marching cheerily on? At any rate, it is clear that things in my world seemed pretty dark and unlikely to get brighter any time soon without me changing something.

The third painting is perhaps the most disturbing. I was sorry it was my perky little Sprite that had brought me to it. When I stood at the colonnade overlooking Dealey Plaza in Dallas there were only three other people there...three white habited nuns. The only other item in the frame is a floral memorial...not one of those semi-spontaneous and overwhelming displays of teddy bears and flowers that now seem obligatory at every scene of horror we face daily, but what looked like a very official wreath on a stand...much like the one placed by presidents at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier each Memorial Day. Simple and somewhat poignant scene, right? But not the way I portrayed it.

Once again blood was the theme. Clear to me Vietnam was much on my mind. This is also a long, narrow painting, though this time horizontal. The white of the colonnade stands in stark contrast to the totally crimson background. Everything floats on this sea of red. The wreath is there, but the colors of the flowers struggle to be seen against all that oppressive red. And the nuns? Again faceless, and in black instead of white....and with high and pointed hats looking for all the world like some menacing KKK trio (yeah, I know they wear white). Pretty much obvious what I was thinking about the dangers of religion as well as the political climate of the times.

When I applied for a deferment from active duty commissioning to attend Graduate School I did not know I was going to be turned down. Though the application was submitted on time, the Air Force claimed it was past the deadline...yet another indication in my accumulating body of knowledge that, when they (the evil “they” could be a company, a person, or, of course, the government) want to screw with you they will find a way. Nor did I know, at that time, how strongly the “Cool, Grey City of Love” and its summer was pulling on me...but I was beginning to suspect.

The album “If You Can Believe Your Eyes and Ears” came out in 1966. Yeah, I have it...but the second version of the cover, where they covered up the toilet with a banner. I believe the first song I heard from it was actually “Monday, Monday” and I remember rushing to buy it and only then realizing getting it home on the motorcycle was going to be a challenge. I had no place to strap it on and no saddlebags, and trying to keep the wind from ripping it out of my hands as I fumbled with the controls was, in retrospect, a pretty dangerous way to ride. But I made it...and only then heard “California Dreamin.” Uh-oh.

The album went home on weekend visits with me. The Sprite didn't hold much, but that record occupied the passenger seat and not the trunk. I remember playing it and staring out the picture window of the folks' apartment in Cocoa and just...wondering. Mom saw the wistful look in my eye and even though it didn't happen for a few more years, I think she knew. Mom's always do, sometimes even before you realize it yourself.

At the end of 1967 I finally had all the credits I needed to graduate. I now had my feet in two worlds...the “normal” straight one, and the world of the hippies, drugs, and music. I had appealed the denial of deferment from the Air Force, and while I waited enrolled in Grad School. Oh yeah, Marcia and I also got married. And I discovered photography.

Tom had checked out a book called “The Complete Photographer” from the local library. He wanted to add photo elements to his paintings. I picked it up and was immediately hooked. I “got it” technically and realized it could allow me to express myself at a level I was highly unlikely to reach in painting. I could either learn that quickly with a camera, or spend years and money I didn't have to see if I could develop as a painter, perhaps to no avail.

Besides, it was a lot easier to carry a camera on a bike than painting gear. Our kitchen became an ad-hoc darkroom, as I wanted to control the process and final execution of my visions. A single print I did not long after perfectly illustrates how the bike and my art could work together.

Krystal is a chain of hamburger joints which I think is still around. They were a “White Castle” type of format...small white buildings with a limited sit-down counter...perhaps a cut above WC in quality. There was one in Gainesville on University Avenue just a half block in from 13^th Street, the main North-South drag. I don't recall why, but on this particular night I was troubled by something...I dunno, there was plenty to be troubled about such as the War and my struggles with the military...what I do know was it was not with Marcia. Our relationship was still solid and growing. My typical pattern would be to go out for a ride or drive and just try to decompress, though not normally at night, and certainly not as late at night as it was when I took the shot. I think it was at least 11PM and maybe even later, judging by the lack of the normal University Avenue traffic. I was on the motorcycle. Of course night shots mean long exposures, and the clarity of this would tend to indicate use of a tripod...but how the hell I would have been able to strap that to the bike is beyond me. I was pretty good at exposures as long as ¼ second without one...so maybe that is how I made the shot. The lack of movement of cars and the people in the Krsytal tend to weigh against a really long exposure.

At any rate, the point is the car and motorcycle often became the way to the photos. I would set out with no agenda or destination in mind, but would just use the concentration required to see things of interest to shoot as the means to relieve whatever tension provoked the drive or ride to begin with.

The “Summer of Love,” like all summers, ended. But did it really? Certainly its influence continued far into the uncertain future, and as I wandered around the exhibit I realized that much of it is still with me, and I suspect many others. While 1967 was still relatively early in my own gradual “awakening,” a process that began before it and continued after had been set in motion which would, within three years, turn me and my life with cars West forever.

The Ferrari of Motorcycles

The Ferrari of Motorcycles

I only met him twice, and both times it was sort of an accident. I was down at Ernie's helping to tech inspect cars before one of the Monterey Historic races. That would have made it the first weekend in August, though I don't recall the exact year.

Ernie had known Steve Earle longer than I had, and it was a sign of respect by Steve that he allowed Ernie to hold a pre-event inspection two weekends prior to the Historics. This was a big help to those of us who could take advantage of it. It helped ease the congestion surrounding inspection at the track just before the race weekend, and also gave participants a chance to make corrections before finding out at the event itself that something was wrong and then scrambling around trying to make a correction at the last minute.

I never brought my own car to these. With Ernie as my mentor he quickly gained confidence in me to the point that he would say “I can tech your car by phone,” meaning he was sure that I had verified both its safety as well as conformance to the rules. At some point during the pre-inspection day he would surreptitiously slip me the required sticker, and then would sign my log book when we first connected two weeks later in the paddock.

For me, volunteering at pre-tech as well a number of times at the event itself was an education. I learned a lot about how different builders solved various technical problems. I also quickly found out which owners were themselves both knowledgable and skilled. Some cars were so clean and solid you could eat off the floor, while others were so obviously a lackadaisical attempt to slide by with a minimum slap-dash approach to both safety and rules that I'm still amazed that anyone would think they could pass the most cursory look. I'm also amazed at what some people think is OK in terms of safety. I quickly came to think the three scariest words in an ad for a race car were “ready to race.”

Ernie's place was a tribute to his cleverness. Though his career never made him much money he managed to design and build a three bedroom, two bath house with space to work on cars, first in front with a pit so he could get underneath, and later a 1500 square foot shop behind the house. I really need to devote at least a full blog entry to the man, but for this one it is only necessary to say that the inspections were held out front on a parking pad, followed by grilled hot dogs back by the shop later in the day. We would pitch a couple of bucks into a kitty and Ernie would do the cooking honors. It was always fun to see a bunch of pretty exotic machines trailered in and parked in front of the house over the course of the day.

Almost no one actually drove to the house, as most of the cars were not street legal. Ed Archer was an exception. His racer was and remains a bright yellow Ford Model T Speedster, and Ed embraces the part fully, dressed in white coveralls with goggles, boots, and a leather helmet, and sporting a handlebar mustache right out of the era for the car.

What year is it?

 The car had died a few blocks from Ernie's house so a couple of us went to collect him...somewhere around De Anza and Stevens Creek Boulevards in Cupertino. Quite a show.

Anyway, while I had my head buried under the lid of a GT40 I heard something that was clearly not a race car and yet still made the hair on my arms stand up and take notice. Banged my head on the car as I popped up to stare at an apparition...a guy wearing boots, leather chaps, a leather vest over his shirt, and a leather beret...astride a Vincent Black something...whether a Black Shadow or Black Lightning I couldn't say as the bikes to me were ghosts I knew only as whispers in the darkest of nights...so exotic they made the early Ferraris I was familiar with seem almost commonplace.

Pure mechanical jewelry

I knew of Vincents only through articles almost as rare as the bikes themselves. I had never seen one.

Dave Molloy turned out to be a neighbor of Ernie's from a couple of blocks away. Along with Llew and Bill Kinst these guys made up a weird little underground classic vehicle hotbed in a tiny corner of unincorporated Santa Clara county called Monte Vista. The few blocks around Errnie's house were a strange mixture of residences and car related businesses...mostly body shops. It turned out that Molloy not only lived there and owned this magnificent beast, but actually ran a Vincent restoration business out of his place.

The very idea of someone stocking parts to restore Vincents nearby was so implausible...but then Bill and Llew were doing something similar though not as totally focused, mainly but not always involving Porsches of one type or another. Dave invited me over to see his setup after the tech session ended. His two car garage contained three customer bikes in various stages of restoration, along with shelving units stacked with neatly labeled boxes of parts.

Everything on a Vincent is pure jewelry...the motor alone is eye candy.

Love and passion in every polished
and machined part

 What isn't polished is beautifully painted, and every piece is sculpted to look as well as it functions. Like virtually all Italian cars from the same era the pride of the manufacturer is apparent before you ever fire it up. But the fact that it is British and not Italian is so startling that you find it hard to believe. I love British cars and bikes, but everything out of England in the years after WWII always is so...agricultural you think it must be steam powered. It was a privilege just to be allowed into Dave's shop.

A few years later John Lewis and I were chasing a pretty special train along Interstate 80. Whoops...there he is again. I told you he would keep popping in and out of my stories. Though I was closer to Ernie and John was never a role model ( his mechanical work was embarrassing), he was much more...entertaining than Boss Mendicki...though Ernie had his own great stories and personality as well.

What we were chasing was the Western Pacific restored F3 diesel which in the late 1940s had pulled the famous California Zephyr passenger train.

 One of the engines had been restored and was being run “up the mountain” through the Sierras, along the Southern Pacific rails now part of the Union Pacific system. We would out race the train, stop as close to the tracks as we could, snap some photos, and jump back in to get ahead of it again. Our last shot at this was going to be when it came into and stopped for a short time at a little town called Colfax. Renamed after Speaker of the House and later Vice President Schuyler Colfax, the town is 2500 feet up the Sierra Nevada foothills, some 50+ miles above Sacramento. The station is a typical SP structure and sits right across the tracks from the tiny downtown.

Typical of most Southern Pacific (now Union Pacific) stations
More are being restored now than torn down,
though only a few, like this, are still active rail passenger depots

After the train left we decided to walk across the tracks to a little cafe on the adjacent main street. The pretty waitress's name tag said she was called “Sierra.” Being of a certain age I was pretty sure I remembered when unusual names like these first made the scene, and told her I thought I could guess when she was born...1972. I hit it right on the head, which surprised and pleased her, until I made some idiotic comment stating I could also guess what her parents were smoking the night she was conceived. That definitely did not please her. Should have quit when I was ahead.

But I had little time to recover as just at that moment the door to the cafe opened, and in stepped a guy wearing...boots, leather chaps, a leather vest over his shirt, and a leather beret. Really?

“I know you,” I said confidently.

“Not a chance,” he replied. I couldn't remember his name, so the best I could come up with was:

“If I say the name Ernie Mendicki, will that get your attention?”

“Who the hell are you?” he asked, somewhat incredulous.

Once we completed that dance he invited John and me to his new digs outside town, near a little place called “Chicago Park.” A bigger shop, more Vincents, but the same attention to cleanliness and detail.

Sometime later I learned that another member of what I came to call the “Cupertino Mafia” even though he lives in Los Altos, also has a Vincent. Gary Hubback has stuff stashed away in various “rooms” in his two story shop as well as a couple of other roofed lean-tos. His is a story for another day, but recently I was at his place and asked to see his recently completed restored 32 Ford 3 window coupe hot rod. There sitting just beyond was...this jewel. 

Gary's Vincent
Sitting just byond his latest restoration...
32 Ford 3 window coupe hotrod

Then there's also the one Don Bell has and which Llew and I tinkered on one day. I wouldn't say the bikes have become exactly common, but it does seem that the folks I know in the car world also have an affinity for special two wheeled machinery as well. But it started with Molloy, who apparently is still there outside of Colfax, and still working on these wonderful machines. He's about halfway down this page: http://www.thevincent.com/vin-suppliers.html

Oh, in case you're interested...a nice one will set you back about 100 large. Pretty reasonable compared to a 250TR.

7743 Miles- Dorothy Had it Right

7743 Miles- Dorothy Had it Right

There really is no place like home. By the time my East Coast racing trip was over and I returned home to California I had been away 49 days, had been through two countries, 19 states, one Federal District, and one foreign province, all while living in a camper with only a single place to sit, an area only about two feet by ten feet to stand, and, excluding cabinets and storage compartments, with less than 80 square feet of “living space.” From being exhausted after 300 or so miles of driving, I was so tired of the road and so anxious to get home that I was doing over 500 miles every day.

I was also totally alone. Don's motorhome had broken down in Hagerstown, Maryland. After a couple of days waiting for parts I was more and more anxious to end a trip which now seemed to have more “lowlights” than highlights. We were planning to head back via a visit with Gerald Davenport in Paducah, Kentucky (see “The Long and Winding Road”). So I told Don I would head in that direction and check in with him daily. If his rig got fixed before I reached Lexington I would find someplace to nest and wait for him, but if he was still stuck I would turn west to pick up Interstate 70 and head home...which unfortunately is what happened.

Don had further misadventures, culminating in his brakes failing outside Carson City. On a vehicle with airbrakes a failure causes them to lock as a safety feature, so he was stuck until the unit could be towed to a repair shop.

The last bit of luck I had was the street display and original course tour at Watkins Glen (see “Empire State of Mind”). The last bit of fun Don had was even before that, at least getting a few laps at Lime Rock before his engine blew (see “That's Racing...At Lime Rock”).

Don fought hard to not try to do anything about his car. I couldn't understand it. Local Crosley guys had offered to help, and one of them offered his shop, parts to cobble together a motor, and parking in front of his house in Newtown, Connecticut. Why was he so negative about making the attempt.

Then Hurricane Frances paid a visit.

Though no longer officially a tropical storm this thing still packed a punch of wind and, especially, torrential rain, which arrived just about the time Don had given in and we had parked in front of this fellow's house, setting up a canopy under which we were somewhat sheltered...it kept out about half the water. But it was also surprisingly cold.

Don's Nardi lacks the removable firewall of the Siata, and the Crosley motor sits tight against the panel. The configuration does not allow removal of the transmission along with the engine, and the fit is so tight that getting things back together is truly nightmarish. By the time we were done I had new appreciation for the Siata...along with a much better understanding why Don was resistant to the task. If only he had said that to begin with...

When we got his motor out of the car and took off the water jacket covers we stood there in total shock. The #3 cylinder was...gone! None of us had ever seen anything like it. It seems Don had decided to try an experimental block he had somehow acquired...one that never was put into production, likely because in testing it must have experienced similar destruction. Powel Crosley was always trying to reduce costs, and this block used less iron in the block casting, mainly by thinning out the cylinder walls. The middle cylinders run hotter than the outers due in part to the siamesed ports as well as less air circulation, so are subject to more stress.

Despite a long, wet, cold and exhausting slog to build up the spare motor, when we tried it there was a noise Don did not like and so he refused to risk destroying someone else's property and so did not run, though he graciously came along to the Glen and then up to Mosport.

After the mixed “joy and sorrow” of the Glen we went to Ontario for what was supposed to be a vintage race event. Things got off badly when I wound up in the commercial vehicle line crossing the border. The Canadian officials had not, as I was promised, been notified about us coming, and were extremely nonplussed about the race car. They seemed to not know what to do and wondered if I was going to try and sell the car in Canada without the proper permits. I could have been smuggling trailers but apparently that thought never crossed their minds and did not bother them.

The track at Mosport is quite uninteresting for a low powered car like the Siata. In fact, there is only a single “fun” turn on the entire track...the “Moss Complex.”

 It also turned out the race was just a single vintage group stuffed into a modern car weekend. Worse still was that only about four other vintage cars showed up. Most of the Canadian racers had been at Watkins Glen the weekend before, and were headed for another race weekend at Mt. Tremblant the following weekend, so had decided to skip Mosport.

As you can see, 

Mt. Temblant is a much more interesting configuration as well as a beautiful setting. The other vintage guys decided, after Saturday, that they were not having fun and wanted to bail on the event, but told me they wanted me to make the decision to stay or go as I had traveled the furthest. They also invited me to join them at Tremblant. Obviously I could not see selfishly keeping them at Mosport, particularly since I found the track uninteresting. And Tremblant would mean adding another two weeks to what already was a very long and tiring trip.

So Mosport and Canada became a write off. There was some compensation though. The Canadian Association of Sports Car clubs (CASC) is an FIA affiliate, so the track tech inspection gave me the only FIA approval stamp in my log book. I was also officially timed at 99+mph on the track, the first such speed verification I had.

To end this saga on a positive note I'd like to relate an amusing incident that happened while we were freezing and drowning in Newtown trying to get an engine for Don. I've introduced Peter Giddings before in this blog. Peter was at the Lime Rock event, getting re-acquainted with the 250F Maserati F1 car he had owned some time earlier and had just repurchased.

One of the Prettiest F1 Cars Ever
Driven by a true friend and gentleman

Peter had a day to kill while waiting for a flight out of the country. I don't recall where he was going. Though I had known him for many years, for the most part I only connected with him at race events, though Sherri and I had been to his house in Danville a couple of times and, as mentioned elsewhere in the blog, the Siata had “convalesced” there for a number of months after my traumatic incident at Sears Point in 1987.

Peter asked if he could hang around with us, and of course I was happy to have him join us. He offered to help “chase parts” or do any “gofer” tasks we needed. A real insight into how down to earth he is...a guy with Bugattis, Maseratis, and Alfa racers with fantastic histories “chasing parts” for a couple of low buck Crosely racers.

At some point we were running out of food, so Don's wife and I needed to go to a grocery to replenish supplies. Of course we could not take the motorhome and it would have been very clumsy to move my rig as well. Peter quickly offered to take us in his rental car....and then pushed the grocery cart around the store while we loaded it with stuff.

Peter was dressed well...tan cashmere slacks and a snappy dark turtleneck, also cashmere. He also has a refined British accent. With his close cropped hair and that accent he was quite a contrast to my sloppy work clothes and Alice's housewife outfit. I could sense people looking at us and I just know they were wondering who this scruffy couple with the Brit butler were.

Peter Giddings with his usual warm smile