I couldn’t wait to get behind the wheel of any car and be in full command. I had recently spent the summer with my friend Bill Kimpton working for his grandfather on his farm about 20 miles outside of Kansas City, Missouri. What I was to learn, that in Grandfather Drennon’s barn was a 1934 Ford coupe that ran but slowly, but it ran. Bill in the summer of 1947 had self taught himself to drive it “sort of.” Missouri in those years I don’t think you had to have a driver’s license on a farm. So it wasn’t long before, with Bill driving and I watching how he shifted gears and at a stop the balance it took to lift your left foot up (the clutch pedal) which would engage the engine that would start the Ford moving but at the same time you had to press down on the gas pedal to speed the engine up. This coordinated movement of my right and left foot at the same time ended in a lurch of the Ford leading to a dead stop. It was a little embarrassing but after several more tries I was driving down a dirt county road with the whole world in front of me. 

         I arrived home a couple of weeks before I was to start my eighth grade year at Jordan Junior High School in Palo Alto Ca. My dad, while I was gone for the summer, had bought from Robley Hall, a girl's dorm at Stanford, a 1927 Ford model T that the girls had used in a Stanford, Cal football parade for $25. It ran but in front there were only the front spoke wheels but no tires or rims so it made for a rough ride but I was behind the wheel with friends and the rule my dad left me with was, I had to stay on the Stanford campus. This was also a time when breakdowns were frequent so dad started explaining to me how a four cylinder four cycle engine worked and the timing that was necessary to send a spark to ignite a drop of gas inside of a cylinder at just the right time. It wasn’t long before I found myself broke down on a Stanford road. Let’s see I have gas but no spark. The answer was by process of elimination I needed to tighten a loose ignition wire and I was back on the road again. 

           I’ve forgotten who or for how much I got for the model T but I do know that I got enough money to buy a 1935 Ford Coupe that was a real upgrade but the engine burned quite a bit of oil. So much that I started using waste oil that had been drained from other cars at my friend Bob Lozano's father's Shell gas station.

I was now 14 years old and at 14 you could get a Junior operator license. Well I couldn’t take my smoking 35 Ford for my driving test so my dad said practice a little with our now second car, a 1941 Plymouth that my sister, my mom and I had driven from New York to California with a little help from my dad while driving over the Sierra Nevada mountains. I had to have my mother drive me to the D.M.V. to take my driving test which was not much of a test back then, as all I had to do was to drive around the block back up a little and I got my license. lt allowed me to drive to and from school and work but not at night which most Junior operators didn’t pay much attention to. Before I close the chapter on how to keep a 1935 Ford running, I noticed that my coupe was losing a little more power all the time. Because of all the oil it burned and back then most cars burned some oil. I’m sure it was the number one cause of the starting of the “smog era.” I was on a fairly regular time table to remove all eight Spark Plugs from the two heads of the V8 engine and with one of my sister's Bobby-pins I would scrap all the Carbon from each spark plug and my coupe would run better for a while. But this time it was different as I was not getting enough gas to the carburetor. So I asked my dad if he had an answer for my problem and sure enough he did. Jack, go out to where we keep all our nuts and bolts in the garage and bring me a one quarter inch hex head nut and I think we can get you going again. Well it only took a few minutes to have the fuel pump off the top of the intake manifold. With a fuel pump in one hand and a dab of grease to hold the nut from falling out of the cup of the fuel pump, which would go over the top of the camshaft pushrod that would make the rod a little longer so the pump would pump more gas. A few minutes of tightening the pump in place and my dad yelled go ahead and start the motor and with a roar I was back on the road again.  My dad said before you go driving all over why don’t you and I go for a test ride. I said okay. We lived on Alpine Road behind the Stanford campus in our newly built 1950 style flat top house. 

          I turned right on to Alpine road and went a couple of miles then turned left onto a road I can’t remember the name of, but it had some curves and as I turned to follow the curve of the road the Sun blinded me just enough that I drove off the road and I hit a tree with my right front wheel and fender. As we hit I remember the front windshield that was designed to open with a window crank was gone, so as my dad and I jolted forward so did the front windshield and as we went back to a sitting position so did the windshield. Dad said, “you ok” and I said, “yea I’m okay but my fender is wrecked.” That’s when my father said, something I will never forget when he said “remember that fender is only iron” through the years I’ve repeated those words to myself and to my family as one family member or another would have a close call with a piece of machinery and escape with only a few bumps and bruises “remember it’s only Iron.” 

          Dad and I were a few miles from home and my 35 Ford had its right fender crushed into the tire. I knew right off that we needed some sort of pry bar to move the fender back, so it wouldn’t rub on the front tire. My dad said I see over there about a ten foot long limb, “get that son and we’ll see if we can pry the fender.” A half hour probably passed with lots shouting and grunting and the fender was free. The trip home was uneventful but my car didn’t seem to steer as well. We're now parked in the driveway when dad said “climb under and see if you can notice anything bent.” I’m now on my back looking up at the front axle and I notice that the axle is no longer nice and straight. Dad, the axle is bent but only a little and his reply was you’ll be buying tires for the rest of your life. Sorry son but you need to drive it to the wrecking yard and the owner will probably, if you're lucky, give you a couple of bucks. I was once again without a car, but at home was the 1941 Plymouth that had hauled us from New York to California and it ran. 

            I always thought that our family's 1941 Plymouth was the ugliest car ever made. It looked like a Pig climbing out of a mud hole. I think my classmates of both sexes thought so too. But it was mine to use and beggars can’t be choosers. 

           One day while cruising going north in the Pig on El Camino Real I was passing an area where several used car dealers had all their cars washed and shined and all for sale. Oh my god there it was, I had to get a closer look. I swung around making a U turn and into Horse Trader Ed’s used car lot. I got out of the Pig and raced over to a 1947 Black Ford Convertible. It had  really nice car written all over it. Back then you wouldn’t say, “neat car it’s got sex written all over it” but it’s what all my friends were thinking. A salesman walked over to see what car I was interested in and I pointed at the 47. He said “yea that’s a beauty” so I asked how much?

1500 dollars. Whoa, that’s a lot of money can you knock some off? Well, if you can make it all for cash I’ll sell it for $1450. I told him I had to talk with my parents first but I would be back and as I was leaving the salesman said “don’t wait too long or it might be gone,”  As I scurried back to my house I knew that I had to talk to my mother first as she always spoiled me rotten, then she would work on my dad. 

          By 1951 Varian Associates was growing by leaps and bounds, so I never heard the words again “how are we going to get the bills paid this month.” My dad turned out to be a pretty easy sell. I told him I had $200 in my bank savings account so for $1250 I could be a really cool guy. The next day after school I met my father at  “Horse Trader Ed’s” and the beauty was still there. My dad kicked a couple of the tires, then told the salesman he would sign the papers that were, but few and I would be ready to go. I left the Pig at Ed’s lot and told him I would pick it up the next day. As I eased into the student parking lot most everybody took notice that I wasn’t driving the Pig but a really cool convertible Ford. My friend Harry “said now we’ve got great wheels to go cruising up and down University Avenue, then to Marquades Drive Inn for a hamburger.” It’s where everybody went to be seen and to see and my detractors said look what daddy bought Jack. In my teen years I was cocky, in a self assured way that was somewhat polarizing, so I had my detractors, but with a daily shining of my Chickmobile I didn’t find it hard to have a date on a Friday or Saturday night. 

           Almost at the end of my senior year I decided to go to Cal Poly College in San Luis Obispo to study Animal Husbandry. The Chickmobile had been parked in the garage all summer as I morphed into a Cowboy at the ranch where I worked each summer for nine years, then at the end of summer I would morph back into Palo Alto life and into Ivy League style white corduroy pants and Pendleton wool shirts. But this year would be very different for me because as soon as I got home from my summer ranch job I was off to college to pursue my life’s occupation of being a Cowboy with a college education.

            I soon learned that a shiny 1947 Ford Convertible wasn’t going to fit in at an all boys Ag school where dust and mud favored pickup trucks and were the number one vehicle on campus. So it was back to the used car lots, I was hoping to trade straight across for a 1950 Chevy half ton pickup which at the time seemed reasonable. History would tell of a possible different outcome “if only” I had parked my 1947 Ford Convertible in some old barn to be discovered today as a barn find, it would be worth as much as $30,000 to $40,000 so hindsight is still always twenty twenty. I drove my 1950 Chevy half ton pickup and parked it in front of my dorm room. I felt comfortable with who I was becoming. I was immersing myself into the livestock world irrevocably with no regrets. 

          I drove that pickup all through five years of college and took my new bride Zera (Zee) from our wedding in Corona California back to finish my senior year at Cal Poly by attending summer school. Well I think this is a good place to close and put my pen (iPad) to rest for now. Besides, I've got a whole new life ahead of me and I need to get started. 

                      See Ya, 

                        Jack