MY FIRST CAR

      I bought my first car in about 1953 in partnership with my brother. It was a 1929 model A Ford. The car was in good condition as it had been driven very little. 

    Now here is where the story starts to sound like my motorcycle story. Neither one of us had a driver's license. The car did not have a license. We did not have insurance. And yet we merrily drove around with our car. The area was remote with few people and little traffic. We avoided driving into the village as it was rumored that there was a town cop in the village. So we drove the country roads with some of our friends.

    Today's weather brought back the memory of my car. Today we had lots of snow and wind. and it was minus 20 C. On a similar day about 71 years ago we decided to go for a drive. These cars did not have heaters. There was no anti freeze so we had to put water in the radiator and hope that the water didn't freeze. There was no snow plow. In the winter everybody put their car in the garage and used their horses for transportation. Only fools decided to use a car. 

   This didn't discourage us from going for a ride. We picked up 2 or 3 friends and made sure that we had some shovels and off we went. The first couple of snow banks we were able to plow through but finally we got stuck. So everybody out of the car and pushed. These cars were not very heavy. We got it out of that snow bank. We got stuck again and had to use shovels to get the car out of the snowbank. 

    Finally we turned around and went back home. I remember feeling exhausted after all the effort to get the car through the snowbanks. 

   Today I stayed in the house and kept warm. For that caper we were outside 3 or 4 hours and enjoyed ourselves. 

FROM THE WAY BACK MACHINE

      My Dad was a fanatic about fishing. He discovered fishing in the early fifties when a friend took him out fishing. 

     There was only one lake near us that had any fish and it was a good lake. There were other lakes but they were quite saline and didn't have fish. 

    Some neighbors built Dad a little wooden boat and he thought it was the best boat in the world. When fishing season opened he would take his boat down to the lake and leave it for the summer ...unlocked. In the late fall before ice formed he would make a trip to the lake and bring his boat home for the winter.

    Now one year he decided to send my brother and I to pick up the boat. I was 14 and my brother was 13. We didn't have driver's licenses. As kids in a rural area we began driving when we were very young. I started when I was 11. We didn't go to town. We just drove on the farm. By age 14 we drove all aver the place. 

    You may say why didn't the police catch you? There weren't any police...at least not nearby. What about traffic? There was next to no traffic. We were in a very sparsely populated area so our chances of running over somebody were very slim.

    Well , we got to the lake and loaded the boat. Dad had taken the sides off the truck box for some reason. We had to be careful. 

   By the time we got home it was dark. When we got out of the truck, there was no boat on the back of the truck

My brother and I at ages 3 and 4

.     The old farm house. I tried to find a photo that would show nothing but open space.

   Okay, we got back in the truck and put the pedal to the metal to find the boat. The boat was 2 miles down the road and had fallen off as we turned a corner. 

    The boat had not been damaged so Dad was ready for the next fishing season.

   Many times we did adult jobs on that old farm that were very necessary and we were proud of the jobs we did,