By Art Smith
Like most of us, my first memories of anything with a motor in it had to do with my Dad.
He was a career Air Force Officer and traveled quite a bit….as did the whole family. Now Dad didn’t really care much about cars – his “turn on” was motorcycles. Since I can remember, in his spare time, Dad was either working on – or out riding his bikes. In the early days, Dad had two Indians – one was a Chief – and I’m sorry to say that I can’t remember what model the second one was. I can remember as a child going out in the garage to see what Dad was doing – and he would have an engine torn down – or a tranny all apart on his work bench….oil all over his hands and a smile on his face. I would sit there and watch him, and sneak and rub some of that oil on my hands – trying to look like him,
In my teenage years, Dad and I did not see “eye to eye” on a lot of stuff - - did not do a lot of things together like we used to – we had grown apart – as teenagers and their parents often do. However, it seems like every time I was out in the garage working on whatever car I had at the time, or on one of my motorcycles (yes, I loved bikes also – got that from him I guess), Dad would always find some excuse to be out there also. He would be on one side of the garage working on his project – and I’d be on the other side doing my stuff…..neither one of us saying anything to the other. Sooner or later he would say that he needed some help doing something (probably just holding something for him) and I’d find myself over with him on his project helping him out. It would not be to long – and we’d start talking about cars, motorcycles or motors – and at least temporally, our differences would be behind us.
This love of anything with a motor in it was the common denominator that bound us together.
In his later years, I remember Dad riding a Harley Davidson, a Vespa scooter (while he was stationed in Turkey) and a couple of BMW motorcycles
From before the time I was old enough to drive, I always had old junk cars that I had to fix up in order to get them to run.….I never asked to drive my Dad’s car because I knew the answer would be a great big “No”. At the end of my senior year of High School, I had a date to the Prom with pretty little Cindy Hall, my High School sweet heart. As I was getting ready to go Dad came up to me and handed me the keys to the family car. He said that he thought I should go to the dance in something better than my beat up old heap. I can not begin to tell you how proud I felt when he handed me those keys !
I picked up Cindy and off we went – she slid over next to me and I was Top Dog on the road that night……until that is – the car right in front of us had to slam on his brakes for something. Well, I was paying WAY to much attention to Cindy and not enough attention to driving – and I smashed into the back of that car. No one was seriously hurt, but my Dad’s car was pretty much ruined. When Dad got there, he was very concerned and wanting to make sure that Cindy and I were OK. He looked his car over – but never said a word to me about the wreck. He knew how bad I felt – and I guess he thought that was punishment enough.
Dad came from a large family in rural Miss. He was one of thirteen children. His best friend in life was his younger (by one year) brother. They did everything together ….walked to school together, got into trouble together, double dated, even got married within two months of each other. They both had daughters within three months of each other – these boys were tight with each other! Neither one of them had ever had a new car before – and when they could, off they went to the Chevy dealer – and they both bought new cars the same day, from the same salesman. They both bought a brand new 1956 Chevy Belair 2 door post car……….at least they each chose a different color :)
That is why, when I retired, the first classic car I just had to build was a 56
Chevy.
Dad died of cancer in 1996 and I miss him
a lot.
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