Stangs sat on top of the hill, just outside of Anderson, and for us it was an ideal place to begin our journey. We could top off the tanks with fuel, get a bite to eat and make all the general provisions necessary for riding the next four hours.
Upon the completion of all of our sundry business, we were exiting the store when we found a gentleman walking around and viewing our bikes.
The usual polite conversation followed, but we were to find out a lot more about him than we had ventured for. He was driving a custom-built T-bucket and was on his way to a car show somewhere in Kansas.
His T-bucket had all of the standard features, open motor, windshield, and bucket covered with the square shaped frame and a soft top. Narrow front tires and wide rear tires, accented by the headlight buckets set on the chrome bar crosspiece that dressed out the front of the vehicle.
He talked about his previous attempts to build this car but found that he was not properly equipped. His wife and daughter had taken up the cause and purchased him new welding equipment, equipment that he felt was the answer to his many previous problems.
This time, this time he said was the completion of a car that he was really pleased with and his tribute to that was to travel to the car show in Kansas and enter the T-bucket into the competition. I don’t remember where he was from, how far he was from home, or how far it was to the event that he was planning on attending.
To the best of my memory this must have been a Friday or a Saturday because any other day of the week would have been a trip that would have resulted in a “sit and wait” period prior to any car show.
If people are going a distance to enter a show, they may go the day ahead in order to have time to clean the entry and get it ready for the show. It is kind of like “fitting” a cow before the county fair. All I do know is that he was going to need all the time available after what was going to happen next. He finally completed his story about the construction of the car and his great pride in this accomplishment, along with his admiration of the T-bucket, which is a classic item for any car show, when he stated that he must take his leave.
Brother Ray and I watched as he pulled out and away from the fuel pumps. We calmly stood by our bikes as he left the entrance to Stangs and pulled out onto the highway. He was on his approach to the bridge that would cross I-49/Hwy 71 and take him to the northbound on-ramp, when he realized that he was in full view of Ray and me.
At this point he punched the accelerator on the car and the end result was something that we had never seen before.
When he hit the gas, the engine revved up, the torque traveled down the driveshaft, the transfer case on the rear axle received all of that power, and the rear of the car lifted up, the rear axle came out from under the car.
Immediately the T-bucket sat down on the pavement on the frame and continued to travel down the lane. The rear axle bounced a couple of times and then began an end-over-end somersault motion, eventually vaulting over the guardrail and into the northwest quadrant of the interchange.
At this point, Brother Ray turned to me and said, “I don’t think those welds held. We’re not going to leave in that direction, let’s take a right and the long way around down to Pineville.” It was one of those moments of “that’s gotta’ hurt,” at least your pride, and “I’ve never seen anything like that before.”
Broken welds can change your day, I have had my own experience, but that’s another story.
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