Two things we all remember, no matter what… our first love and our first car.  While my first love shall remain anonymous in this space, my first car was a 1956 Volkswagen Beetle, as mentioned in an earlier post.  

It was dark green and came out of Wolfsburg that way.  It had no gas gauge, but a reserve tank handle under the dash.  If you ran out of gas, you turned the handle and could go another 40 miles or so.  If you ran out of gas after that, you had no one to blame but yourself.  There were semaphore turn signals that actually worked.  If you were making a left turn, you turned a knob and the signal flew up from the left window post.  Same for the right, and I cannot for the life of me remember how they were returned to their original position.  It had no radio, no heater and a non syncronized transmission, meaning you had to come to a complete stop before returning to first gear.   Someone before me had not done so and chipped a tooth off the gear.  Hence, taking off in first gear sounded like taking off in a P-40 Warhawk.  

Other first cars in my family and neigborhood included my father with his 1947 Mercury Coupe (pictured) which he bought new after he got out of the Navy; my cousin Herb’s T-Bucket rail hot rod he and my uncle built; cousin Dennis’ 1963 Falcon, Danny’s 1958 Bel Air, and Judy’s 1966 Mustang.  

Neighborhood cars included Ronnie Shook’s 1963 Triumph Spitfire, Mark Durham’s Austin Mini (imagine 5 or 6 longhairs riding around in that thing; you get the picture), Jan Stowe’s Sunbeam Alpine, Jackie Stokes’ 1958 Bug, Dennis Ennis’ 1967 Karmann Ghia, David Whitehurst’s ’69 Porsche 912 (a beautiful vehicle which David still owns today) and Gail Bryant’s 1962 Chrysler Imperial with a push button transmission.  There are so many more that space does not allow me to mention, although I would be remiss if I left out David Cason’s 3 wheel Cushman Mail Cart.  

First loves and first cars… you never forget either, and in many ways, they are both one and the same.  Keep Cruisin’!  –J.

NASCAR is, of course, big business.  Born in post WWII America on the dirt tracks scattered throughout the Southland from the cities to the rural pastures, it grew into a multi-million dollar international sport.  

Names like Petty, Johnson, Roberts, Baker, Turner, Allison and Jarrett raced on those tracks, and my father was a part of that.

That’s him in the orange and white #9 car.  My uncle built the car and the engine, Daddy drove.  They raced on the tracks from the old Peach Bowl in Atlanta to the one pictured here, which, my uncle told me, was in Jonesboro about where Sam’s Club sits on Jonesboro Rd. today.  They raced out of East Atlanta Garage under the name Johnny Luck to keep my grandfather from finding out. He eventually did, of course, and told them if they wanted to kill themselves that was fine, just don’t be a couple of sneaks about it.  

This picture was taken sometime in the early 50s by a friend of my father’s, Tom Aldred, who was a photographer for the Atlanta Journal.  The original was black and white, which Daddy colorized by hand sometime in the 60’s using a brush and photographer’s tints.  Years later I had a negative pulled from it for a print for a friend, then later scanned the negative for a digital file.

Daddy eventually flipped the #9 car in a race at the Peach Bowl, walked away and never raced again.  

My father and uncle’s involvement may not have been as great as others, but I am very proud the fact that they were indeed a part of the roots of NASCAR.  Thunderin’ Past… –J.