By Gary Faules

NASA Mentor Director

As we grow up we have no conception of how our values will change over the years as we journey through life. What we think might be the ultimate adventure when we are 17 years old could in fact be a nightmare by the time we are 55. Marriage comes to mind. But seriously... On the other hand, little did we realize that those toy race cars that we played with might just turn into the real thing someday. I suppose when Evil Knievel was a boy he was probably pretending to jump his toy motorcycles across a make believe canyon. When I was a boy I drove my pretend formula one car around a dirt race track, making the rumbling sounds in my throat of a race car shifting up and down through the gears. Continue reading...

On the same topic, it's funny how many of us country kids felt as if it was the city kids who had it so good, and many times I'm sure the city kids felt the same about us country kids. My mother used to say the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence, and since I grew up on my parent's cattle ranch, I could relate. It seems no matter how large a pasture is, the cattle always try to stick their necks through the fence to reach just one more clump of green grass. In my case I lay awake many nights dreaming how much fun it would be to live near a race track. That was my biggest dream of all. What if I lived in some place where there was a go cart track, or better yet, someplace where they held a soap box derby? As a young boy who grew up in the 60s I wasn't alone with such dreams--the soap box derby was a dream shared by a countless number of youngsters.

For me the dream of building a soap box derby race car with my father, testing it and then going on to compete against others would remain just that, a dream. I will never forget the first time that I actually saw an official soap box derby downhill track. I was 15 years old, and even though it was empty and devoid of any racers or soap box cars, it was as if I had found the holy grail. I stood there with my mouth open in awe, and it was as if I could hear and see all those who had been there at the very moment they crossed the finish line. I could hear the cheering and screaming, the sounds of the wheels on the black shiny pavement and even the rustle of the wind as they hit speed.

But back at the ranch the reality would set in, and if there is one thing a country boy that lives twelve miles from town knows how to do, it's how to make due with what you've got. Now there was one thing I had that most city kids didn't have, and that was a long paved downhill road with almost no traffic. You would be amazed how fast a soap box derby car can go when it's built out of three pieces of two-by-fours, a wooden apple box, some old wheelbarrow or lawn mower wheels, a piece of rope and a few well-placed nails. For forty years I have wondered if my country boy special could in fact go faster than an official soap box derby car. After all, mine weighed about one quarter of any of those full-bodied cars. My mother used to scream at me for using her good wooden apple boxes, and so again I used my country boy ability to make due and unloaded a wooden box of ditching powder (dynamite for you city folk), stacking it neatly on my father's workbench. This calmed my mother down a bit, but for some reason my father had a real problem with the fact I left the ditching power stacked on his workbench. I don't think he minded me using the wooden box as much as he did me using a hammer and nails on the same work bench to build my racer, right next to the neatly stacked pile of dynamite. Boy was he mad, at least until dinner than night, when he said, "Well if it had blown up Gary never would have heard a thing, but that damn racer of his would have gone like hell."

Eventually, as I grew older my biggest dream came to reality when one afternoon I looked out the dining room window and saw my father unloading a go-cart out of the back of his pickup. From that day on there just wasn't enough daylight, and the only things that changed besides my age were the dreams. The dream of adventures of passing through a cheering crowd as I took the checkered flag at the National Soap Box Derby championships eventually changed to driving the winning car across the finish line in races like La Carrera Panamericana. In reality the dream is always with us racers, but the boxes just keep getting more expensive.

Comments

GTwildfire
Apr 3, 2008 5:49:02 PM

I grew up in a small town next to west philly. We didn't have much money, so I made my money by finding old bikes (or parts) and building new bikes from what I gathered, then selling them, straightened, tuned, freshly-painted, and shined. I always wanted a go-kart and finally managed to buy one, but it didn't have a motor and I never ended up managing to get one for it.
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Ironically, when I as 18, someone let me have my first car, which was going to be scrapped or parted out, most likely. It was a 1972 Duster (think it was an R/T?) Didn't matter because it had no engine or transmission, and absolutely no redeeming asthetic value, either. I had it towed home with what little cash I had. The only place for it was in my Dad's parking space in the alley. He was pissed off beyond belief and gave me 3 days to have it removed.
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Luck shined on me somehow. On the second day, I struck a deal with a co-worker to swap the plymouth for his Kawasaki 440 LTD. It ran great and I ended up driving that bike for 3 years.

retroman
Apr 3, 2008 5:09:41 PM

You know, that still looks fun. I think I can vouch for the quality of the old wagons somewhat though. Mine actually was handed down to me by my brother who is 13 years older than I am. Ours didn't have the pneumatic tires and I remember seeing pictures of it in the album dated somewhere around 1980. We still have that thing. It's been repainted and oiled but we got it!!

Gary Faules
Apr 3, 2008 2:57:52 PM

Radio Flyers... now that's a whole different chapter of the book. Since you're only 20 you will just have to trust me when I tell you how well built Radio Flyers were made back in the 60's compared to the ones they make today. But that never stopped me from still enjoying one. Here is a photo of my gradson and I going for a ride down the driveway in he new Radio Flyer.... http://lacarrera2007.blogspot.com/2007/05/getting-started-off-on-right-foot.html

retroman
Apr 3, 2008 11:16:56 AM

Know what you're talking about entirely. Aside from living south of Akron, OH where the first soap box derbys took place, we had a long hill as well. In the winter, it was sled riding with a ramp at the bottom. In the summer it meant grabbing the ol' Radio Flyer wagon and cruising down at full speed. We spilled more than once, but it was fun. I'm only 20, but if there was one thing my parents taught me about fun, it was making do without cable television in favor of a pile of scrap wood instead. My dad had plenty of that since he was a carpenter.