Cars and Driving - by Dad

When I was a teen we were allowed to get our license at 15 1/2 years old, I
think you had to drive with an adult until you were 16, then you got your
independent license. We all had drivers ed when I was in school, it was
taught by a guy named Gene Payne who was a legend in Heber, former highway
patrol became teacher who also taught health in junior high school, was
famous for setting aside two days after the deer hunt to tell deer stories
in class. He later became the owner of Snyder's Hot Pots, a swim resort in
Midway, and was alcoholic. But I digress. He was the one who taught me in
drivers ed. Prior to that I had been taught by my dad because I worked at
the garage and part of my work was washing all the used cars on the lot once
a week, so I would carefully drive the used cars from the lot to the car
wash bay, about half a block away. It was all on private property so I
didn't need a drivers license for that and started at age 13. By the time I
was 17, my dad had picked out a car he thought would be a good one for me,
and told me I could buy it. It was a 1957 Olds 88 with a giant 400 cubic
inch v8 engine which was very heavy and drove kind of like a boat. That was
my first car, though. I believe prior to that I had driven my mother's 61
chevy convertible and wrecked it once and drove it into a ditch once on a
date with Sharon Bowden. Her dad had to come and pull us out of the ditch
with his tractor. How embarrassing that was. I crashed my mother's car in
Salt Lake trying to speed up to wave to a friend (David Rasband) and crashed
into the rear end of the car in front of me. I remember that wreck ruined
the front end of the car, but only cost $700 to fix which seems like very
little, but it would probably be more like $7000 now.
I left that 57 olds for Stanton to drive when I went on my mission, and
according to the folks he "drove it into the ground". In any case it was no
more when I got back. I bought a classice VW beetle and drove for a short
time after my mission, then sold it and bought a datsun 1600 sports roadster
with a removable hardtop, the only two seater I have ever owned. I loved
that car, but sold it before I went to med school and was without a car my
first year of med school. I lived right across the street from the school so
I didn't really need a car and I bought a Schwinn Varsity used 10 speed for
transportation. My second year in med school (1976) I bought a 1965 Ford
Falcon, the worst car I have ever owned I suppose.

I  sold that car when I went to Israel for the summer after my second year,
and later bought a Toyota Corona, red 4 door that I owned when Mom and I got
married. We drove that car to San Francisco for our honeymoon. Out in the
middle of Nevada about mid morning after our wedding I was getting sleepy
and I asked carolyn if she could drive. She said yes, but she was sleepy too
and went to sleep, woke up going off the road, over corrected and rolled the
car 1 3/4 turns near the town of Battle Mountain, Nevada. Fortunately
neither of us was seriously hurt  - angels must have protected us and that
little car was very sturdy. We decided to leave the car there at the shop
and went to Ely, Nevada where we were able to get a plane to San Francisco
and rent a car for the rest of our honeymoon.

Well, I think that is enough rambling about cars. Thinking about cars
brought back a lot of memories. Thanks for asking.
Love,
Dad