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Joan Richter (Lucchesi) (1960)
Everyone is telling stories about cars and I thought I would post this one. I wrote it in the Writing Your Life History Class.
I remember the bright idea came as my cousin Ray and I were walking home from school. It was our first year at Woodland High School. Our parents dropped us off at school on their way to work, but we walked home. Ray lived on the corner which is now East Gum and East Street. Back then it was County Road 23 and Highway 99W. After Ray’s house, I passed Bell’s Trailer Village and I had a quarter of a mile farther to walk alone, down the road. The road was lined with black walnut trees on both sides, the Yolo County Fair Grounds was on the south side and barley fields were on the north side.
Our fathers worked together in Ray’s dad’s accounting firm. Every year it was mandatory for them to take tax classes to keep up with the new changes in tax laws. This meant traveling to the closest town, which was San Francisco. As a treat they were going to take our mothers this year so they could shop, have lunch and then everyone would meet for dinner before returning home in the evening. These classes were always on Saturday. Ray’s and my bright idea was whichever car was left at home, we would take our “younger” siblings for a ride. We were responsible for my brother, Bill, and his sister, Carol. I had just taken my driver’s test and had my driver’s license. If my parent’s car had been the one left home, everything would have worked out well and no one would have been the wiser. My father had driven and Ray’s father’s Hudson, which was yellow with a blue top, was sitting in the garage just waiting for us!
Although I was only 15 at the time, I had been driving for a number of years, but only recently on roads with my very new license. I started driving when I was about 12 but just around the ranch. Since I lived in the country, I was able to get my license at 15, but my father would not let me get my license until I could parallel park the car correctly in one try. I practiced for years, in front of the barn, with two poles stuck into cement. These were placed at each end of what would be a parking space. I can still parallel park in one try to this day today. Ray, on the other hand, did not live on a ranch, did not have his license, and had not driven often.
On Saturday our parents left for San Francisco and Bill and I walked down the road for our drive into town. Ray and Carol were anxiously waiting for us outside the detached garage. The door was open and we piled into the car, Ray behind the wheel and me riding shotgun with the two “kids” in the back seat. No seatbelts, of course, but nothing was going to happen to us.
I wrote so many letters in those days because long distance calls were unheard of and we headed to the post office on Court Street to mail a letter to my cousin Nancy, who lived in Clarksburg. In the 1950’s parking in front of the post office was diagonal. It was why we went there since Ray could not parallel park. We parked right in front of the post office and we walked out the door 15 minutes later. It seemed like we were in a dream. All four of us stood at the top of the stairs and saw a fire truck, a police car and Jim Irvin, the photographer from the Daily Democrat, with his huge camera, deciding if a picture was necessary. Lights were flashing on both vehicles and the police were walking around trying to find out where the car’s owner was.
Although Ray appeared to be doing a great job, he had forgotten to take the emergency brake off, and it caught fire while we were driving the car. None of us remember how we got home. The car was driven home by the police after the fire department extinguished the blaze and it was in the garage when our parents arrived home. We were lucky we were not ticketed.
Telling my parents about our adventure was very difficult. Dad took my license away for a month and because I was the one responsible for my brother, he did not get into trouble. Ray told his dad but his mother never found out. Everyone knew we would never hear the end of it if she knew. On Monday, there was a small article printed in the back of the Daily Democrat with just the make of the car but not who was driving. I think they were the only people with this make of car in town so, if she had read it, she would have figured it out. The article was about two square inches and Ray’s dad had cut it out. When Dorothy asked why something was cut out of the paper he said, “It was a coupon I needed.”
There was a reason it made the paper. Ray’s dad was the Mayor of Woodland. It was likely the same reason Ray was not ticketed!
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