Looking back, I’m not entirely sure what the reasoning was, but sometime that summer Dad decided to buy a different truck for me to use. This second one was a step side as well, but it was the short bed, and it had a ’76 250 CID (4.1L) straight six, and was white. And it had a jacked up fender that looks like it had been through an accident and very, very poorly repaired. It was horribly rippled and the fiberglass looked like, well, crap.
I have a receipt dated 8/21/97 showing where Dad had the engine from the white truck rebuilt using the top half of the engine from the parts truck. I’m pretty sure it was shortly thereafter that I started driving the white truck. So there I was, a teenager with a drivers license and a vehicle. I thought I was pretty cool. I would drive to school, to work, pick up my friends, and just generally cruise around town.
Sometime shortly after getting the truck’s engine rebuilt, we had to find someplace to put the parts truck, whose engine was now taken apart and set in the bed of the truck. Dad talked to his friend who owned a sheet metal shop in Lakeland, and arrangements were made to store the truck there for “a few months.” Here again, Dad did something for reasons I don’t know. I guess it would be simple enough to ask. He decided to tow the parts truck on the grueling journey of 12 or 13 miles with the white truck, rather than his F-250 (a 6,000+ pound beast with a 460 big block).
We fitted the parts truck with a tow bar. For those of you not familiar with one of these devices, it’s an A-shaped or triangle-shaped metal frame. The base of the triangle is attached to the bumper with chains, and the apex of the triangle hooks to the tow vehicle. In tow, the towed vehicle is left in neutral and the steering wheel left unlocked, and this allows it to turn with the towing vehicle. At the time, the brakes in the parts truck still worked, and my Dad decided it would be best if someone rode in the parts truck in case something went wrong. My uncle Mike was volunteered for the task, and given instructions to hit the brake if necessary, and not to touch the steering wheel.
So off we went north toward Lakeland. My Dad drove, I was riding shotgun, and Uncle Mike was in the parts truck. Now, in Uncle Mike’s defense, I think it would be extremely bizarre to be sitting in the driver’s seat of a moving vehicle for several miles and not touch the steering wheel. As we left town going north on Highway 98, hitting about 45mph, we had noticed that he had, in fact, put his hands on the wheel. This is not desirable as it causes resistance in the towed vehicle’s steering, which can cause the front wheels to drag a little instead of rolling in track in the direction that it is being towed. This can cause the front wheels of the towed to be yanked all the way to one side or the other, which can have the effect of dragging both vehicles in the direction that the wheels were yanked. In our case, this was to the right. We were in the right lane, and then we were in the right ditch. Dad tried for second gear (I think) and missed (I think), first gear (which wouldn’t ever work if the vehicle was moving), and finally found a gear and managed to drag us back up to the shoulder to a stop. Words ensued. We were all pretty shook up, and Uncle Mike’s wrist hurt a little from having the steering wheel ripped from it, but otherwise we were fine. The rest of the trip was taken at a much more leisurely pace.
That truck stayed there in that yard for the next 14 years. The white truck went on to many more adventures, which are . . . To be continued.
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