Larry, Dick said it is OK with him to post. Gary

Dick

I knew you were a auto hoarder. I just remember driving around them hills in the 1950s and 60s and seeing all kinds of car bodies

setting back in the trees. I’m sure they are long gone by now. You said you like to drive around them little ND towns. I do to, I wish I could see into some of them old garages and sheds. You know there are some real undiscovered treasures in some of them. A fellow would like to stop and look, but I would hate to end up looking down the wrong end of a shotgun.

I don’t know what them duffers do with their old balls. I do know, some them characters seem to get purity excited, scrubbing them out on the golf course.

Have a good day.

Larry

Larry,

I remember the old ’31 Chevy coupe that Frank had and they used
to pull behind the tractor out to the hay field. Bill used to ride
in the car while Frank towed it with the old John Deere. They had
a pole hitch that fastened under the front and steered the car like
a trailer. Dr. Schack from Rolette bought the car from them. I
think Frank got a Jeep pickup and $800. if I remember right. He
hired John Awalt to redo all the wood for the body and then he had
the metal bodywork done and had it painted. I don’t know where Dr.
Schack or the car went when he left Rolette. I had been in the
basement of the old Gamble store in ’65 and bought an old/new tire
and a muffler from Art Henning for $5. I was at the clinic and Dr.
Schack asked me if I had any parts for his car? I had the new
muffler that had ’31-’32 Chevrolet right on the tag. He offered me
$20 for it! Do you suppose he could afford it? I think I still
have the tire—it’s what we used to call a ‘nobby’. It has round
button type tread on it. It’s a 17″ tire for about the ’33-’34 era
cars, but it wasn’t that old of a tire—-probably from the 50s.
There was some really neat old car stuff in the basement of
Gambles. Seems like I’ve been at this for a long time!

Dick

Dick
Doctors quit making house calls a long time ago. For some reason
them Rolette Doctors made house calls on the Hackman brothers.
I heard tell while I was in the service that they were making a lot
of trips up to see Frank and Bill and hauling a lot of old stuff
off.
Some felt the Doctors were taking advantage of the Hackman brothers.
I don’t know if they did or not.
Larry

Larry,

One short story about the car after the Dr. got it from Frank.
He had it restored and was driving it in Rolette and it stopped for
some reason. Gary Prouty just happened to come along and stopped to
help. It took him over an hour to get the problem figured out but he
got it going. The Dr. asked what he owed him and Prouty said, “Well,
what do you charge for an hour?” He said the Dr. got sort of pale
before Gary laughed at him and said to forget it.

Dick

Dick
The jeep pickup that Uncle Frank drove actually was bought new and
owned by Henry Dietrich.
Henry drove it in the winter time and kept it in a shed when he wasn’t
driving it. He always complained when he drove it, that it would never
trail right, and that the engineers that designed it must have had
their heads up their asses, and forgot to pull them out as the wheel
base was wider in the back, then the front. When driving a rutted
road or through snow the vehicle could not make up its mind, what back
wheel was going to follow in the track made by the front wheels and so
it was always fish tailing. He also complained that it was under
powered, as it only had a four cylinder engine, and couldn’t pull off
your hat during a wind storm. The suspension was so stiff that it was
like riding in a buckboard.
So, maybe Frank did get took by them doctors. Although if he got 800
dollars for that old car, that was still, a lot more then what he paid
for it.
Larry

Larry,

I’m off to Minot this morning but checked the email before I go.
Kenny Tooke ended up with the Jeep Pickup you are talking about. He
too said it was so under powered that he hated it so he had me put a
289 Ford V8 in it. I had to use an adapter plate and round up a bunch
of parts in the bush. I had a Buick radiator and on and on. When I
was completely finished, I hit the started and it spun but didn’t
engage the flywheel. I found out I had a flywheel off a 260 V8 and
it’s smaller than a 289 flywheel but bolts on. I had to start over by
pulling the engine back out and doing the whole job again. I changed
all the system over to 12 volt and changed all the tires and even waxed
the body—-all for $300. It seemed OK back then. Larry Tooke
eventually hauled it to Oklahoma and sold it there for $2500. So ends
the lesson.

Dick

Dick
Didn’t Johnny Cash make a song about using one of them adaptor kits.
Seems to me he said he tried to mate a transmission with an engine and
said they mated Ok,
but he couldn’t bolt them together cause all the holes were gone, so he
used one of them adaptor kits,
like you used. Have you ever had to use one before?
Did you end up with the same amount of headlights on each fender?
I guess we are coming to the end of this conversation.
Larry

Larry,

He said the motor was a ’53 and the transmission was a ’73 and when I
tried to put in the bolts, all the holes was gone.

The headlights was another sight—I had two on the left and one on the
right. But when I pulled out the switch all three of um come on. One
piece at a time.

Old Johnny Cash had the same problem. Actually, being somewhat of a
mechanic I have been in the ‘all the holes was gone’ situation before and
it ain’t good! When someone says that it’s exactly the same part—you
better check close.

Dick