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Gary and Friends,I suppose it’s time for a car story with a happy ending.  Back in
1978, I was driving into Bottineau and had been looking for a Mustang
for Mom to drive after she had asked me to find one for her.  As I was
driving by the empty lot where people used to park cars for sale,  Pete
Klingbeil was just turning in driving a pretty nice blue ’68 Mustang
fastback.  I looked back and he was putting a ‘For Sale’ sign in the
windshield so I turned around and went back and looked it over and asked
the price.  He wanted $1000 and I had just been paid for doing a couple
paint jobs so dug out my wallet and counted what I had–$830.  He had a
chance to buy a black ’70 Mustang fastback if he could round up the cash
quickly.  I handed him the cash and got the title and the deal was
done.  Mom drove the car to work at Security State Bank and really liked
her car.  When she died,  I kept the Mustang kind of in memory of her
and how much she liked it.  Pete has asked to buy it back for at least
20 years now every time we run into each other.  It was actually his
first car and he really wanted it back.  As we get older,  things take
different priorities and I began to think about what really is important
and Pete having his old Mustang back is more important than me keeping
it.  I have another ’68 Mustang that is of greater cash value and even a
more desirable model as it’s a red GT with a black interior.  It came
from the factory with a 4 barrel, four speed, and posi-trac
differential.  My son and I decided that we would sell Pete back his car
and restore the red Mustang and keep that one.  So after 36 years,  Pete
got his car back.  It’s in nearly the same exact condition as it was
when I bought it from him as we only put a few miles on it and it has
never been out over night or in the rain in the last 30+ years.  Pete
was smiling from ear to ear and said he never thought this day would
come.  He plans to do a complete restoration and keep his Mustang for
life.  He drove it back to his home in Langdon and called to say he had
no problems whatsoever.  There is a car story with a happy ending.
Thanks Gary!

Dick

 

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 Blog (130) posted on June 12, 2008

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Gary and Friends,Most of the folks reading these messages will probably remember Axel
Johnson. He was my Grandpa Hans Johnson’s older brother and worked at
Dales cleaning and watching things at night. There are some things folks
may not have ever heard about Axel. He was married to a young lady by
the name of Mary Olson, who died in the flu epidemic in 1918. I think
she was only about 20 when she died. She is buried in the old cemetery
southeast of our place on the corner of  Peterson’s land. Axel was
single for many years before he remarried to Bernice Kelly in the late
1930s. During that time he was a local game warden and one time chased
an illegal trapper until the guy climbed a tree. Axel told him to come
down because he was going to ‘yail’, as Axel would have said in his
Norwegian brogue! The guy said he wasn’t coming down so Axel tied his
dog to the tree [mean dog] and then went to Bob Lambs and borrowed an ax
and chopped the tree down and took the guy to jail! He used to tell the
story about when he was in the hardware store in Dunseith and saw a guy
jump into the back of his old pickup to steal a case of beer that Axel
had bought for the ‘fort of yuly’, as he would say. He grabbed a steel
scoop shovel and whacked the guy over the head with it. He used to tell
us, ” It roong like da bell on da catlic church”. One other story he
liked to tell, was when the snow got so deep in the creek coulee east of
the farm, that the rabbits ate the top branches off the trees and left
them bare. He said the next fall some hunters from Minnesota asked him
what happened to the trees along the creek? He said,”I told them it was
the hungry rabbits last vinter, and they said, what the hell kind of
rabbits you got up here!” He had the loudest laugh and ended most of his
stories with a laugh! I couldn’t get to the end of most of his stories
without busting out laughing! He was born in Norway, as was my Grandpa
and their sister Louise. Axel and Grandpa never really lost the brogue,
it was fun to hear them talk! Grandpa said, “By the time I learned to
say ‘telewision’ they changed it to ‘t-we’! I have a hundred more
stories of Axel and Grandpa Hans, but maybe later!!  Again, thank you Gary!

Dick

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From Ellen Graff Myrick (58):

Thank you Ellen.  Hopefully we can get those other 3 identified.  Gary

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