I Grew Up Here

Discussion in 'Other Reminiscences' started by Frank Sanoica, Nov 30, 2016.

  1. Frank Sanoica

    Frank Sanoica Supreme Member
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    I may have posted this before, but have forgotten; too many different forums, maybe. These pics are circa 1970, of my home and birthplace where we lived after buying the place from my retiring parents. These are Polaroid "Swinger" pics (remember those?), so far from today's quality. Taken from up in the attic, the garage my Dad built with help from his kid brother Jim, about a year before I was born. My Folks moved to Michigan in 1966, and Sue & I were left the responsibility of keeping up the place where I had been born. A "car nut", as you all know by now, the '63 Falcon has a 430 cu. in. Lincoln engine in it, 4-speed transmission, no obvious way to tell. Real "sleeper"! '65 Mustang I ordered new in Aug. 1964. 1958 T-Bird was my wife's daily driver. My Dad wanted the place because of it's "side-drive", which meant a 5-foot wider lot than the others, 35'!

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    View from within the garage. The Mustang was "Vintage Burgundy", a metallic Maroon, very beautiful. God only knows how many trials and tribulations I underwent in that garage. Last few years I had equipped it with an air compressor, welder, oil stove, hoisting facility. Engines and transmissions were routinely "jerked out", I tried to not make too much noise, surely the neighbors objected, though they feared to voice such aggravation: I had during one summer extracted an offensive large lilac bush from the ground at my wife's request, using 1/4 stick of dynamite pushed deep into it's root system. WHUMP! Not loud, but dirt and gravel were propelled clear over onto the neighbor's driveway!

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  2. Patsy Faye

    Patsy Faye Supreme Member
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    Love those old cars Frank - not sure I'd want you as a neighbour though :p :D
     
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  3. Frank Sanoica

    Frank Sanoica Supreme Member
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    @Patsy Faye
    Agreed and understood! They were no doubt glad when I left the area. My type of hobbying requires a big lot with the work being done right in the center of it, as I have now, 2 acres. 90 in MO was even better!
    Frank
     
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  4. Patsy Faye

    Patsy Faye Supreme Member
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    @Frank Sanoica - great to hear ! :)
    Just be careful with that dynamite :p
     
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  5. Frank Sanoica

    Frank Sanoica Supreme Member
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    @Patsy Faye
    Well, I cannot tell whether you think I jest and make this up. It's true, however. Back in those days, one could legally buy dynamite in any well-equipped rural hardware store, which is exactly what I did. Farmers used it extensively to clear land of trees. I learned about it once at about age 13 or so, while visiting my Dad's Uncle Joe, in Michigan, who happened to be using dynamite while we were there. The sticks were about 1-inch in diameter and 8 inches long, consisting of waxed heavy red paper, with the ends crimped shut. Relatively soft inside, the stick could be squeezed and indented easily by a finger. He showed us how to crimp the cap, having inserted about 3 feet of fuse into it, then pierced a stick at it's center, at an angle, inserted the cap about 2 inches deep, then secured the fuse about the stick with rubber bands. He drove a thick wrecking bar into the sandy soft soil beneath a fairly large tree, then removed it, and inserted the loaded stick down in the hole, pushing it down with the bar.

    When he lit the fuse, our inclination was to run, but he laughed, walking slowly away, the fuse burning at a rate of 47 seconds per foot. About a hundred feet away, we waited, then, no explosion, just a "whump", felt as a light thump to one's chest, and that tree just rolled over, as nice as pie! Of course, he explained where he obtained the dynamite, Baroda Hardware, Baroda being a small farm town nearby.

    A number of years later, probably at least 4, my high school friend and I drove to Baroda. The guy there was not surprised at all, at our purchase request. All he wanted to know was the intended use, whether we were familiar with it's safe use, our age, and there we had it! True story! A whole 'nuther chapter relating to it can be told, if anyone cares to hear it.
    Frank
     
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    Last edited: Nov 30, 2016
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  6. Ken Anderson

    Ken Anderson Senior Staff
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    I can attest to that. Either my father hid his very well or he never bought more than he planned on using on a given day, but we found my uncle's dynamite one day. It was just stored in the barn.
     
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  7. Frank Sanoica

    Frank Sanoica Supreme Member
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    @Ken Anderson
    Seriously? How did you dispose of it, if you did? Or are you harboring it for perhaps another serious "encounter"? Average folk are "Hollywood-acclimated", wherein John Wayne tosses a vial of nitroglycerine at the bad guys. Dynamite is in reality very little more dangerous than black powder, available today at any gun shop.
     
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