Joining us Saturday at the museum was the Mooneyes Americruise contingent and participants of the annual local car show. The Starbird clan played host to us all that evening with live entertainment and a barbeque. It was quite an event-and our little buddy Nick managed to make it all come to a stop. There we were, in a big field next to a beautiful lake, surrounded by street rods and with a band playing a song titled "Tailgate Party at the Wal-Mart Parking Lot" in the background. The barbeque pit was stacked high with buffalo burgers and manned by Midwestern guys wearing cowboy hats and real big belt buckles. And then (I cringe as I even say it), you'd never guess, my vegetarian buddy asked for a burger without the buffalo. You could have heard a pin drop. "You mean you don't want no meat?" they all asked in unison. While Nick munched on his mustard and lettuce sandwich I heard someone whisper, "Its okay, he's from California."
As day three dawned we were off to sample the hospitality of the Hot Rod Garage in Sand Springs, Oklahoma. After a tour of Jim Smith's first-rate shop we were on our way to Tulsa when we suffered our first serious problem. Somewhere along the line the electric fan had pitched some blades and the resulting imbalance created quite a vibration. When a couple more blades came off, the motor jammed and burned up (the circuit breaker was way too big). As this was a Sunday, and we had a somewhat unusual fan, the option of finding a replacement was out. Our only choice was to have one shipped to a stop down the line.
As always, Jack Chisenhall and sons, John and Landis, were bringing up the rear of the Vintage Air pack to help out anyone stranded. Needless to say, they found their stragglers and kindly stopped to lend a hand. By the time the '33 was buttoned up and ready to go the rest of the group was long gone, but Jack assured us he knew where we were going. Now, as anyone who knows him will agree, Jack is a great guy, but he can be, how should I say it, somewhat "navigationally challenged." To better explain...some question how the former Air Force jet-jockey found the ground after a flight. Nonetheless, off we went. It was during this little jaunt we learned something else about Jack; his turn signals are more often than not an indication of the last turn made, not a signal of the turn he's about to complete. It got to the point that Nick and I started betting on if we really were going to turn the way his signals were flashing; that cost me a full-on vegetarian dinner.
When we arrived in Tulsa we joined up with the Hot Rod Power Tour at the City Plex center. In contrast to our back roads meandering, the Power Tour seemed to be a thrash from one stop to the next as people were eager to get parked and set up. With 2,500 cars in attendance there was a ton of cool stuff to see (like a turbo-charged straight-eight Buick), but I was amped up for our next stop-West Mineral, Kansas, and Big Brutus, the world's second largest electric shovel. Yeah, it sounds hokey, but what a sight. If you appreciate things mechanical, you've got to love Big Brutus.
A few miles down the road and we pulled into Rusty Jackson's new shop, Odd Rod Creations in Carl Junction, Missouri. An extremely talented young builder, he and his entire family welcomed the tour. Then, after lunch, it was on the road again to the Ozark Empire Fairgrounds in Springfield, Missouri, where we'd once again join the Power Tour for their evening festivities.
On day five we were bound for Gateway International Raceway in St. Louis with a lunch stop at the headquarters of Bob Chandler's Big Foot. We were still running without a fan, and though the roadster had not yet boiled over, we decided we were pushing our luck. So we left the dragstrip early to get to the motel and install the fan that had arrived the night before, but that was still in the trunk.