Drive-In Movie Tour

August 21, 2004 - Page 2

At the drive-in, the cars were parked in a cluster, folks situated their lawn chairs, talked about the old cars, saw a couple of shooting stars and watched the movies, The Bourne Supremacy and Cat Woman.  (It was the first time Norma had ever seen shooting stars and they were spectacular!)  As the night air became colder and wetter, condensation began covering everything and everybody.  Slowly, the chairs disappeared as everyone moved into their cars halfway through the second feature. 

The real excitement began as Bill and Liz decided to call it a night during the second feature and drove away, only to have their ‘34 come to a stop.  Bill quickly gathered a few of the fellows who pushed the car back into a space, let the owners of the theater know that the car would be spending the night and grabbed a ride back to the motel. In the morning, Bill, Frankie and Dave ate an early breakfast and headed back to the drive-in.  The folks who had stayed overnight at the motel joined them later.  When the guys began the fiddling and head scratching, the ladies got the lawn chairs out and moved into the shade of the movie screen to solve the world’s problems.  After several hours, a trip to a car parts store and more puzzlement, the ladies were ready to have the car towed, but there was one more thing to try.  Lo and behold, the car started and we were off to a late afternoon lunch at an Italian restaurant in town.  The remaining crowd of ten was seated at pushed-together tables near the back of the restaurant after only a short wait and had a leisurely meal, talking about the events that had occurred that weekend.  It was a pleasant drive home down Route 50 and they split off one by one waving and heading to their individual homes.

 (Note by John Girman: The NVRG crew did yeoman’s work to get the ‘34 back on the road.  Bill and Frank did the “heavy lifting” by swapping out the distributor.  Dave and I located a well-stocked car parts store that was open in a small town on a Sunday morning to purchase a coil secondary wire.  Hank and Bill stretched and shaped a small spring used to provide pressure on the contact in the distributor.  Most importantly, all the guys provided diagnostic and mechanical support so that no Ford was left behind.)

Created 01/28/08