"I WAS THE STAR OF THE SHOW"
by Vernoy Willis, CHS "50
Two or three things came to my mind, Mil, after
reading your recent post---
1. I had a very nice, modern bike at beginning of War. It had a compartment between handle bars and seat for a battery operated horn. I was the star of the show. We would use my bike as a command car and pretend to be sending morse code messages. Took a little pretending, but we were good at that.
2. Our store was next door to auto repair shop so we had some good items to use. We took our handle bars off and used old salvage steering wheels on our bikes. It took a little engineering but we finally perfected the method. Lots of fun riding down the street on a bike with a steering wheel. (and a morse code radio)
3. The little round green reflectors, for our mud flaps, came at a premium.
4. We learned to ride the bikes backwards. Sitting on handle bars facing the back of the bike. Kind of like driving with a mirror.
5. Had a good friend stationed at Cannon. Sometimes he could scrounge up a few pieces of a windshield of a B-24. Made great, hearts, and other cutie pie things to wear on a chain around our necks... OR give it to the cute little blonde next door.
6. Had to disassemble our rear wheel brakes and wash with gasoline, put new grease in the chamber, wash the tires, new paint job at least once month and away we would go.
Today's kids would think all of this is nonsense.
7. Oh yes, if you drove one end of your handle bar into the ground, the other end pointing up, drop a lit firecracker into the upward pointed handle bar, then drop a good size marble, or steelie, into the handle bar on top of the firecracker - then bang! you had a small minature cannon. Lucky to be alive.
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"MY SECOND-HAND BIKE COST FIVE DOLLARS"
by Robert Stebbins, CHS '51
Mil, Vernoy did a good job ---he jogged my memory.
I remember some of the guys had bicycles with that battery compartment. Their bikes may even have had fenders. My second hand bIke that I had in 1946-47, I think cost $5.00, and was not quite as fancy. It lacked fenders, lights, and a horn, and had a chain that frequently came off. It had been repainted a dark blue.
Without fenders, it wasn't much of a rainy day bike, but as you know, we usually didn't have to worry much about rain often in Clovis. $5.00 was a lot of money in those days when I was setting pins at the Playmoor Bowling Alley (between the Mesa Theater and Busy Bee Restaurant) for Mr. Murray for 5 cents a line.
There was no air conditioning there in those days and very little cross ventilation in the "pits" behind the muscle-operated pinsetting machines It got pretty hot on a summer day when the bowling teams were hotly competing.
I remember one bIke ride that I took. As you will recall, the old Post Office at Mitchell & 4th had an elevated loading dock and a ramp that lead West down from the back of the post office and exited to Mitchell.
At the bottom of the ramp on Mitchell, you had to make a quick 90 degree turn to the right while trying to avoid any cars that might have been coming around the corner from the intersection on the left.
The post office officials probably discouraged bicyclists like me from riding down the ramp, but we used to sneak one in now and then. You know how the government was.
Well, one day I successfully launched myself down the ramp from the platform on my bike. I had, I thought, carefully looked to the left toward the intersection to make sure it was safe to go. However, as luck would have it, a car came around the corner and by the time I had reached the bottom of the ramp and the street and before I could turn, the two of us collided.
The driver stopped immediately, and I assured him that I was not seriously injured. I may may have had a bruise or two, but no broken bones. Fortunately, in those days drivers didn't drive as fast as they do today. The car only "grazed" me, but my poor bike was put out of operation for good with a bent frame and broken wheel.
That's my bike story. Today, that kind of incident probably would lead to ambulance chasing lawyers and a never ending lawsuit for who knows how much money, even though I was probably at fault.
But, we lived in different times in those days. We took responsibility (or kept our mouth shut) if we were at fault, but today there are much different rules for the "ball game of life".
Anyway, that's my bike story. Feel free to use it any way you wish.
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FOR MIL'S PLACE
Vernoy Willis, CHS '50
Robert Stebbins, CHS '51
10/27/16
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