Johnny's Ford Station Wagon:

E-Mail from Andra Jean:

Dear Uncle Johnny,

So are you going to be able to go see my parents? Justin and I were looking through old pictures last night and I was telling him about how sometimes your family drove up for Thanksgiving at our house, then I started to tell him about your station wagon and how much I loved it because of the very back seat. I always remember it as having two seats facing each other sideways in the back, but he says he's only heard of them with the back seat facing backwards, not sideways. So which was it?


love
andra

 Uncle Johnny's reply:

Facing each other.

I have seen the ones facing backwards too.

Yes I remember the station wagon. It was a Ford 1980 model. I remember looking at it in a used car lot. I checked everything and one of the door locks didn't work. I left, but in only a few hours the man from the car lot called me and told me he had fixed the door lock if I was still interested. He seemed really anxious to sell it for some reason. We gave $2,000.00 for it in 1990 and with only $650.00 more had it running where almost everything worked. It was an ugly green color. I don't think it was the ugliest car color that ever came out of Detroit, but I'm not aware of an uglier one. When we got it all the door locks worked and most of the paint was still on it. Every time I opened up the hood (which as you will see below was often) we traded fluids. It got grease on me and I got blood on it.

Karyl hated that car passionately. I don't know why - but what man can understand a woman?

The Ford 1980 model station wagon had one of the first electronic carburetors. It was one of those bleeding edge state of the art ventures that Ford eventually got right. After 2 years or so, we exchanged it for a working 1979 carburetor from a wrecking yard. After that the car's computer had lots of wires that the computer thought came from the carburetor, but in actuality they were now just loose wires because the carburetor was not "manual". The older carburetor solved many problems, but created some new and interesting ones. For example, when the car went around a sharp corner at a low speed, the computer wouldn't be told to gun it a little to keep the sloshing fluids from confusing the float and stalling the engine (or something like that). So you had to be smart enough to gun it yourself just as you came out of the corner or it would die. After it did die you had three choices (as I will explain later) of how to re-start it. It was exciting to drive (as you will see below) and had leather seats which were very comfortable.

Most people, of course, just go around a corner. In the adventure car, you started around a corner at the normal speed, but gunned it going out of the corner! It was like a race car except it wasn't very fast and wasn't very responsive and wasn't as much fun to drive and was really way to big to be a race car, but you get the picture.

Anyway, we lived in a community called "Poetry" - out in the country. there was a small store about 3 or 4 miles from home (half way to Terrell). If Karyl stopped there, the car would not re-start so well. (After a few years we discovered or were told that you had to hold the foot feed down all the way to the floor if the car was warm. Pump it once if it was cold. Heaven help you if it was hot)

The man at the store always walked out with K, opened the hood and "held open something" (I think he was holding the carberator mouth open so it wouldn't try to run the choke) as she would tell me - so that the car would start. We met all sorts of friends this way.

Karyl said it always worked for me but that it didn't like her. (She was exaggerating of course. Sometimes it didn't work for me either.) I called it our adventure car. Other people got in their cars and the cars started. We got in the station wagon and it might start and might not. You can see how this added an element of surprise and danger to almost any normally mundane event like starting a car

Other people put their cars in gear and drove to their destination. We drove. Sometimes we got where we intended - sometimes not. I think you can see how that added all sorts of surprise and adventure to our lives. Sometimes we were on the side of the road meeting strange and interesting characters. We met a man who had his own antique repair shop way up in the hills in Missouri for example. He gave us fried chicken and cookies his wife had made. I think they felt sorry for us and our four small childred. He called a tow truck for us while Karyl changed two diapers.. Think how many people drove right by his little house without getting to meet him. I felt truly privileged to get to meet him, because he was really a nice man! We were on our way again in only 3 hours!

Sometimes, such as that day, our little children got diaper changes right there on the side of the road. Sometimes we got trucks to pull us into towns where nice men in jump suits gave us their undivided attention adding parts to the engine that had real sounding names and looked new. Sometimes they took out parts. The car had four fan belts. It would run with just two of them (with no air conditioner - which really worked well when the belt was on). It would also run with just two pistons (but not very well) which I found out when I put the wrong size spark plug wires on. (They kept popping off - the car needed all eight, but would run with as few as two! Pretty versatile if you ask me!)

Once on top of a mountain in Colorado the alternator went out. That means that if the car died, the battery would be uncharged and it would not re-start. So you have to make sure and not let it die (which with that car was sometimes a challenge!)

Anyway, the good news was that in the valley below our mountain was a town. And where there's a town there's a FORD Dealership. But the bad news was that it was already 6:30 so we knew all the car places would be closed. BUT WAIT... It was Colorado time! It was only 5:30 in Colorado. (I've always appreciated them for having earlier time just for such emergencies!) Some nice men in overalls put in a new alternator and we were on our way to our next adventure in only an hour and a half. We got to drink coffee and read the newspaper right there in the waiting room too. They had comics in that little town! We might have easily driven by and missed that little fact!

Once in East Texas after the YAMBURY (sweet potato festival) I found out the station wagon had one of the smallest water hoses I've ever seen. It had a lot of long regular ones, which I had changed, but it also had one tucked away in the engine that I had never seen before which was only 1 1/2 inch long. Unfortunately we stayed to the very end of the YAMBURY late into the night to find out who would win the fiddle contest (Your cousin, Josiah, played too - he was about 9 years old).

Anyway, the reason I found out about the little hose is that the car was over-heating because that 40 cent hose was leaking. We met a nice man in and empty A&P parking lot who went and woke up his brother in law who owned the local hardware store and brought us a little chunk of hose with which I personally fixed that car. They also brought us gallons of water to re-fill the radiator. And neither one of them would take a dime for their time (it helps to have crying babies and an exasperated wife in the car). But that was just how nice those people were. And you can only imagine how many people went through that town without getting to meet these wonderful folks. Why it makes you sad just to think about it!

Once on our way between our house in Poetry and to your house in Broken Arrow, the alternator went out threw a belt as alternators are apt to do. We were on the 75 mile an hour Indian Nation Turnpike between Paris Texas and Tulsa Oklahoma. I walked a couple of miles back to a rest stop/McDonalds, called your mom (Barbie) and had her buy the parts I needed to fix the station wagon. On my way walking back to the car, I met a genuine Oklahoma State Trooper that was nice enough to let me know that it was illegal to be walking along the turnpike. He gave me a ride back to the car and then waited there until your mom, Barbie, arrived. He let Josiah and Caleb see the inside of his car, showed them the siren which they talked him into turning on so they could hear his power so to speak. He showed them the spotlight, and his radio and generally entertained them till your mom arrived. Then I put the new alternator on the car and we left the nice patrol officer to help other people.

Now, lots of people have been on the Indian Nation Turnpike but VERY few of them know how nice these Oklahoma State Trooper can be, especially when they are helping you. (I know for a fact that lots of people try to avoid meeting Oklahoma State Troopers altogether!) But let me tell you it would have been a shame if I had just driven straight to your mom's without ever getting to know this kind man! This was just a long boring drive until our Ford station wagon allowed it the drive to be spiced up with this little incident.

Another thing happened on that very road (we made the trip often since we couldn't afford a real vacation). It was night time and we were driving when all of a sudden the panel lights went out (that was the 1st time that happened - it happened many more times through the years.) What is was is that the brillant engineers at Ford tied the panel lights to the same circuit as the rear lights of the car so that if the rear lights blew the fuse, you in the driver's seat would know it immediately! Now isn't that great car design? Anyway, in only an hour or so beside the road we found the fuse box and replaced the blown fuse and made it almost all the way to your house before it blew again! It was really exciting in that Ford Station Wagon. You just never knew what would happen next!

And we would never get to meet so many wonderful new friends without a car like that station wagon! And Mihai, my friend from Romania who is a wonderful person and a gifted mechanic, came over one day to help me put a new drive chain in the station wagon right there in the Walmart parking lot in Terrell Texas. Lots of people would really be a lot better off if they had a friend like Mihai (pronounced "ME HI"). And I got to spend lots of time with him right there in the parking lot that afternoon (and far into the night). Besides car stuff we discovered lots of things about insects and their love of lights for example. It sorta makes you sad to think about how many people have spent good money to go to exotic destinations in search of adventure. With us it was right outside in the driveway.

Anyway, back to the story. Ok-to get to the drive chain you have to take off all the belts (which we replaced). And some hoses (which we replaced). And the water pump (which we replaced). And of course we had to push the car and steer it under a WalMart parking lot light. And as you might image, steering an automatic steering car without the car running can (and did) cause the steering pump to burst, so we replaced that too. It was lots of fun. Karyl went to the car parts place in Mihai's car about 5 times to get all the parts we needed. (But for some reason she didn't seem to be having as much fun as we were...)

One time when we spent our family vacation with your family (Steve, Barb and kids), Gayle, Don and kids in Uray, Colorado. Everyone left the same day. It was a Saturday. K and I got up later (or had more kids to put in the car or something). By the time we all got in the car everyone else was gone. And the car just made a little clicking noise. Didn't even turn over the motor. I started hitch hiking from the little town of Uray to Montrose. I met a really nice Christian man on his way to a weekend retreat. We had a nice discussion about God, the Bible and all sorts of interesting topics. He left me off at the car parts place in Montrose Colorado where I bought whatever I thought it was that would get the old Station Wagon going again - I believe it was a battery.

Then I started walking back to Uray where my wife and kids were waiting. On the way back, I was picked up my a really neat guy who had all sorts of strange beliefs. The gist of it was that he believed that the American indians were the lost tribes of Israel. He, of course, wanted me to believe all that too. I was extremely polite since I really needed the ride!

Anyway, when he got me back to Uray he insisted on hanging around till it was clear that our car would start (which it did). He was some sort of chiropractor (or something) and he gave K and I both a nice back rub/adjustment. For some reason he thought we were under stress.

Another time we were going to go up to St. Louis, Missouri to my cousin's wedding. Karyl and the kids came to get me in Terrell. We filled up the station wagon with gas and kids, and I went into a convenience store to buy a map. When I got out I saw something leaking under the car. I drove two wheels up on the curb and crawled under and had to fix the radiator hose. I fixed it right there, in only took 2 hours or so. K and the kids got a bit cranky for some reason so we decided maybe the Lord didn't want us to go way up North after all. I felt like the Lord spoke to me often using that car. Can you image any other family with their own EPHOD? This Ford Station Wagon was really unique!

One of our trips home from Colorado we met a wonderful lady who wanted to give us money. She came bursting into the Dairy Queen where we were refueling the kids with fatty foods and announced very loudly, "WHO OWNS THE GREEN STATION WAGON?" (She was almost in tears!)

I admitted it was me.

She came over to our table and with shaking voice said she had just bumped into our station wagon, but she had insurance and she would pay for the damage. She said she had just barely bumped a fender. I said, "Oh, don't worry about it."

She said, "Aren't you going to take a look?" I said, "Lady, I don't think you could hurt that car!" I finished my hamburger, loaded up the kids and took off (we came back for Karyl after only 1/2 mile down the road…. (Well, I HAD counted the kids, I just forgot to count the adults.)

Now, I ask you. What if I had had a nice new car that the nice lady bumped?

What a headache! Police, car insurance adjusters, body shops, new paint, ...where would all that end? But the Station Wagon? Are you kidding? One of the really neat things about driving that old car was that we didn't have to worry about it! And on top of that we got to meet a nice lady and let her keep her money too! In one 20 minute break! I guess you can see how the other people at the Dariy Queen proably felt jealous.

After a while for some reason Karyl, who seems pretty level headed in most areas, just refused to drive the station wagon any more. I started using it to drive to work. One day as I was going about 55 miles an hour on a farm to market road some part fell out of the engine. I heard it bounce loudly on the pavement before bouncing off the road. I stopped the old station wagon and looked for the part, but never found it. I opened the hood and looked for anything missing and didn't see anything (and believe me, I knew very well what the engine looked like, having traded fluids with it many times through the years) Anyway, I just shut the hood, jumped back in and drove to work. I never did find out what had fallen out of the car and neither the car nor me ever missed the fallen part. And you can see how a thing like that can give you something to ponder if you for some reason can't sleep at night. I know what you're thinking, Andra. Where can you get a car like that one. Well, you'll just have to believe me - it was't all completely perfect - I have't told you about any of the downsides to owning such a wonderful vehicle. For one thing we got stared at a lot. I think it was envy...

Well, this is getting pretty long, so I'll tell just one more little thing that happened. One day it flooded as it is wont to do in this part of the country. I tried several routes to get to work (in Greenville, Texas) and when I finally made it the parking lot at E-Systems was pretty flooded. As I was driving around to a parking place I came to the end of one isle and as I turned too sharply and the right front of the car went totally under water and of course it stopped running. (Since everything was under water, it was hard to tell any boundaries - or so that is the excuse I am using for driving into a ditch). Anyway, I left it there with the front half submerged after crawling out from the driver side door and stepping into 6 inches or so of water. And so I walked on into work.

That morning I heard Joe and Andy talking about the rain and the flooded parking lot. It seems that Andy had seen an ugly green station wagon half submerged right there in our parking lot. I just let them walk by. I wasn't going to supply any unneeded information that might damage a reputation!

Around lunch time the water had gone down as water does, so I crept out, opened the hood and dried out things that I thought should be dry. The station wagon then started up and I parked it "properly" so to speak.

You know what happened to that car eventually? You might find it hard to believe, but I actually gave the car away. I gave it to the Union Valley Volunteer Fire Department as a donation for their auction. ("Do you want us to come and haul it?" "No. I'll drive it to you." "You mean it runs? You're giving us a car that runs?" "Well, there's two schools of thought about that. "My wife seems to think that it is inconvenient for it to die every time you go slowly around a corner...")

Yes the station wagon was a real adventure car. But unfortunately Karyl did not always enjoy the adventures. (I still don't know what her problem was.)